Where the Truth Lies

by Jessica Warman

  I close my eyes. Let it be, Let it be, Let it be, Let it be … I should have gone to her side and started singing when I came into the house. I should have left everything alone. This is too much for one girl to hold all by herself.

  “You said you wanted to tell me,” I say to my mom, “so why didn’t you?”

  “I didn’t know where to begin,” she says. “I was afraid you’d be so angry … are you?”

  “Yes. You lied to me. How am I supposed to look at Daddy now? How am I ever supposed to think of him in the same way?”

  “Emily, you have to understand—he is your father. He loves you more than anything in the world. He would do anything for you.”

  All I can think about is my own baby. How will he or she feel someday, knowing that I abandoned my baby? Will my child hate me?

  I’ll never know. And now that I’ve talked to my mother, learned the truth about my past, I almost wish I didn’t know.

  Maybe Bruce Graham was right. Maybe sometimes, it’s better to lie.

  chapter seventeen

  Almost two weeks go by without any signs from my father that he knows what I’ve learned. Then, one morning as I’m about to sit down beside Franny in homeroom, my advisor, Dr. Hollinger, shakes his head at me. “Don’t even bother,” he says. “Your dad wants to see you.”

  Even though it’s been weeks since my mom told me the truth about Sandy Gray, about the fire and my real father, I know immediately what my dad wants to talk to me about, and I can’t imagine facing him right now. It is simply too soon. Sure, I’ve seen him on campus. I’ve had brief, meaningless conversations with him here and there, but this is going to be a serious talk. I don’t know what we might possibly say to each other.

  In a way, though, I want to see him more than anything. I need to hear certain things from him: I want to know that I am still his daughter. That I will always be his daughter.

  The door to his office is cracked, and I stand outside for a moment, watching him. He’s holding a putting club in his hands, knees slightly bent, practicing his swing. I smile a little bit. To practice his putts, he has a tiny machine that spits the golf ball back out and across the room once the ball has been sunk. It was a gift from me a few years ago. For Father’s Day.

  “Daddy?” I ask, taking a step into the room.

  Clink. He hits the ball. It goes past the putting machine, too far to the right, and comes to a rolling stop beneath his sofa.

  He stands for a moment, staring at the ball until it becomes completely still.

  “Emily,” he says. He doesn’t look at me, just continues to stare downward. “Close the door, would you?”

  It appears as though my dad has aged ten years overnight. The lines in his face seem more pronounced, less gentle somehow. How can this man not be my father? He raised me. He has given me everything. Now, though, it feels like I’m no different than Franny or Grace or Steph: just another sad student with nobody else but him to call “Dad.”

  We take seats on opposite ends of his sofa. “I don’t know how to say this,” he begins, “so I’m just going to start. I know you talked to your mother. She told me last night.”

  I can only stare at the carpet. I don’t want to cry, but it seems inevitable. I feel like I’ve done enough crying in the past year for a whole lifetime. Besides that, I feel physically exhausted in a way that I’ve never experienced before. I’m angry with my parents, of course, but it’s more than that—my entire reality has been shattered. In the past weeks I’ve spent most of my nights wide-awake, thinking about all the things that I’ve taken for granted up until now, and how almost none of them are real. I feel almost too tired to speak. More than anything, I want to curl up in my parents’ arms and have them hold me, to go back to the way things were before I knew anything about my past. I want to be oblivious again. But that’s impossible.

  “Emily,” my dad continues, “I’ve thought about this day so many times over the years, and I never knew exactly how it would play out. I never pictured it happening this way.”

  “Do you know that Mom still smokes?” I ask. It’s the only thing I can think of to say.

  Of course, I know he doesn’t know she’s still smoking; she told me herself. I am so, so tired of all the lies. I don’t want to keep any more secrets.

  Except for the secret about my baby.

