Broken and Beautiful

by Ryan, Kendall

  Everything my sexy but perpetually grumpy neighbor, who I now knew was named Lisa, shouted at me on my stoop, clicked into place like a tumbler in a lock. "You apologized to make yourself feel better. That's not an apology."

  "What? I didn't…" Her mouth closed, and her brow furrowed. She was deep in thought.

  "Look, I know you get overwhelmed, and it makes you angry, but sometimes you lash out and the shit you say…" I trailed off and shook my head. "And you know what?" I looked her in the eye. "You did hurt my feelings. I know I'm not perfect, but neither are you, and I would never talk to you the way you talked to me. And not because you have an anxiety disorder but because you're my sister, and I love you."

  "Cole." She heaved a deep sigh. "You're right. You're definitely not the first person to bring this to my attention, and I've been working on it with Dr. Marquez." She wrapped her slender brown fingers around mine and squeezed before continuing.

  "I am the last person who should be giving anyone life advice or passing judgment, and I guess it's easier for me to focus on other people's issues than to face my own. And it's easiest to hurt the ones I love the most because they love me the most. It's not an excuse, and it doesn't make it okay. I can't guarantee that it will never happen again, but I promise to try as hard as I can."

  She bit her lip and raised her eyebrows at me.

  This went better than I expected, and I was almost a little pissed that I didn't get to recite the four components of a proper apology. We hugged, and I felt like Kimberly and I had crossed some invisible barrier.

  "I know it's none of my business, but Lisa would be lucky to have you." She smiled at me and wiped away a tear. The thought made my chest expand with warmth, and I wouldn't tell Kimmy that after my own botched apology attempt, I had a better chance of getting drafted by the NFL.

  By the time her driver dropped me at the Starbucks closest to my office, I had a feeling today was going to be a good day.

  * * *

  Judy kept her promise to cover for me, and I rewarded her with two lattes—one at 130 degrees so she could drink it right away, and one at 180 degrees so it would be the perfect temperature when she was ready to drink it. At the morning meeting, Smith asked me to sit instead of standing against the wall like the other first-years and gave me a shout-out when he mentioned the case I'd been working on.

  Feeling pretty good about the morning's developments, I was making my way to my desk when my phone buzzed in my pocket. The area code was from Missouri, and my chest tightened at the sight of it. Crystal was released four years ago, and I had expected her to come live with me. I had prepared a special place for her in my home with all of her favorite things. Instead, she chose to move back to Missouri. Her decision was something I never understood. My birth mother never had a good thing to say about that place. She didn't have any friends there. She hated her family. After living with them for a few months as a kid, I understood her hatred.

  So, when she chose that place over me, her own son, I didn't handle it well. She called me once a week for over a year, but I never answered. The calls stopped, then the letters started. They came weekly, then monthly, then after a while, they stopped too.

  I ignored the call, determined not to let Crystal's current drama ruin the good day I was having, and deal with it later. I'd been in the research library for a few hours when Sam, one of the receptionists, found me.

  "Hey, there's a woman here to see you." They paused. "She says she's your mother?" Their confused look immediately told me that it wasn't Crystal. I didn't have time for annoyance, and I wasn't planning on offering an explanation. I ran past them, my brain sifted through all of the possible reasons why she would show up at my job in the middle of the day.

  I found her standing at the reception desk, chatting with one of the firm's managing partners, Bryce Cameron.

  “—your husband that if he’s ever ready to come back, we could use him.” He chuckled heartily.

  Mom smiled genially. "I wouldn't hold your breath on that one." Her smile widened, and Bryce laughed even harder.

  “We have to get together for dinner. Rebecca asks about you all the time.”

  "Well, that would be nice. I'll talk to Reggie." She noticed me approaching them. "Bryce, do you have a place where we can…" She tilted her head towards me.

  "Oh, yes, yes, of course." He looked around before finally spotting one of the receptionists. "Hey, Natalie, could you show Cole and Dr. Simmons to a private conference room." He turned to my mom. "Can we offer you anything—coffee, tea, water…?"

