Elijah looked around at the homestyle dinner that was displayed across the small table in his apartment. He had decided to live near his old college campus that he had graduated from in order to stay near his friends that he’d made in the past 4 years. Elijah took one of the seats at the table and looked around at the three empty chairs left. Two of the three empty chairs should be filled, but his parents were running very late. Their plane was supposed to land 2 hours ago so he couldn’t think of a good reason that they weren’t here yet. He looked at his watch to check the time, 7:35. 

Something is definitely wrong, Elijah’s parents were never late. He reached for his phone and called his parents 3 times each, neither of them picked up. Plus, their Life360 wasn’t working. Elijah was getting very wary so he decided he would wait another 10 minutes and then he was going to clean up dinner and head to bed. 

As the long arrow of the clock reached the number 9 he began to clean up the feast he had prepared 3 hours ago. When Elijah was finished, he sprawled out on the brown, leather futon in his living room and turned on the TV. By default, it went straight to the news station.

“That’s odd.”, he thought to himself. The TV only went straight to the news when there was a really big story. He went to change the channel but he noticed the red bar at the bottom of the screen that read, “BREAKING NEWS: FLIGHT 298 HAS CRASHED IN AN OPEN PLAIN IN SCRANTON, PENNSYLVANIA”. Elijah’s  heart dropped to his knees. He reread the statement several times just to make sure he had understood it correctly. This had to be a prank, there’s no way this is real…right? The flight number checked out with the one his parents were on but maybe this flight came from a different airline? Nope, his parents flew with Southwest Airlines and sure enough so was the crashed plane. Elijah ran for the phone in the kitchen and dialed the number to Southwest Airlines customer service line that he had pulled up on his phone. It went straight to voicemail. He tried again. Voicemail again. He tried a third time. Voicemail for a third time. Elijah dialed and redialed several more times until he finally burst and crumpled to the ground. This couldn’t be happening. This isn’t the sort of thing that happens to him, this happens in movies and to other people. He decided that there was no use of trying to call the airline as many people would be trying to do the same so, instead he ran back to the living room and paced in front of the TV. Elijah figured they had to announce the passengers at some point in the story. He sat down on the futon and got ready for a long night.

The sun shone through the windows of Elijah’s apartment. He was still in the exact same spot he was last night when he readied himself to watch the news all night. He woke with a start as the kitchen phone rang out, interrupting the chattering of the news.

 Elijah ran across the living room and into the kitchen, reached out for the phone and said eagerly, “Yes???”.

“ Hello sir, is this Elijah Smith?”, the voice of a woman asked timidly.

“Yes, and who is this?”, he responded with anticipation forming in his stomach.

“My name is Elizabeth, I’m calling about your parents.”, she seemed very nervous and sounded as if she didn’t want to be making this call. Elijah’s heart dropped, he remained silent and waited for Elizabeth to speak again.

“I’m sure you saw the news, but one of our planes was in a horrible crash last night. I’m so sorry…your parents, Walter and Marianne Smith, were on that flight. There were no survivors.”.

Silence. A silence so loud that Elijah thought he could hear the atoms in the air buzzing around. 

“Thank you for the call.”, Elijah said as he hung up the phone and walked back to the futon. This couldn’t be real. There’s no way. He had just seen his parents two months ago. And how did the plane crash? There wasn’t a storm or anything similar. Elijah decided he would call family members to inform them of what happened now. Right now, he was in shock. If he waited to call there was a good chance that he wouldn’t be able to effectively communicate what happened. Elijah got out his phone and began making calls.

Elijah stood in front of his mirror, struggling to fix his tie, he’d never been good at it. To be fair, he had a horrible teacher, his dad. But even his dad couldn’t help him now. He looked up at his reflection and then down to the all black suit he was wearing. It had been 2 weeks since the crash and Elijah still didn’t know how to feel. But today was his parents’ funeral. He made his way outside to his car and drove to meet his other family members.

 His parents wanted to be cremated together and have their ashes spread at Marsha P. Johnson State Park. They used to take Elijah there as a kid almost everyday just to sit and look at the water. Elijah read his piece about how loving and caring his parents were, and how he couldn’t have asked for anyone better than the two of them. His grandmother gave a speech about how the crash was a terrible accident and gave a similar spiel to Elijah. 

