“I’m not sure, Jenny. Maybe it’s something from his childhood. Living in foster care all those years was probably really awful. Who knows what happened to him when he was a kid?”
“Maybe his sister knows,” Jenny said. “Maybe she can tell us why he’s like that.”
“Maybe,” I agreed. “I think tomorrow I will call that adoption agency and see if we can get any information about her. Or maybe I’ll just go in person. It’s harder to turn someone down when they’re standing right in front of you.”
“Can I go with you?”
I tilted her chin up, so I could look her in the eyes.
“Yes, you can go with me. We’re in this together, Jenny. Whatever happens, we’re in this together.”
I didn’t sleep much that night. I was so tired I felt halfway dead, but I still couldn’t turn off the static in my head. Brannon’s voice screamed at me. I will find you, bitch, and when I do you’re a dead woman. How could I have fallen for a man like that? How could I have been so wrong? I swore when I left Arizona that I’d never be with an abusive man again. And now here I was, running from another disastrous marriage.
I heard Jenny’s rhythmic breathing and wondered how she could sleep at all. I hoped she wouldn’t have nightmares. God knows, we were already living one.
51
Jenny
The next morning, Lorelei let me use her computer to send an e-mail to Lashaundra.
Hi, Lashaundra. Emma got your mom’s message last night. We are fine. I sure miss you. Love, Jenny.
I didn’t read all of the e-mails that filled my in box. There were just too many, almost all of them from Lashaundra.
We met MommaJean and Lily for breakfast at a place called the Steer Inn. Lily’s boys were at school. Everyone else was at work. I was glad it was just the two of them.
“How are you this morning?” MommaJean wrapped me in a hug and kissed my cheek.
“I’m okay.”
“How about you, Emma? You sleep well?”
“I’m fine,” Emma said. She didn’t look fine. Her eyes were red, her face was white, and her beautiful red hair was kind of a mess.
“You look like you could use a cup of good, strong coffee.”
MommaJean waved at the waitress.
“We want three coffees and four orange juices,” she said. “Do you want some cocoa, Jenny?”
“Yes, please.”
The waitress handed us menus and went to get our drinks.
“Now this is on me,” MommaJean said. “No, don’t even argue about it. I have eleven years to make up for with my granddaughter, and I can surely buy her breakfast.”
“You might as well let her,” Lily said, smiling at Emma. “Momma doesn’t ever take no for an answer.”
“Thank you,” Emma said quietly.
“Now, after breakfast I thought we could go to the old house, the one your mama was raised in. I thought you might want to see it.”
“Actually,” Emma said, “we have plans this morning.”
“Oh.” The old lady’s face and shoulders sagged.
“It’s just . . . we found some adoption papers in one of Brannon’s boxes. Apparently, he had a little sister. We’re going to the agency to see if we can find out anything about her.”
“Well then, we’ll go with you.” MommaJean looked pleased with the idea. “Lily has the day off, and I don’t need to open the store today.”
“I really think it’s better if we do this on our own,” Emma said. “I don’t want to overwhelm the people at the agency, or Jenny’s aunt, if we can find her.”
MommaJean opened her mouth, but before she could say anything, Lily touched her arm and shook her head.
“That’s fine,” Lily said. “You-all do what you need to do.”
The waitress returned with juice, coffee, and cocoa.
“What can I get you today?”
“I’ll have the biscuits and gravy,” MommaJean said. “With a side of potatoes.”
“Eggs Benedict,” Lily said.
“Can I have pancakes?” I asked. “With chocolate chips on top?”
Emma nodded.
“Veggie omelet, please,” she said.
“This was one of your mama’s favorite places to eat,” MommaJean said, patting my arm. “When she was in high school, she and her friends came here almost every day after school to have a Cherry Coke.”
“Is the high school close by?” Emma asked.
“Just down the road about a mile. We can go there sometime, if you want to see it.”
“Okay.”
I looked around, taking in the smells and sounds. My mother came here with her friends after school. Maybe she’d sat in this very booth.
“I’ll tell you what,” MommaJean was saying. “Maybe tomorrow I’ll take you on a whole tour of Irvington. I’ll show you where your mama went to grade school and where she got her hair cut and the old movie theater and the park. Would you like that?”
I nodded and smiled. She seemed so eager to please me.
