And I understood promises.
So I went.
Every month.
Through heat waves and winter storms. Through flu season. Through the anniversaries that made it hard to breathe.
Until one morning, something shifted.
There was a new branch manager. A man in his forties with a sharp suit and sharper eyes. He watched me from behind his office window.
“That woman again?” I heard him say.
He asked for the name.
Christopher James Bennett.
When he typed it in, his expression changed.
The color left his face.
I didn’t know it then, but he had triggered an internal security flag.
Account: Restricted — Federal Investigation Hold.
Disclosure prohibited.
That afternoon, he instructed security not to allow me back inside.
The following month, I returned.
But I didn’t come alone.
On either side of me walked two people who did not look away when doors closed.
“Good morning,” I said as we stepped inside. “Today, I have help.”
“This is Assistant U.S. Attorney Veronica Morales,” the woman beside me said, showing her badge.
“And I’m Daniel Harper,” the man added. “Counsel.”
We asked again.
In a closed conference room, the truth began to peel itself open.
My son had not been an ordinary engineer.