  “Water would be great. Thank you.” Mom’s face became more grave by the second. I jumped when Mr. Cameron put his hand on my shoulder and squeezed.

  "You got a good kid here. I'm hoping he’ll be a good influence on Beck. Cole's doing a fantastic job for the firm. "

  "Is that supposed to surprise me, Bryce?" Mom smiled again, and Mr. Cameron guffawed.

  He backed away from us, wagging his index finger at my mother. "Always good to see you, Bev."

  “You, too. Give my best to Rebecca.”

  * * *

  Once we entered the conference room and sat, Mom leaned forward and wrapped her arms around me, squeezing me so tight I started to lose my breath.

  “Mom, what’s going on?”

  She let out a deep sigh. "There's been an accident, baby."

  “Is it Dad? Is he okay?”

  “It’s Crystal.” She paused for a moment and scanned my face, and I could see tears welling in her dark brown eyes.

  “Is she okay?” Somewhere deep inside, I already knew the answer.

  Mom gave a slight shake of her head. "She's gone, sweetheart." A tear fell. "I'm so sorry."

  “No.” I shook my head. “She called me. Today. She just called me.”

  “You spoke to her?”

  "No," I whispered, and guilt crept in. "I…I…"

  Mom put her hand on my cheek, mercifully saving me from having to admit that I ignored her call.

  “Apparently the accident happened a few days ago. It was probably the police trying to reach you. They called me when they couldn’t get through to you.”

  I swallowed thickly and nodded. “How?” I whispered.

  “A car accident. She was driving and seemed to have lost control. The detective I spoke to said she most likely went quickly. Didn’t suffer.”

  “Was she…?” Drunk or high, I thought to myself.

  "I don't know, sweetie." She sighed. "But, there's more."

  I picked my head up and looked at her.

  “You have a brother.”

  “What?”

  “Crystal had a baby. You didn’t know? She didn’t tell you?”

  My mom didn't know that Crystal and I hadn't spoken since she decided to move back to Missouri. She had more of a say in my relationship with my birth mother as a child. She made sure I never forgot to send Crystal a Mother's Day or birthday card. Mom would make the long drives to whatever facility or halfway house Crystal was staying in so I could visit. Once I turned eighteen, she backed off and let me manage my relationship with my birth mother on my own even when I could see the strain not interfering put on her.

  “No, she didn’t tell me.”

  "Well, you're his next of kin. So, you need to go to Missouri, take care of your mother's affairs, and decide what you want to do about the baby."

  "You're my mother," I whispered, still trying to wrap my brain around this overload of information. Crystal was gone. She was really gone. I went months or years without seeing or speaking to her, but in the back of my mind, I knew she was out there somewhere living and breathing. I spent years holding out the foolish hope that she'd show up on my doorstep one day and tell me she'd changed her mind and chosen me after all. I would show her the apartment I had kept just for her and spend the rest of my life taking care of her like she tried to do for me. Now that would never happen because she was gone. And I had another brother. She'd had a baby. Is that why her letters stopped? H
ad she replaced me?

  Mom sighed, gripped my hands, ignored my statement about her being my mother, and said, “You need to go to Missouri as soon as possible. I’ve already rescheduled my appointments. I can come with you if you need me to.”

  I squeezed her hands and nodded. I needed her. I never imagined having to ever go back to that place, much less to identify Crystal’s body and claim the baby brother that I never knew existed. I didn’t want to do it alone.

  "I've already talked to Bryce. You can leave work early today, and he knows you'll be taking some time off."

  “I can’t…I…”

  "Yes, you can, and you will. You need time to process this, and you have a lot of decisions to make."

  I nodded.

  * * *

  Dad chartered a private jet. Kimberly pulled some strings to get us a deluxe cabin in a luxury resort called Welles Estates, right outside of Branson, that would provide a car and driver during our stay, which I hoped wouldn't be a long one.

