I didn't think that I would be nervous to reunite with Eleanor until I parked on the curb outside of her house. I've known Eleanor since I was fourteen and she helped me through the hardest time of my life. My dad, at no fault of his own, had been arrested for something he didn't do and I was thrown into the foster system.

She helped me make sense of the things that were happening and acted as a mentor figure for me throughout my teen years. I was excited to see her again after not having seen each other, or spoken outside of the Instagram comment section, in a year.

However, as I stared at the front door, I wondered if Casey would be there too? I knew he didn't live with his older sister, but he could be visiting. He lived nearby, it was possible. My weird relationship with Casey was the reason I wasn't close with Eleanor anymore.

We were the best of friends all the way through high school. He was the most empathetic, smart, and protective person I'd ever met. Just like his sister. And what I needed most when I was fourteen was to feel protected. He made me feel safe and he reminded me that although there is a lot of bad in the world, there is a lot of good too.

I thought he cared about me as much as I adored him, but when he went to Massachusetts to study at Harvard, it was like he fell off the face of the Earth.

Phone calls were distracted and short, texts came off as bored and uninterested. I knew that having a long distance best friend would be hard, but I didn't think that it would be impossible. I thought we'd both fight for our friendship, because it meant so much to us. But when the phone calls faded into nothing and my texts got left on read, I realized that maybe it only meant so much to me.

It had been six years since we'd spoken at all other than a quick small talk conversation at Eleanor's wedding four years ago, and the only updates I got about him were through his sister's social media. I knew he graduated from Harvard really early and then even picked up some national attention when he received his doctorate degree last year, at only twenty-three. Eleanor posted last year that he got a job at an environmental lab downtown and had moved back home.

Eleanor was always clearly confused and disappointed that my and Casey's friendship didn't last, but I never asked her why. I didn't think she even knew either. I didn't want to cling to a friendship that wasn't viable anymore, so I never asked her about him. If he wanted me out of his life, I had to take that hurt and accept it rather than annoy Eleanor with it. But it was exhausting to be around her without asking her a thousand questions about how Casey was doing and why he ghosted me during freshman year of college.

So, slowly, I lost contact with her too.

Until today.

I wasn't prepared to give Eleanor the news about Shiloh, to inform her that she had a long lost little sister in the world, but I knew that it had to come from me, straight from the source. I'd spent all of my free time that week doing research, corroborating Shiloh's story, and from all of the sources I could find, I was all but certain that she was telling the truth.

I just had to knock on that front door and give Eleanor the news.

It took longer than I was willing to admit to give myself enough of a pep talk to get out of the car and start walking across the street to the house.

I had been to the house a few times, and the brown stone and beige paneling of the upper middle class house looked familiar. They had a nicely landscaped lawn with a flower bed of purple and white flowers, some organized bushes, and a cement snail that stared at me as I approached. Through the slats of the blinds on the wide front window, I could see a cartoon playing on the TV inside.

I knocked on the looming black door three times, held my breath, and waited.

There wasn't much of a wait until it was swinging open and Eleanor's familiar face stood across from me, only the screen door separating us.

Nervously, I watched as her large brown eyes widened at the sight of me, some stray brown hairs flailing around her face as she rushed to open the screen door. "Josie! It's so good to see you!"

As if I was the last person on Earth, she hurried out the door and wrapped me in a strong embrace. She smelled like sweat and dirty diapers, but I was excited to hug her back. Her affectionate hug felt so familiar and comforting to me, I immediately felt myself relaxing in her presence.

"It's good to see you too, El," I responded calmly.

"Well, come on in," she ushered me inside. "You want anything to drink?"

"No, I'm good for now. Thanks," I responded. We walked through a laminate foyer into the homey living room of the house where the cartoons were captivating Eleanor's daughter, Auden, who must have been two at the time. I stopped coming around at about the same time that they were signing the adoption papers. She didn't even acknowledge us walking into the room at all, the only thing she cared about was her Paw Patrol.

"This is such a nice surprise," Eleanor continued smiling her white grin, dimples poking into the smooth surface of her cheeks. "How have you been doing?"

"Um, I'm doing pretty well. Still working at the Kripke Journal and everything. I got a cat," I stated. I kind of wanted to just jump into the reason why I came over, but I also thought it might be easier if we have some small talk first to reacquaint ourselves with each other before moving forward.

"I saw that on your Instagram, she's adorable," she said. "I've been trying to convince Micah for so long that we should get a pet, but I haven't gotten through to him yet. We have this big back yard, it would be perfect for a puppy. Oh, he's going to be so bummed out that he's not here to see you, but he had to work today."

"On a Saturday?" I asked in surprise, although it was quite hypocritical of me because I worked on weekends all the time. I thought it was different for me though, since I didn't have a wife and kid waiting for me at home. Only a cat, who really didn't care if I lived or died.

"Yeah, he's working on this big case at work and it's been really demanding," she responded. "He thinks they'll win and soon, the last hearing will be over so we'll have him back home again. Auden, can you say hi Josie?"

The toddler ignored her mother completely, as if she didn't say anything at all.

