He scratched at the side of his face again. They were talking about him a lot, which was a little weird. It felt rude, and, well, it just never seemed to be a good topic of discussion. It was hard to explain it without just being really, really depressing, and he didn't think Rylee had asked him here in order to depress her. But he couldn't very well not answer her, and sometimes it was best to get this sort of thing out of the way before she went on forming ideas about him that just weren't true.

So Roddy cleared his throat. "Yeah, I knew her. I was seven when the government took custody. The Bonnimans adopted me when I was twelve. So," he sighed, "I've actually been in the United States longer than I was in Russia." He smiled slightly, as if he were proud of that in a way a lot of people born US citizens might not understand. He remembered when the years had tipped in America's favor. It had felt surreal at the time, but seemed to make more sense now.

He also hoped he'd said enough that she'd forget about the question of what happened to his mother. A lot of adopted children and families would have referred to her as his biological mother, or birth mother. Roddy did not. He called her his mother. And he had no idea what had become of her, but he bet it wasn't good.