  After a restless night of sleep, we walked into the Taney County coroner’s office.

  "Hi, I'm Cole Simmons. I'm supposed to be meeting Detective Richard Tan."

  “Okay, please, have a seat. He’ll be right with you.” The thin, pale woman at the receptionist’s desk motioned to a row of chairs and picked up the phone on her desk.

  I took a seat next to Mom. She put her hand on my shoulder and squeezed. The place was bare, sterile with hard plastic chairs and harsh fluorescent lights. In the corner, a flat-screen TV played the local news. The air was heavy with the smell of disinfectant. Crystal always smelled like shampoo and perfume. The aroma hung around her like a cloud. It was so strange imagining her in a place like this.

  “Mr. Simmons, you can follow me,” she called. Mom and I stood. “Ma’am, if you’ll just wait, I’ll be with you in a minute.”

  “No, she’s with me. This is my mother.”

  She made no attempt to hide her confusion. Mom stepped forward, smiled, and extended her hand.

  “Dr. Beverly Simmons. My husband and I adopted Cole as a child.”

  The receptionist shook Mom’s hand, looked between my mother and me, then pasted on a cordial smile.

  “I see. Well, my apologies for the confusion. If you’ll both follow me.”

  We followed her into a small conference room where we were met by two men: a tall man of East Asian descent in a suit and a shorter gray-haired white man in a lab coat.

  “Can I offer you anything to drink?” he asked. “Coffee, tea? We have a vending machine down the hall if you’d like a can of pop?”

  I shook my head.

  “No, thank you,” Mom responded.

  "Thank you, Denise." The detective nodded at the receptionist, and she backed out of the room. The door closed with a small click.

  Detective Tan was a stern-looking man with a hard, angular face, short black hair and calculating and assessing dark eyes that seemed to be sizing me up. I'd seen this look in detectives before, but having it directed at me was unnerving. He cleared his throat before speaking.

  "Five days ago, we were called to the scene of a single-vehicle collision. The lone occupant of the vehicle, Amy Smith, was pronounced deceased at the scene."

  “Amy Smith?” I asked.

  “Yes, were you aware that your mother changed her name?”

  I shook my head again.

  “We weren’t able to identify any next of kin until two days later when a woman fitting the deceased’s description—”

  “Her name was Crystal,” my mother interjected. “May we address her by her name going forward?”

  "Yes, ma'am." Detective Tan cleared his throat and nodded. "My apologies. A woman fitting Crystal's description was reported missing by her landlady, a”—he checked his notes—“Cecilia Buckley. Ms. Buckley was caring for the child and grew concerned when she hadn't heard from…Crystal in a couple days. After interviewing Ms. Buckley, we were able to gain access to the residence and find your contact information. I believe I spoke to you on the phone yesterday?" He made eye contact with Mom.

  “Yes,” she confirmed.

  “How can you be sure it’s her?” I asked.

  "Well, we will need you to identify the body, but based on our interview with Ms. Buckley, the description of Crystal, the vehicle, and the photographs we discovered in her apartment, we're pretty confident that we've got a positive ID."

  I deflated and leaned back in the chair. The final shred of hope I had vanished. Crystal was really gone.

  “Where is the baby now?” my mother asked. I’d almost forgotten about the baby.

  "We notified the Children's Division of Social Services. They opted to let the child stay with Ms. Buckley for the time being. The department is already stretched thin, so it made more sense than putting him in foster care for only a day or two. We're already working on having him brought to the local Children's Division office so you can head on over there when you're all finished up here."

  “How did the accident happen?” I asked.

  "Well, as far as we can tell, Crystal ended up on the wrong mountain road. Lost control of her car. It happens, unfortunately.

  “I’m gonna leave you in the capable hands of Dr. Burrows. Here’s my direct line if you need to reach me.” He slid a business card across the table. “I’m sorry for your loss.” He exited the room.

  Dr. Burrows stood. “If you’ll follow me, I’ll take you to view the b— Crystal.” He gave me a tight smile.

