Anthony Wiggs always knew he was adopted and felt no shortage of love and support from his family, but that didn't stop him from wanting to know more about his birth family.

Almost two decades ago, when the emergency room nurse from Arlington set out on a journey to stitch together his past, he discovered his biological brother and father in San Antonio. But he wanted answers about his mother, too.

Where was Elsie Ramirez, the woman who had given him his Puerto Rican heritage and olive skin? A death certificate for a woman with their mother's name seemed to close the case, but Anthony, 46, wasn't satisfied and kept digging.

In May, a DNA test led him to 64-year-old Elsie Ramirez in Massachusetts, the woman he and his brother had been separated from as infants in Puerto Rico. They connected by phone, and Elsie broke down in tears when she heard her sons' voices for the first time. The three have talked every day since.

After weeks of late-night calls and sorting out travel arrangements, the mother and sons were finally going to be reunited. Elsie was to arrive at 9:40 Friday morning at DFW International Airport where the brothers were waiting with their families -- and questions.

One of the big ones for them was how exactly they had been separated from their mother all those decades ago. Everyone involved seems to have a different account of events, and the brothers are hoping that after some time with their mother, they'll have some clarity.

Now only one hour stood between them and their reunion.

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8:30 a.m. - Anthony and Raymond pace around a baggage claim carousel and check with airport staffers, again, to make sure their mother's flight is on time. The questions they've been asking themselves for weeks again race through their minds: What will she look like? Will she be overwhelmed? Is she as nervous as they are?

8:37 - Anthony downloads a flight-tracking app on his phone. He plugs in the airline and flight number and sees that her plane is over Arkansas, 300 miles -- so close, but still so far.

8:55 - Anthony tries to eat a few almonds to get something into his stomach. Nerves and excitement had kept him up all night, and he'd had no appetite for breakfast. He knows he should try to eat something; he has low blood sugar and wonders if he gets that from his mother.

9:25 - Fifteen minutes to go. Raymond, who says he doesn't like to cry, starts to get emotional. He thinks about having heard his mother tell him she loved him for the first time over the phone. "That's what I'm thinking about right now," he says through tears. He's eager to hear those words in person.

9:30 - Anthony's phone buzzes. It's the app telling him that her plane has landed 10 minutes early and is on the runway. Anthony and Raymond position themselves as close as they can get to the airport gate.

Anthony Wiggs (left) and Raymond Ramirez wait to meet their biological mother, Elsie Ramirez, for the first time at DFW Airport. (David Woo / Staff Photographer)

9:45 - The brothers' eyes are fixed on the passengers walking through the door into baggage claim. Anthony taps his hands behind his back. Raymond nervously rubs the scruff on his face and adjusts his hat. Celine Dion plays over the airport speaker. Still no Elsie.

9:50 - Raymond's phone buzzes. It's his mother. "Dónde estás?" he asks. Elsie says she's just gotten off the plane and will be there soon. The minutes crawl by.

9:55 - Focused on the stream of people coming through the door, the brothers almost miss the small Puerto Rican woman walking gingerly up to them. "Raymond?!" She calls out to her oldest son, collapsing into his arms while also reaching for Anthony. Muffled sobs burst from her as she buries her face in Raymond's chest.

The last time Elsie held her boys, she was a teenager living in Puerto Rico. Now the brothers, adults with their own children, hold their shaking mother in their arms.

"You still look like my babies," she says in Spanish. "They're still my babies."

Elsie walks around the baggage claim area to meet her some of her grandchildren, with whom she shares a striking resemblance, and to find her bags, never once letting go of her sons.