  My baby. I have no right to call it that. At night I’ve been wondering where he or she is living, wondering if my child is safe. What if somebody leaves a cigarette burning? Or walks away from my baby in a bathtub? Or doesn’t keep him or her warm enough in the winter? When I signed away my child, I signed away my rights to know about, or have any control over, his or her happiness. The reality makes me heartsick.

  “I didn’t know your mom was still smoking,” my dad says. His voice is slightly hoarse, so soft that I have to strain to hear it. “Emily,” he repeats, “I would give you anything you want. Anything in the world.”

  I look him in the eye. “I want you to be my real father.”

  “I am your real father. Maybe not biologically, but in every other way.”

  “You lied to me.”

  “I didn’t think I had a choice.”

  “Are there other lies? Other things you’re not telling me?”

  He doesn’t say anything. The silence is enough; I know the answer is yes. But I can’t even imagine what other secrets my parents might be keeping.

  “Tell me what you want at this moment,” my father says.

  Oh, Daddy. All I want—all I really want—is to tell him my secrets, for him to tell me the whole truth about my past, and to know for sure that he still loves me. I want to be a family.

  But none of that seems possible, so I ask for something I know I can have.

  “I want to sleep,” I say.

  “Okay.” My father nods. “We can do that. Do you want to go home for the morning?”

  I gaze at him. “Can I sleep here? On your couch?”

  He seems surprised. “Really?”

  I nod. “Yes.”

  He doesn’t think about it for more than a second. “Okay. Go ahead and lie down.”

  So I do. There’s a throw with the Stonybrook Academy insignia lying across the back of the sofa; I pull it around my body, curl up in a ball, and rest my head against my hands.

  My dad turns off the lights in his office. He kneels beside me, tugs the blanket toward my chin, and gives me a kiss on the forehead.

  “Sleep,” he says. “Take as long as you want.”

  I look at him, my vision growing blurry through tears. “I love you.”

  “I have always loved you,” he says. “Someday, Emily, these will all be nothing but bad memories.”

  I know he’s wrong; my child will never fade into nothing but a memory from a difficult time. But I can’t tell him that, so instead I give him a half smile and say, “I hope so, Daddy.”

  He brushes the hair from my cheek. “Sweet dreams.”

  I am unconscious almost before he closes the door on his way out. It is a hard, dreamless sleep that lasts for over two hours.

  It feels like I blink and the bell signaling the end of second period is ringing. I hear doors opening, voices in the hallway, and for a moment I consider pulling the blanket more tightly around me and sleeping through the whole morning.

  Instead, I get up and go to class, like it’s any other day in a normal life.

  Every day before chorus, Ethan meets me outside my calculus class (which I’m failing), and we walk to the music room together. And every day, as we swing our arms hand in hand, he asks me the same question:

  “So. Do you want to be my girlfriend?”

  Every day, I give him the same answer. “I don’t know, Ethan. I’m still kind of committed to someone.”

  I say it real coy, like I’m only kidding. And for all practical purposes, I might as well be. Everyone thinks Ethan and I are a couple.

  Today, since I wasn’t in calculus, he’s waiting for me outside th
e chorus room. After we go through the same conversation, after I explain that I’m still somewhat committed, he frowns and asks, “Well, how about this?” He gives me a knee-buckling grin. “I’ll fly backward around the earth to go back in time so that you never meet Del. We could rewrite history.”

  We’re standing in the hallway beside the big double doors to the music room. It’s been almost a month since our evening at the pier.

  I’m leaning against the wall. Ethan stands in front of me, a hand on the wall beside me, his hips close to mine. He’s a good ten inches taller than I am, so I have to stand on my tiptoes to put my lips close to his ear.

  “Okay,” I whisper. “You do that, and I’ll be your girlfriend.” It’s amazing how good I’m getting at switching back and forth between chaos and normalcy. If he knew how I’d spent my morning, he might rethink flying backward around the earth for me.