The waitress returned and set a huge plate of pancakes in front of me, chocolate chips and whipped cream on top. They looked almost like the pancakes at Happy Days. A lump filled my throat.
“Go ahead, darlin’,” MommaJean said, “taste them.”
I took a small bite, hoping I could swallow it.
“It’s good,” I said.
“Your mama used to love pancakes,” she said. “And French toast. Next time we come here, you’ll have to get the French toast. That was her favorite.”
After breakfast, we walked to the parking lot.
“Where is this agency?” MommaJean asked.
“It’s on Churchman,” Emma said, pulling a piece of paper from her purse. “Lorelei made me a map.”
“That’s not too far,” Lily said.
“You call us when you’re done there,” MommaJean said. “We’ll have lunch, maybe at Dufour’s. How does that sound?”
“That sounds lovely,” Emma said. “But I have to say, I’m so full I’m not sure I’ll have any appetite.”
“Oh, you will once you get there,” MommaJean said. “They make their own bread. The smell alone will make you hungry.”
She wrote her phone number on the map.
“Good luck,” she said. “Call me when you’re done.”
“She’s so nice,” I said when we got in the car.
“She is,” Emma said, nodding. “She really wants you to like her.”
“It’s weird that she’s my grandma and I never even knew about her.”
“Give it time. It will start to feel normal after a while.”
We drove south for a bit and then turned west, eventually pulling into a parking lot beside a redbrick building. It felt like we were out in the country.
A receptionist smiled at us when we walked in.
“How can I help you?”
“My name is Emma Bohner,” Emma said. “We’re trying to find my husband’s sister. Her name was Jennifer Adele Bohner before she was adopted.”
“You’ll need to see Karen,” the receptionist said. “Have a seat and I’ll call her.”
We sat down in the waiting room. Pictures of happy families covered the walls.
A few minutes later, a middle-aged woman with short dark hair appeared.
“Mrs. Bohner?”
Emma rose and they shook hands.
“I’m Karen Mason. I understand you are looking for your husband’s sister?”
“Yes, ma’am. She was adopted in 1992 through your agency.”
“Come with me,” the woman said.
We followed her to a big, cluttered office, where several more pictures of couples with babies smiled down at us.
“Now then,” Ms. Mason said, “what was her name?”
“Jennifer Adele Bohner,” Emma said.
She reached in her purse, pulled out the letters I’d found in Daddy’s boxes, and handed them to Ms. Mason.
Ms. Mason put on her glasses and scanned the letters.
Then she rose and walked to one of the big file cabinets that lined the walls.
“Bohner,” she said, flipping through files. “Yes, here it is.”
She pulled a file from the drawer and sat back down at her desk.
“Mr. Bohner wrote to us three years ago, looking for information on his sister. Unfortunately, it was a closed adoption and the best I could offer was to put a letter from him in his sister’s file, in case she wanted to make contact. But we never received another letter from him.”
She looked up from the folder and smiled.
“The good news is that Jennifer did contact us last year and indicated she would be willing to meet her brother. I have a letter from her here.”
“Can I see it?” Emma asked, reaching for the envelope.
“I’m sorry,” Ms. Mason said. “It’s addressed to Brannon Bohner. I’m afraid he’s the only one who can receive it.”
“But she’s my aunt,” I said. “I’m even named after her.”
I reached into my pocket and pulled out my school ID card.
“See, Jennifer Adele Bohner, just like her.”
The woman smiled, but she still held onto the letter.
“Jennifer was very particular that only Brannon would receive the letter. She didn’t want her birth mother to find her.”
Her birth mother? How could her birth mother find her? She was dead.
“The thing is, Ms. Mason, my husband is very ill,” Emma said.
I stared at her for an instant, then dropped my eyes, trying to look sad.
“He’s in the hospital and all he wants is to meet his sister. He asked me to come.”
Ms. Mason frowned slightly.
“I’m sorry he’s sick,” she said. “What hospital is he in?”
“It’s Taylor Regional Hospital in Campbellsville, Kentucky,” Emma said. “That’s where we live.”
Ms. Mason said nothing.
“Please, Ms. Mason, Brannon needs to see his sister again, or at least talk to her. He’s afraid he’ll die without ever finding her.” Emma’s eyes were wide as she stared at the woman.
Ms. Mason sighed then.
“Do you have proof that you are his wife?”
Emma reached into her purse again and pulled out another sheet of paper.