When the funeral proceedings were over and his parents’ ashes had been spread, Elijah made his way to his car. His next stop was the courthouse where he could pick up a copy of the will. He was really nervous for this part because it made everything feel so final. Elijah needed his parents, he was barely an adult and now he can’t ask advice from the two most important people to him. 

***

“Finally, I'm home.”, Elijah sighed out loud as he locked the door behind him. After he had gotten the copy of the will he decided to wait to read it until he got home. He thought he might get emotional because of the finality of it all. Elijah threw himself onto the futon and got out the manilla folder that contained his parents’ will. He took a deep breath and opened it anxiously.

“We, Marianne Smith and Walter Smith, do identify this paper to be our final will and testament. We would like to assign the tending of our house to our son, Elijah.”. 

Elijah’s heart stopped, he was now the owner of a two story house in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. After taking a few moments to collect his thoughts he read on;

“We also give all of our life’s savings, including our retirement fund to our son, Elijah.”

“Holy sh*t!!”, exclaimed Elijah out loud. He can’t believe that he had just inherited that much money. He could finally pay off his college debt and still have plenty of money left over. He looked down at the next line;

“Finally, we have a special request for Elijah. In the attic of the house you have just inherited, there’s a cardboard filing box. Inside of it you will find some very important documents that you need to know about. There will also be a letter at the very bottom of the box. Read this last. It explains everything that you need to know. Goodluck, we love you.”

Elijah had stopped breathing as he read this. He didn’t know what to think. He took a deep breath in and out to make sure he didn’t pass out and then re-read the paragraph. 

“Goodluck”

What had his parents meant by that? Goodluck with what? Surely he wouldn’t have trouble finding the box, so what could they have meant? What else did he need to know? Had they kept secrets from him? Are they really dead? Were they killed? Elijah felt his heart rate speed up and felt that painful floating sensation right before an anxiety attack erupts. He had struggled with anxiety attacks since he was 12 years old but he hadn’t had one since his junior year of college. He knew exactly what to do. 

As Elijah’s breathing quickened along with his blood pressure he ran into the kitchen to get a washcloth. He knew that he needed to put the ice on the cloth as soon as possible before the attack got to its peak. He set the washcloth in the bottom of the sink and tossed 5 ice cubes onto the material. He then quickly turned the faucet all the way to cold and on the highest water pressure it could be at. Elijah’s attack peaked and he started his breathing exercises:

Inhale, 1,  2,  3,  4,  5

Exhale, 1,  2,  3,  4,  5

Inhale, 1,  2,  3,  4,  5

Exhale, 1,  2,  3,  4,  5

Elijah repeated this several times before he felt his heart rate slow down. He then grabbed the washcloth and dumped the ice cubes back into the sink. He folded up the cloth into a long rectangle and placed it on his forehead. After a few minutes he moved it to the nape of his neck. Elijah started to feel the tension subside as the anxiety attack waned. 

Although his mind and body were exhausted from today’s events, Elijah managed to drag his body upstairs to his room and fall asleep right away. Thoughts and worries of what could be in the cardboard filing box flew in and out of his dreams that night. Along with the disturbing images of his parents’ broken bodies laying in the crash.

The stairs of the rickety, old ladder that led up to the attic at 346 Pillen Lane in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania let out a loud and disrupting creak as Elijah climbed up them. It had been roughly a month since he had read his late parents’ will. He should've gone earlier but Elijah couldn’t bring himself to travel to their house, that he now owned, and look for the cardboard filing box they had requested him to open. Finally, after much convincing from his best friend and close family he made the flight over to the house that he grew up in. As he neared the top of the stairs he paused and took a deep breath in and out. Elijah cleared the top of the stairs and stepped onto the old and ruined floor boards from the 1920’s. At first he just glanced around at the dust swollen room until he spotted an old cardboard box that was labeled, ELIJAH’S STORY. This label made no sense. He had no story. He was just a regular old person who grew up in a nice neighborhood and got good grades in high school and throughout college. Some people might even call him a “plain joe”.

