Dear Alice,
So many clues.
Letters to the last occupant (1985) from a social service agency. Needing more information about the relationship. You can't adopt Tiffany unless you give them more information. They need a statement from her mother (who you seem to be living with). Or her father. Or various people. There are Tiffany's school notebooks, a handbook for parents of special education students. Forms, forms, and more forms. For lots of things. Tiffany's small mattress lies molding and soggy on the floor of a small room off the kitchen. Her toys are in the living room, her bike's out back.
Did the love you felt for Tiffany make a difference? To her? To you? What happened to all of you? Where did you go when you left here? Did things get better? Or worse? She'd be in her mid-twenties now. What's her life like? And how did the time she spent living here on this side of this North Carolina mountain change her?
It's all just more questions.
-Ellen, near Cherokee, North Carolina