I noticed a large princess castle in the corner of the room by the TV with an assortment of dolls and accessories sprinkling the floor around it and inside the many floors. Eleanor's house looked mostly clean, except for some toy tornadoes splayed about in some areas. I could only imagine how difficult it was to keep up with a two year old.

"This TV is melting her brain, I swear," Eleanor said with a shake of her head. "But an hour a day probably won't do too much damage. If Paw Patrol wasn't on, she'd be really happy to see you too."

I knew that probably wasn't true. Auden didn't know who I was, which was a really sad thought because a lifetime ago, I was so close to Eleanor that she felt like an older sister to me and now, I hadn't even met the daughter she'd had for an entire year. "She's adorable."

"Oh, she's really leaning into those terrible twos. Learned how to say no and it's killing me," she admitted with a tired laugh. "Anyway, what brings you over for a visit? I mean, I'm totally happy if you're just popping your head in to say hi, but I assume there's a reason."

"Yeah. Um, there is something I need to talk to you about. I wish I was coming over under better circumstances, but I have some news for you."

"Oh," her face fell a little bit as she leaned against the back of the couch. "Is something wrong?"

"Not really..." I trailed off, wishing that I had spent more time rehearsing how I was going to give her the news. I thought it'd be easier to just improvise, but that was clearly a dumb decision. It was Saturday, I had almost an entire week to prepare for this moment, and still I was drawing a blank. "But I don't really know how to tell you this."

"You're freaking me out a little bit," she stated as her smile faltered again. "Do you want to go sit?"

"Yes," I said quickly. "That'd be good."

I followed Eleanor into the attached dining room where she sat at the edge of the six seat table. I took the seat at the other side of the corner and began ringing my hands against each other again, this time resting them under the table on my lap.

"So you remember those articles I wrote forever ago about Silas?" I started off.

Eleanor nodded. "Yeah, kind of."

"Somebody found them recently and asked for a meeting," I continued nervously. "Turns out, this girl is claiming to be Silas's daughter. It's not one hundred percent confirmed, but her story adds up in a lot of ways."

"Oh. Wow," she blinked a few times, looking confused about how she was supposed to react to that news. "I guess that's not really surprising, is it? That me and Casey aren't the only ones. How old is she?"

"Eighteen."

She nodded a few times, her mind clearly racing as her brown eyebrows furrowed into her forehead, creating valleys and mountains on her pale skin. "And she is talking to you because she wants you to report about it?"

"Yes," I confirmed. "And if it's true, I want to write the piece and finally expose him for the creep that he is. I'll leave you out of it, of course."

"Does Silas know that she exists?"

"She said he does. Do you have a lot of contact with him?"

"No, not really. But he answers my calls," she said with a shrug. "I don't know if he'd admit to it or not if I asked."

"Well, I know a story like this might really affect you and if I could stop it, I would try if that's what you wanted. But if I tell this girl that I won't print the story, I'm sure she'll just go to somebody else."

"Honestly, I'm surprised that it's taken this long for Silas to get caught up in a public scandal. It was inevitable. If you can, just keep me and Casey out of it. I know if my name gets connected to Silas, my past could get stirred up and it's just best kept in the past. Case already hates the attention that he gets, I know he won't want to be involved publicly either."

"I'll do what I can," I promised her as my throat started to tighten in knots at the mention of her brother. "I know that people will go digging for information, so be prepared."

"Thank you for coming to give me the heads up," Eleanor said. Although she was still processing the information, I was surprised at how calm she was about the whole thing. Maybe she'd been expecting her connection to Silas to eventually cause her issues, so she was already prepared. Or the new sibling thing was numbing her to the situation. "Did you tell this girl about us?"

"Not yet," I said. "And I don't have to. If you're interested, though, I could set up a meeting or give her your number. This is a really weird situation, I don't really know what the best thing to do is."

"I need some time to process for now, and I should talk to Casey about what we want to do," she decided slowly. At another mention of her brother, my eyes cast down to the table.

"What about Jay? Do you still talk to him?" I wondered curiously. From what I remembered, Eleanor spoke to her half brother every once in a while, but they weren't close by any stretch of the imagination.

"Yeah, we keep in touch," she confirmed with a nod. "I won't involve him yet, he just found out his wife is pregnant."

"I don't know how he feels about his dad, but it would be nice if we could do a DNA test between Jay and Shiloh, so I don't have to drag you into this," I thought out loud.

"Her name is Shiloh?"

"Yes."

"Do you know if she was raised well?" she wondered curiously.

I could sense a concern in her eyes, probably worried that Shiloh fell into a similar fate as she found herself in as a result of Silas's affair with her mom.

"I'm not sure. It sounded like she was close to her mom, but I didn't ask very many questions," I said with a helpless shrug.

Anxiously chewing on her thumb, she finally said, "This is going to be a shit storm."

"Yeah," I agreed with her. Although a story like this would affect her much more than it would affect me, I was also aware of the possible dangers that came with writing an article like this. What if Silas used his influence to ruin my career? Smear my name and credibility? Who knows what he was capable of. "A total shit storm."

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Song: What Am I Doing to Me - Anna Shoemaker