  He pulls back a little bit. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Our music director, Mrs. Foster, rushes past us into the room. She gives us a wink as she passes. “Come on, lovebirds. Time to sing.”

  “I didn’t mean anything. It came out wrong,” I say.

  “Emily, it’s been a month and you still won’t say you’re my girlfriend. You won’t say that you’ll go to homecoming with me. What do I have to do, track down Del so you can tell him it’s officially over? Even though you haven’t heard from him or spoken to him in months? Because I have news, Emily. It wouldn’t take much for him to get in contact with you. He could pick up a phone. He could send an e-mail. Hell, he could write you a letter. You keep saying you’re not sure it’s over, and I’m getting tired of it.” His tone softens as I try to blink back tears, without success. I should have stayed in my dad’s office.

  “Hey. Oh, come on, don’t cry. Come here.” He puts his arms around me. Despite everything I’m feeling that he can’t possibly know about, I put my head against his chest and wrap my arms around his waist. He’s so good, so kind—so different from Del in every way. I adore Ethan. And he deserves better than what I’m giving him.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “There’s a lot that went on between me and Del that you don’t know about. I don’t want him anymore, it’s just that—”

  “Emily.” He’s still holding me close. “If you’re talking about what I think you’re talking about, it’s okay. I already know.”

  I pull back slightly, wiping my eyes, feeling mild alarm rise in goose bumps all over my body. “What do you know?”

  He looks at the floor. “I know you slept with him.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “My sister.”

  That bitch. Bitch, bitch, bitch. I don’t even remember telling Stephanie that Del and I slept together, not explicitly. But she knew I was sneaking out. She must have just assumed. “Oh. Well, you had a right to know.”

  “It’s okay. I mean, it has to happen sometime, right?”

  I nod.

  Then he looks at me, his dark blue eyes flashing with sincerity. “I want you to know,” he says, “that I haven’t been with anyone yet.”

  “Oh.” Have I told you I’m also a mother? And I’m not who you think I am, either. I don’t even know if my name is really Emily. Maybe my parents wanted to reinvent my entire past, to “protect” me from it. Pretty much my whole life up until now has been one big lie.

  When I think about it in those terms—all the lies, everything that has been kept hidden or buried for so long—it makes me want to be free, more than anything. It makes me want something good, something true.

  “Ethan,” I say, standing on my tiptoes, my mouth close to his, “I don’t want to talk about Del anymore. I want to be with you.” That reminds me. “Hey,” I say, “what happened to your band? Do you still need a singer?”

  He shakes his head. “We broke up at the end of last year.”

  “Why didn’t I know that?”

  “You were … distracted,” he says. He’s right. I wasn’t paying attention to much of anything besides myself by the end of last year.

  “You should get back together,” I tell him. “I want to sing for you.”

  He rests his forehead against mine. The first bell rings for class.

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  His tone is cautious. “And you want to be together? You’re sure?”

  “I’m sure.” And to show him I mean it, I kiss him on the mouth. We step backward until we’re both leaning against the wall, ignoring the students rushing past us into the room to avoid the late bell. There’s a part of me—a small part, but it’s definitely there—that can’t help but feel excited that I’m Ethan Prince’s Girlfriend. Everyone who passes us pauses for a moment to stare.

  I’m the princess. It has to be the most undeserved crown in the history of royalty.

  There’s another letter from Renee waiting for me in my room. In my reply to her, I’d told her all about my mother’s news, about my certainty that Del knew what he was doing when he went after me. I’d told her about Ethan, and about how, ever since I found out about my own past, the guilt from my secret was starting to tear me up inside. I told her I thought of my baby every day, wondered where it was and if it was safe and happy. It’s a horrible thing, to think of your own child and not even know whether it’s a boy or a girl. To know that your child can never really be yours, that the choices you had to make at seventeen will affect multiple lives forever.

