Lawrence tucked my hair behind my ear and whispered, “Wanna get out of here?”
I looked up at the stage. Jack was up there with the rest of the acts for the evening.
I looked over at Trinity.
“Fuck off, then,” she said.
*
I woke up on New Year’s Day feeling like crap. Lawrence was beside me, a smug smile on his face. He wasn’t my usual type, but he’d been sweet in bed. I’d developed a soft spot for him and I was sober enough that I couldn’t blame the alcohol anymore.
“Breakfast?” he suggested.
“What did you have in mind?”
“I have cereal?”
“What milk do you have?”
“Oat milk. I’m vegan,” he said.
“Me too,” I said with a smile.
Wearing my dress from the night before, I sat and ate cereal with Lawrence in his tiny living area. It was one of the smaller apartments I’d been in around New York. The bedroom, living room, and kitchen were separated by wooden dividers. The only room that was separate was the bathroom. That was a blessing. Hadn’t he said he was a director? How was a director living in a place like that? Had I been drunk enough not to notice how gross the place was the night before? If my headache was anything to go by, yes. Yes I had been that drunk.
The sex was civil and slow and polite, and I liked that after all the craziness I’d been through recently.
After breakfast, I gave him my number and took his. We had a sweet goodbye kiss, then I left feeling better than usual.
I texted him after to say thank you, but he never replied. Given that I’d sent it ten minutes after leaving his apartment, that seemed odd to me. Had he given me the wrong number? I wasn’t going back to check. That place was disgusting.
As a few minutes turned into a few days, I realized one horrifying thing: he had no interest in keeping in touch.
14
Tate
I am who I am
And I won’t change for you
This is who I’m supposed to be
Any problems with that are on you.
— “You,” Tate Gardener
Three months after my meeting with the private investigator, the only updates I’d had were that there were no updates. That just built the anticipation more. The longer I waited, the more convoluted my theories about why I’d been put up for adoption became. And the more outlandish my birth parents’ job possibilities got. What if I was the illegitimate child of a former president? Or I was born to a young couple that couldn’t afford to keep me but were still married, twenty years later?
One morning, in mid-January, I finally got the phone call: “I have news,” said the PI. He never had been one for small talk.
I paced around my apartment as I listened to what he had to say.
“I found your birth mother.”
I jumped up and down a few times. Yes! He found her! What was she like? Would she have my hair? My eyes? My amazing skin?
“Unfortunately I haven’t found out anything about your father yet—he isn’t listed on your birth certificate—but if anyone can tell you who he is, she can. Once we’ve got his name, I can do some more digging. I’ll email you through what I have so far.”
“That’s amazing! Thank you so much!”
“Just doing my job.”
I relentlessly refreshed my email inbox as I waited for the files to come through. When they did, I read through them, studying every last detail. My birth mom’s name was Eleanor Simpson. She was a homemaker. She lived in Connecticut and always had. She’d had me when she was fifteen. Wow, a teenage parent. No wonder she’d given me up. Did that mean my dad had been her teenage boyfriend?
There was only one way I was going to get more answers. It was time to take charge of the situation myself…
*
“Got everything?” said Trinity.
“I think so,” I said.
I mean, what do you pack for a road trip to Connecticut to visit your birth mother? I’d only told Trinity and Camilla that I was going. We weren’t even taking security, which I knew was a big risk, but I didn’t want to chance any of what was happening getting back to anyone until I was ready. I wanted to tell as few people as possible because I didn’t know how it’d go. A part of me was desperate to reach out and tell Jack, which made me annoyed at myself. He had no right to know anything about my life. He’d lost that right when he’d cut me out of his life. That was his loss, not mine.
“Let’s go, then,” said Trinity.
The concierge carried our bags downstairs for us, then loaded them into Trinity’s car. We were going in hers in case I got too upset and wasn’t able to drive. Plus I was too anxious to drive there because I didn’t know what to expect. The PI had only given me the information on my birth mother a couple of days ago. Since I was working on my next album, I could take a couple of days away to go meet her. If nothing else, it might inspire some songs.
But I wanted more than that. I wanted her to like me. I wanted her to say that she’d wanted to keep me but couldn’t. I wanted her to say that she was proud of everything I’d achieved.
Wanting all of that when I had such great adoptive parents made me angrier at myself. They were lovely. But they’d lied to me for my entire life, and I still didn’t know how to process that. It went so against everything they’d taught me that every time I thought about it too hard, it gave me a headache.
“Stop worrying about what’s going to happen,” said Trinity as we pulled away. “There’s no way you can predict it.”
“I know! That’s what I hate! I need to know what’s going to happen. Do you have any idea how crazy this is driving me?”
“Yeah,” she said. “It’s written all over your face. It’s also in everything you say and in every message you send.”
I lowered my head. “Sorry.”
She reached over and put her hand on my leg. “It’s OK. I get it. But you’re hurting yourself by worrying about it.”
