Andrés Moreno desaparecido, I type. This time, I find a few sites that are more than lists of dead people. One site in particular is a whole newspaper article from 1998 with the name included in one of the paragraphs. I click Translate this page, and after a few minutes of deciphering badly translated English, I figure this is what it says:
After a lifetime of believing he’d been born to a marine officer and his wife, Facundo García now knows he was born on July 7, 1976, in an illegal prison in Banfield in the province of Buenos Aires, where his mother, Caterina Rizzi, was being held. His father, Andrés Moreno, was seized on a crowded city bus on June 17, 1976. Rizzi, who was eight months pregnant at the time, was taken from their house two days later in the middle of the night. The young woman gave birth to her child with the assistance of doctor Jorge Bergés. The baby was delivered, still bloody and wrapped in newspaper, to marine officer Aníbal García and his wife Esmerelda Perez. The doctor then signed a false birth certificate claiming that the child was born in his private clinic in Quilmes and that Perez was the biological mother.
My heart is pounding, and I feel sick to my stomach. I scan the rest of the article and find the word Canada, followed by a few quotes:
Today, the young man’s biological parents remain “missing.” However, more than two decades after their disappearance, Facundo García has discovered other relatives and has been welcomed into a large extended family with members as far away as Canada.
“I can’t express what it was like to meet my biological grandparents, aunts and uncles for the first time,” says the young man. “They’ve been actively looking for me for years, and when I see my smile on their faces, or my habitual gestures made by their hands, I realize I’ve been hoping to find them too. I just never knew it would be possible.”
As for the couple who raised him, he says, “I don’t hate them. It’s the deception that hurts. I’ve always been honest with them, and all my life they’ve been lying to me.”
I slump back in my chair and blink at the screen. I can’t imagine what it must feel like to be Facundo García. No matter how bad my life gets, it could never compare to his.
And no matter how much I want to honor Alison’s memory by donating money to the soup kitchen, I can’t use the money in the bandoneón case for that, knowing how much Facundo has lost and that I’m holding back one of the few gifts his parents can give him now.
A tap on my shoulder makes me jump.
“I wondered if I’d find you here,” Jeanette tugs on the straps of her loaded backpack. “I finished sooner than expected. How are you doing?”
“Uh, fine,” I say, closing the window and logging out before she can see what I’ve been reading. I grab my own backpack and stand up.
“I can wait a bit, if you like,” she says, appraising my empty bag. I haven’t even looked for books yet, but I don’t feel like it now anyway. How can I think about reading when my own aunt is trying to pull my family apart?
I clasp my hands together to stop them from shaking. “It’s okay. I’ve still got a few books at home to read. Mostly I wanted to check my email.” I meet her eyes. “I got a message from Mom.”
“Oh?”
We walk to the main exit in silence. Outside, she asks what the email said.
“She thinks I’m angry at her because we never actually finish a conversation these days.” I kick a stone in my path. Hard. “She probably assumes I’ve asked you to take the phone away every evening.”
Jeanette sighs. “Look, Ellie, I’ve told your mother exactly what I’ve told you: that I think she needs professional help, and that I think you need some space. I asked her to stop telling you all her problems and suggested she look for a psychologist.”
I feel like shoving her against the wall and demanding that she use her brain. “If you’re so worried about her, why make everything worse by making her think I’m mad at her?”
“Hold on there,” she says, stopping to face me. “I didn’t make her think anything. After you and I discussed the whole mental-health thing, I told her what we had talked about and requested that she not rely on you for emotional support. From there, she jumped to her own conclusions.”
“Of course she did,” I say. “She probably thinks I’m the one who decided she’s crazy and that I don’t want anything to do with her.” It sounds illogical when it comes out of my mouth, but I know my mother.
“If she thinks that, then it’s not because I haven’t explained.” Jeanette bites her lip and is silent for a second. “You know, you could have refused to give me the phone. I wouldn’t have forced you to give it to me.”