The Miraculous was back on Wunder’s nightstand all the time now. He found himself reading through it even when he wasn’t searching for letter recipients. He never went to the last entry—he couldn’t do that yet; he didn’t want to do that ever. But he read everything that came before.
He told himself he still didn’t believe in the miracles, but his heart seemed to think otherwise. While he read, the stone of his heart would grow warmer; the stone of his heart would stir and shift.
And he was getting braver, delivering letters and sharing entries. He was getting closer and closer to being ready, ready to ask the witch for the truth, the whole truth, about who she was and what she wanted.
After dinner one night, Wunder was flipping through a new stack of letters. He separated them into names he recognized—Alex Lin, Susan Holt, Mateo Ramos—and names he didn’t—Margot Arvid, Charlie Darrow, Afnan Khan. He knew the names he recognized must have entries in The Miraculous, but he couldn’t think of any of them off the top of his head.
Until he came to the last letter in the pile:
Mariah Lazar
He knew Mariah Lazar. She wasn’t in The Miraculous exactly, but her children were.
She had twins. Wunder had interviewed them at school last year. They had been in first grade, and he had been in fifth. Their teacher, Mr. Raavi, had once been Wunder’s teacher. He had listened to Wunder talk about his miracology, and he had seen The Miraculous once when Wunder brought it in for show-and-tell. After that, he had often brought Wunder stories to add to his book. The Lazar twins’ story had been one of them.
Wunder found it in The Miraculous. It went like this:
Miraculous Entry #1003
Wunder: I am here with Jayla and Jayden Lazar to hear their account of their miraculous birth.
*giggling from Jayla and Jayden*
Wunder: Jayla, Jayden, can you tell me how old you are?
Jayla and Jayden (together): Seven.
Wunder: And where were you two born?
Jayden and Jayla (together): Branch Hill Hospital.
Wunder: Would you please describe the circumstances of your unusual birth?
Jayden: We only know what our mom told us—
Jayla: Because we were babies! We don’t remember.
Wunder: I understand. Please tell me what your mother has told you.
Jayla: Well, we were born early—
Jayden: Really early. Only twenty-six weeks. It’s supposed to be forty weeks—
Jayla: Twins come early most of the time, but not that early. And we were really, really tiny, not even two pounds. We were the smallest babies ever born at Branch Hill Hospital. We weren’t breathing when we came out and they had to hook us up to machines—
Jayden: Like robots! And we were in the hospital for a long time, like months and months. But Jayla was in longer … something happened to her.
Jayla: Something in my heart, my mom says. So I had to stay, but Jayden got to go home.
Jayden: But then she came home too. You came home, Jayla.
Jayla: I did. I came home too. We both did.
At the time, it had just been one more miracle. There were always miracles about babies—babies born to mothers who thought they would never have babies, like his own mother; babies who survived horrible catastrophes unharmed; babies who lived when doctors predicted they would die. If you only read about miracles, you would think that babies always defied the odds.
Wunder knew now that they didn’t. But Jayden and Jayla had.
So why was their mother getting a letter?
Wunder left his room and went to the kitchen. The visitors had stopped after a few days, the casseroles after two weeks, but the cards kept coming in, even now. There was a huge pile of them on the kitchen table. He sifted through until he found what he was looking for.
It was the card that had come with the casserole on the day of the funeral. It read:
No one can ever know exactly what another person is going through, but I do know about loss. When you are ready, please reach out to me. I would love to connect.
It was signed Mariah Lazar. Her phone number and address were there.
Wunder decided to go right away.