  Friday

  unseasonably cool but sunny

  legs v. sore from running the mile in gym class

  Emily,

  I cannot believe you’re dating Evan! (Just kidding … I know it’s Ethan.) What is he like? You two are probably a nauseatingly adorable couple—worse than Hillary and Max. Do people call you Princess?

  I wouldn’t be so sure that Del’s out of the picture . He loved you, and he was a clever one . Just because you haven’t heard from him doesn’t mean you’re not going to. I feel like he’s just biding his time, like he has a plan. I don’t think he’d just walk away knowing what he knew.

  I’m applying to Yale for the summer. I’m going to take classes there and hopefully I’ll get into their drama program next fall. Bruce says I don’t need to go to college, and he’s right, but I feel like it will keep me grounded, you know? A person has to have an identity that doesn’t depend on other people, or else they can just disappear.

  Now that you know what your nightmares are about, have they gone away? Have you talked to your father or Dr. Miller?

  Can’t you sense whether your baby was a boy or a girl? You must know deep inside somewhere, if you were able to hold on to those nightmares all your life . If I were you, I’d decide . Give him or her a name . Imagine how loved that baby is, just like you are. I think it will make you feel better.

  xoxo

  R .G.

  It’s funny how Renee knows exactly what to say, even from a distance. It’s definitely occurred to me before that Del has some kind of plan, but I can’t imagine what it might be. Isn’t he afraid that I’ve stopped caring about him? Or does he know, somehow, that I can never stop caring, never stop thinking of him, because of what we created together?

  Can’t you sense whether your baby was a boy or a girl?

  I can. I know, from somewhere deep within my body, that my baby was a girl. She was born July 23. She’s ten weeks old.

  Ten weeks! It feels like nothing, no time at all. But because of all the hours I spent with my trainer in New York, I can lie back on the bed and feel my abdominal muscles; I can feel the slight hollow between my hip bones. Ten weeks ago I had a baby, and almost nobody knows but me and Renee Graham, daughter to the stars, my secret pen pal. The whole situation seems too bizarre to be real. I tuck the letter under my mattress with the others as I hear my roommates making their way down the hall.

  They’re practically bumping into each other as they rush through the door.

  “Emily,” Grace says, clapping her hands together, “yo
u’re never going to guess what we have. Wait—ohmygoodness, you are Ethan Prince’s girlfriend. Everybody saw you two outside the music room, making out like crazy. You can get in trouble for that, you know? Steph! No—Franny—show her what we have.”

  Franny’s backpack, full of books, looks like it’s going to knock her over. She hoists it onto her desk, digs through it, and pulls out a huge Ziploc bag of marijuana.

  “Guess who we got this from. You’ll never guess. Not in a million years.” Grace snatches the bag from Franny, opens it, and takes a whiff. “It’s called Mexican red hair. It was a thousand dollars.”

  Leave it to Stonybrook to have a fatally flawed banking system for its students. This is how it works: If you want money, you go to the school store, where there is basically a credit system with no limits. You need books? A new uniform? Fifty bucks for a haircut? A thousand dollars to buy primo dope? It gets put on your account, and your parents get charged at the end of the semester. The bills are itemized, but most people’s parents are so rich that nobody asks questions if their kids are taking out excessive amounts of cash—which most of the students do, for one reason or another. Last year, for instance, once I knew I was going to New York with Renee, I started systematically taking out a hundred dollars a week. My parents never batted an eye.

  “Let me guess,” I say, rolling my eyes, “you got it from Digger.”

  “WRONG!” Grace shrieks. She pauses. “Although we do have to give him a cut for turning his head the other way. It’s a long story— Anyway, we got it from Mr. Henry.”

  My mouth drops. “Mr. Henry? The intern Mr. Henry?”

  Stephanie snickers, grabbing the bag to smell it herself. “No, Em. Your dad Mr. Henry. Yes, Mr. Henry the intern.” She grins at me. “Can you freaking believe it?”