Elijah took the box down the ladder and set it down on the coffee table. At this point he had no idea what could be in this box. It was labeled, ELIJAH’S STORY but there was nothing notable about his life up until his parents died in the plane crash. Before he sat down on the couch to open the box, Elijah got himself a glass of water full of ice cubes just in case he had another anxiety attack. He didn’t think he would, but recently his emotions were all over the place so, he had no way of knowing. Elijah took a collective breath in and held. One, Two, Three, Four, Five. Exhale.

As the box opened, so did Elijah’s heart. He knew that whatever was in this box would affect how he viewed his past and what he would do in the future. Inside the box was a pile of papers laid laterally in the bottom. On top of the pile there was what looked like a letter that read, “OPEN FIRST”. Next was a manilla folder which was on top of another envelope that looked identical to the first letter except it was labeled, “OPEN LAST”. Elijah gripped the sides of his arm for support and comfort for a few moments before deciding that it was best to jump in. His hands were trembling when he delicately reached into the box for the first envelope. He nimbly slid his fingers across the glued part of the envelope to open it. Elijah looked up at the ceiling and made a quick prayer;

“Dear Lord, please allow this to go smoothly and not be anything inconvenient to me or the family I have left. I just lost my parents…I can’t take much anymore…”

This was the first time that Elijah had prayed since he left for college. He used to pray every night before dinner when he lived with his parents but he had stopped a long time ago. Elijah could feel the tears welling up in his hazel eyes. He took another deep breath and began to read the letter.

“Elijah, 

First off, we want to apologize. If you’re reading this it’s because we’ve passed. What is in this box will startle you all the way to your core. Which is why we wrote two letters; one to prepare you for what you’re about to uncover and another to explain the backstory of what happened and why we kept it from you your entire life. We know that you struggle with anxiety attacks so we would highly recommend that you get ice and water just in case. This is the story of how you were adopted…

With love,

Mom and Dad”

Elijah’s breath caught in his throat and he sat, frozen to the couch.  Adopted?! There was no way!! Right? He had been told all the time growing up that he looked so much like his Mom. This couldn’t be true. This had to be a big joke that his parents thought would be funny after they passed. A way to keep him laughing through the pain. Right?  Elijah let out a small chuckle as an uninvited tear trickled down his cheek and into his mouth. 

As Elijah tasted the saltiness of the tear, he snapped back to reality and reached a shaky hand back into the box. His hand and mind were on different wavelengths. His mind, still dwelling on the letter, his hand, however, had curled around the manilla folder and pulled it out of the box. It slid perfectly out of the box, like a puzzle piece. Inside was a stack of about 10 papers. Elijah could feel his heartbeat quicken as he realized that the paper on top was his birth certificate. What could this mean?

           As Elijah analyzed the certificate, he realized that the spot where his parents' names were supposed to be, must’ve been filled out incorrectly. The names on the paper didn’t say Marianne Smith nor Walter Smith. Instead they read;  Jane Brown and Jesse Williams. 

            “What the hell??”Elijah actually said out loud. “What does this mean?”

            Elijah quickly flipped to the next paper and found a stapled packet titled, “FIND THE RIGHT FAMILY”. 

           “There’s no way…right?”Elijah was exasperated and couldn’t believe his eyes. Did this mean what he thought it meant? It couldn’t possibly mean that he was adopted. 

          Elijah hurriedly grabbed the envelope labeled “OPEN LAST “ and began to read. 

         “Elijah,

Now that you know the truth, we can finally tell you the backstory. You were adopted by us at a very young age, you were about 3 when this happened. Marianne is your birth mothers sister. Which technically makes her your aunt. Jane and Jesse were very bad people. They committed many chain crimes and ended up in federal penitentiary. For what? That we will leave up to you to find out. We waited this long to tell you because we wanted to ensure you ending up on the right track. Just know, we will always love you as our own son.

With love,

Marianne and Walter Smith”

          Elijah’s eyes were dry as he finally blinked and looked away from the letter. He had read it 7 times over by now. He was adopted. Not only that but his birth parents are criminals. And the person whom he thought was his mom is actually his aunt. His mind was moving a mile a minute and the same questions swam through his thoughts; Who were his parents? What were the crimes? Why him? Why tell him this late? We’re the crimes really that bad? Where were they now? Could he find them? Would they treat him as their own again?

          Elijah knew that there was only one solution. With determination, he stood up and set out to find Jane Brown and Jesse Williamson.