“I guess you’re right.” I said with a sigh. “What do you think she’ll be like?”
“Probably as stubborn as you,” said Trinity.
I nudged her arm playfully. She laughed.
The information the PI had found on my birth mom had been enlightening. She was married to an ER doctor. They had three children together. He’d found a photo of her and sent it to me. Her hair was long and blonde like mine. Her face showed the telltale lines of age. They looked like stress lines on a young face, but maybe I was reading into things. It was better to withhold my judgment until I saw her. Photos didn’t tell you everything.
“What do you want to listen to?” Trinity asked.
“Have you got your new album? Can we put that on?”
“Really?” she said. She was always surprised when people wanted to listen to her music and I never understood why.
“Yeah,” I said with a smile.
“It’s on my iPod.” She pointed to the glove compartment. I fished out her pink iPod Classic and scrolled through until I found her latest album. It wasn’t out yet. I loved being able to listen to her music before anyone else. It made me feel special.
We put the album on and I leaned back in the seat and closed my eyes. We had a few hours’ drive ahead of us. I might as well try to rest while I could.
*
A few hours later, we pulled up at the hotel. It wasn’t the luxury we were used to, but it wasn’t a grungy motel either. It would be easier to blend in somewhere lowkey over an upmarket hotel. The press always liked to keep an eye on expensive hotels to see who might arrive and what they were up to.
We followed the bellhop and our bags to our room upstairs, then each crashed onto our beds. I chose the one by the window as I enjoyed the light. The sunlight annoyed Trinity, so she was closer to the door, away from the curtains, which she complained weren’t dark enough.
“When do you want to go and see her?” asked Trinity, stretching her long limbs.
“I�
��m not sure. What do you think?”
She rolled onto her side, propping her head on her hand. “It’s up to you. I mean, what time of day do you think would work?”
I mimicked her pose so that I could see her better. “Probably when she’s on her own. She has three kids in school and her husband is a doctor, so the middle of the day is probably best. Right?”
Trinity shrugged. “It’s your call.”
Being adopted still hadn’t fully sunk in. Would seeing her in real life make my brain more accepting of the idea? Would it ever feel real?
“I hate this! I hate having to make this kind of decision,” I said. I rolled onto my back and stared up at the ceiling.
Trinity came over and sat beside me. “You don’t have to go at all, you know. Nobody’s pressuring you.”
“I have to have answers. I have to know why she gave me up and why it was a closed adoption.”
“You couldn’t have gotten this far if she hadn’t cooperated by agreeing to have her details shared with you. That has to be a good sign,” said Trinity.
“Yeah, you’re right,” I said. I straightened up. “What time is it?”
“Eleven,” said Trinity.
I’d hoped it was later than that. Then I’d be able to put off visiting her for longer. But then, if I waited too long, would I lose my nerve?
I took a deep breath. “OK. Let’s go.”
15
Tate
My momma once told me
I could be whatever I wanted
but whenever I challenge boundaries
I start to feel hunted.
— “Hunted,” Tate Gardener
I stared up at the front door. My birth mom’s house was bigger than I’d expected, but I supposed she was married to a doctor. Was he my birth father?
Trinity had dropped me off and offered to stay with me, but I’d told her not to. As my throat grew dry and my hands shook, I wondered if I’d made the right decision. Would it have helped to have her beside me?
No. It was something I needed to do on my own.
I raised my fist to knock on the door. Then I hesitated. After months of buildup, I was finally there. It felt like a fantasy come to life. I needed to hold on to that feeling before I reentered reality. While I’d been anxious to see her for months, I’d never expected the day to come when I’d actually meet her. What if she wasn’t in? What if my siblings or half-siblings were in and they recognized me and wanted to know why I was there? That would be uncomfortable.
There were so many variables that I couldn’t control. The only thing left in my control was if and when I knocked on the door.
After one last deep breath, I knocked. A shuffling noise echoed from inside. A moment later, a woman appeared in the doorway. She had long, luscious blonde hair. Just like me. She had sparkling hazel eyes. Just like me. And her eyes were wide. Just like mine. I recognized her from the photo right away.
“Jesus Christ,” she said, crossing herself. “It’s you, isn’t it?”
“Are you…?” I couldn’t bring myself to say it.
“Are you?” she echoed.
“Are you Eleanor Simpson?”
She nodded. “And you’re Tate Gardener. I’d always thought we looked alike, but it never occurred to me it would be you.”
I couldn’t tell how she felt about finding out that she was my birth mom. Was she happy? Sad? Something else?
She stepped aside to let me in. The front door opened out into an expansive hallway with rooms to the left and right. At the back of the hall was a staircase leading upstairs. The house was clean. Too clean. It felt soulless.
“Tate Gardener, my own flesh and blood,” mumbled Eleanor as we entered the living room. The crisp black leather sofas contrasted with the whiteness of the room. I sat on one of them, uncomfortable sitting on a dead animal but having nowhere else to sit. The denim of my jeans prevented my skin from touching the fabric, but it still made me cringe.
