Ryan looked between them in confusion.
“Mom… who is he?”
The man walked closer.
His eyes never left the two boys.
“You told him nothing?” he asked quietly.
The mother began shaking.
Twenty years earlier, a fire had broken out in the hospital maternity wing.
Panic.
Smoke.
Screaming.
Doctors rushed newborn babies out of the building.
And in the chaos…
Two babies disappeared.
Everyone believed only one survived.
The other was declared dead.
Ryan stared at the lonely boy.
The lonely boy stared back.
“No…” Ryan said. “That’s impossible.”
The man slowly looked at them.
“It wasn’t an accident.”
Silence.
The mother’s eyes filled with tears.
“What do you mean?” Ryan asked.
The man reached into his coat pocket and pulled out an old photograph.
He handed it to Ryan.
Ryan looked down.
In the photo stood his mother…
Holding two newborn babies.
Ryan’s hands began shaking.
Then he looked at the back of the photograph.
Five words were written there:
HE WAS NEVER GONE.