  We followed him into an elevator that led to the morgue. I felt myself taking slow labored breaths like my chest was in a vise. We were walking, but I wasn't consciously aware of making the necessary movements to propel my body forward. The only thing that felt tangible and real was my mother's hand squeezing mine as we walked down the hall.

  We stopped in front of a large windowpane revealing a gurney covered by a sheet.

  “You have a couple of options. We can show you the face of the deceased on a monitor. We could have someone pull back the sheet while you stay here, or you can enter the room and identify her.”

  I looked at my mom. I knew she wasn't going to tell me what to do, but this time I wished she would. I squeezed her hand.

  “Sweetie, are you still planning to have her cremated?”

  I swallowed the lump in my throat and whispered, “It’s what she wanted.” Crystal always hated the idea of her body rotting in the ground and getting eaten by bugs and worms.

  “Well, this might be the only chance you have to say goodbye. If that’s what you want.”

  I nodded. “Will you come in with me?”

  "No." She shook her head. "You and Crystal were together for a long time, and she did her best to take care of you. And just like always, I'll be right here if you need me, but you need to do this alone."

  I nodded to Dr. Burrows and followed him inside.

  It was definitely Crystal under the sheet. She had a large bruise on her forehead, and her skin was paler than I'd ever seen, but I was looking at the face of the woman who gave birth to me.

  I couldn't think of anything to say, so I just stared at her. Dr. Burrows’ voice stopped me when I reached out to touch her.

  “Just be aware, she’ll be cold to the touch. A lot of folks aren’t prepared for that.”

  I withdrew my hand and nodded. The doctor was right. I wasn't prepared for that. I wasn't prepared for any of this.

  “Do you need a minute alone, son?”

  I shook my head.

  I turned to look at Mom. Just like she promised, she was waiting for me right outside the glass window. She gave me a small smile when our eyes met. Turning back to the gurney, I whispered the only words that came to mind.

  “Goodbye, Crystal.”

  4

  cole

  With its brightly colored furniture and hand-painted murals, the office of the Children's Division was infinitely more cheerful than the coroner's office. I still felt shell-shocked.

  The social
worker, Ms. Lane, was lovely, and I could tell that Mom was happy to see another Black person on this trip, though she didn't say anything.

  Mom did all of the talking while I sat mutely and nodded. We provided all of the paperwork that proved Crystal was my birth mother—my birth certificate, my adoption papers, photos. Crystal had used her real name on the baby’s birth certificate, so that made things easier.

  I signed the last of a seemingly endless stack of paperwork because seven years of school and a childhood with Reginald Simmons wouldn’t let me sign any document without reading it carefully first.

  “Okay,” Ms. Lane said, scooping the paperwork up and tapping it into a pile. “Are you ready to meet baby Lincoln?”

  My brain snapped into focus. Mom and I made eye contact before turning our attention to Ms. Lane.

  “Did you say Lincoln?” I asked.

  “Yes.” She handed me the birth certificate. “I guess she really liked that name.” She huffed out a small laugh.

  I examined the birth certificate. There was my mother’s name, no father listed and on the line for the child’s name: Lincoln—no middle name—West.

  This could have been my birth certificate. Crystal had two boys over twenty years apart and named them both Lincoln. Creative baby naming wasn't a trait in that family. She told me that her mother said that there was a Crystal Gayle song playing on the radio the night she was conceived, so her mother named her Crystal Gail West. I hoped my name held a different significance.

  "Home birth?" I had to read those words twice before I looked at Ms. Lane.

  “Yes.” She nodded. “They used to be illegal, but in the last ten years or so, they’ve become more common.” She placed her palms on the table and pushed herself up to standing. “Okay, I’ll be right back.”

  Ms. Lane left the room, and I turned to my mom.

  “I don’t know what to do. I can’t take care of a kid. I can barely take care of myself.”

  "I had Kimberly when I was about your age, and I did okay." She put a hand over mine.