“I hired a private investigator,” I said.
She rolled her eyes. “I know, I met him,” she said. Her voice conveyed no emotion. Was she a robot?
“Didn’t you want to meet me?” I sounded like a child desperate for their parent’s approval. Oh wait…
Sighing, she sank into a leather armchair opposite me.
“Do you want the truth?” she said.
I nodded, but judging from the tense expression on her face, I wasn’t sure.
She picked up a Rubik’s cube from the coffee table and began to fiddle with it. Was I really so uninteresting to her that she had to fiddle with a children’s puzzle to entertain herself?
I tightened my jaw, a part of me already wishing I’d never knocked on that front door.
As the seconds ticked by, I realized that she was waging an internal war about whether or not to admit to me how she was really feeling. Well damn. My acting skills kicked in and I decided it was time to play a part: a robot, just like her. It was time to show no emotion. Give nothing away. I refused to let her know that she was hurting me by forcing me to sit in agonizing silence while she decided what she wanted to say. Was this really the woman I’d spent months wanting to meet?
Finally, after what felt like hours but was probably less than a minute, she answered: “No.”
I kept my face neutral. I was a robot. Robots didn’t have emotions.
“I put you up for closed adoption for a reason.”
I waited. She didn’t elaborate. She just kept playing with that stupid Rubik’s cube, never getting any closer to actually solving it.
“Then why give the investigator permission to pass on your details? Why let me inside at all?”
“The same reason we all have to go for a turd: some things in life are inevitable.”
It wasn’t the first time I’d been compared to a turd, but hearing it from the woman who’d given birth to me, it hurt. Robot Mode. I had to stay in Robot Mode.
“I just want the truth,” I said, sitting upright and placing my hands into my lap.
She scoffed. “The truth? Why bother your pretty little, Prada-covered head with something as inconsequential as that?”
I touched my Prada hat self-consciously. She had taste in clothes, I’d grant her that.
I shifted in my seat. I’d been there less than five minutes and she’d already proven herself to be a bad host. For someone with a house like that, you would’ve expected her hosting skills to have kicked in as soon as I’d walked through the door. She hadn’t even offered me so much as a glass of water. That screamed to me that she didn’t want me to stay. Well tough. I was there to get answers and I was staying until I got them. The first answer—what she was like—wasn’t what I’d wanted, but there were still other things I needed to know, and she was my best chance of getting the answers I wanted.
“Just because my face is all over the TV, that doesn’t mean I don’t have a right to the truth,” I said.
“Living a lie is so terrible, isn’t it?” She looked off into the distance, her eyes glazing over.
Where was she going with this? What had happened to her to make her so angry?
“How old are you now?” she asked.
She really didn’t know? “Almost twenty.”
“Wow, time flies. I don’t remember much about your birth. It was so painful—physically and emotionally—that I blocked it out,” she said.
“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” I said.
She snorted. “Are you? If I hadn’t, you wouldn’t exist.”
“If I didn’t exist, I wouldn’t know any different,” I said.
She forced a laugh. “You’ve got sass, I’ll give you that.”
That almost sounded like approval. I clung to that, hoping that my first impression of her was wrong. Maybe she was just cold because she didn’t know me and didn’t know what to expect. If the birth had really been that bad, I could hardly blame her.
“What do you know about Catholicism?”
“What does
that have to do with anything?”
My mom was Catholic, but I’d never been raised religious because my dad was agnostic. He’d insisted that my religion was up to me. Since we traveled so much, we couldn’t go to church regularly anyway, and I asked my mom too many questions she couldn’t give me answers to for me to be comfortable following in her religious footsteps. She’d tried when I was younger, but she’d eventually given up because I couldn’t just believe what she wanted me to without picking the whole thing apart. What could I say? I didn’t like the thought of my life being left up to some higher being. I wanted control of every part of it.
Eleanor put the Rubik’s cube back on the coffee table then folded her arms over her chest. “I was fifteen when I got pregnant with you.”
I already knew that from her file, but hearing her say it, everything start to make sense. That was why she’d mentioned religion first. There was no way they’d approve of a pregnancy at that age, and they really wouldn’t approve of her having an abortion.
It also made her about thirty-five. She did not look in her mid-thirties. She looked much older. Please tell me that was because of her poor life choices and external stress and not bad genes. I’d never survive in the industry if I aged as badly as her.
“When my parents found out that I was pregnant, they kicked me out.”
That explained the hostility.
“Apparently it was more acceptable to have a homeless child than a pregnant one,” she said through gritted teeth.
What kind of monsters were my biological grandparents?
“They didn’t stick with it, though, did they?” I said, assuming they’d change their minds after like an hour.
She snorted. “Oh, they stuck with it. I haven’t spoken to them in twenty years.”
I widened my eyes. She hadn’t spoken to her parents in twenty years because of me? Well shit. I hadn’t expected to be responsible for tearing a family apart.
Hollywood Parents Page 9