“Here is our marriage license,” she said, laying the paper on the desk.
I tried hard not to look surprised.
Ms. Mason picked up the license and read it. Then she sighed again.
“Well, this is not the way we usually do things,” she said. “But Ms. Bohner did indicate that she would like to meet her brother.”
She rose then and held the envelope out to Emma.
“Thank you,” Emma said. “Thank you so much. You have no idea how much this means.”
“I think I do,” Ms. Mason said, smiling.
Emma shook her hand, gathered the papers she’d brought, and put them into her purse, along with the letter from Daddy’s sister.
“I can’t believe you lied to her,” I said as we pulled out of the parking lot.
“I had to,” she said. “She wouldn’t have given us the letter otherwise.”
“Can we open it?”
Emma shook her head. “Let’s wait till we get back to Lorelei’s,” she said. “I don’t want to be reading and driving at the same time.”
52
Emma
We sat on the bed and stared at the envelope. Finally, I tore it open and we read the letter. It was dated May 6, 2011.
Dear Brannon,
I found out a few months ago that you were trying to find me. I got your address from your letters to St. Elizabeth’s and wrote to you, but the letter came back. You’d moved and left no forwarding address. So, I’m putting this letter in my file, in hopes that sometime you will find it.
My name is Jennifer Monroth now. That’s my married name. My husband, Jack, and I have one child. His name is Henry and he’s two years old.
I was adopted by my parents, Mike and Monica Howard, when I was three. I’ve had a happy life with them.
I don’t remember much about before I was adopted. I was so young, and I think I blocked a lot of it out. But I remember you. I think I called you Bray, and you took care of me. I used to have terrible nightmares, and my parents took me to a counselor for several years. When I was older, they told me what they knew about our birth mother and what she did to us. I went through old newspaper records and found out that she was put in prison for child abuse. I don’t know if she’s still in jail. I hope she is.
I would really like to meet you someday. I still live in Indianapolis at the address above. My phone number is 317-555-2484.
Sincerely,
Jennifer Adele Monroth
I read the letter twice. Brannon’s mother was alive. And in prison for child abuse. Why hadn’t he told me the truth?
“Do you think that woman is still in jail?” Jenny’s voice was small.
“I don’t know, honey. But wherever she is, she can’t hurt you.”
“Daddy said she was dead.”
“I guess to him, she was dead.”
She leaned against me and I put my arm around her.
No wonder Brannon had so much anger. He’d been abused as a child. And it must have been very bad, if his mother had been put in prison.
“Poor Daddy,” Jenny whispered.
I could only nod. The lump in my throat was too big to talk through.
“Why didn’t he tell us the truth?” Jenny asked.
“I guess he just wanted to forget all about it,” I said. “It was probably easier just to make up a story.”
We sat a moment just staring at the letter.
“Are you going to call her?”
“I think we should,” I said.
“When?”
I took a deep breath and stood up. “Now.”
I went to the kitchen and dialed the number on the letter. After three rings, a woman’s voice answered. “Hello.”
“Hello,” I said. “Is this Jennifer Monroth?”
“Yes.” The voice was cautious. “Who is this?”
“My name is Emma Bohner,” I said. “My husband is Brannon Bohner.”
The line was silent for so long I was afraid she’d hung up.
“Oh my God!” she said finally. “Oh my God.”
“I’m in Indianapolis,” I said. “And I would really like to meet you.”
“Is Brannon with you?”
“No,” I said. “He’s in Kentucky. That’s where we live now. I just came up . . . to visit family and I told him I’d check in at St. Elizabeth’s to see if we could find you.”
“Oh my God,” she said again. “Where in Indy are you?”
“On the east side,” I said. “A neighborhood called Irvington.”
“I know where that is,” she said. “We took my son to the Halloween festival there last fall.”
“So, do you think we could meet?”
I held my breath. Beside me, Jenny was shaking.
“I would love that,” Jennifer said. “I can come up there this afternoon, if that works for you.”
“That would be great. What time?”
“Is four okay? Henry, that’s my little boy, he has a doctor’s appointment at two. We could come after that.”
“Perfect.”
“There’s a coffee shop in Irvington; it’s on that little side street by the theater, right across from the bookstore.”
“I know where that is.”
“Great, I’ll see you at four. And . . . I’m sorry, what is your name again?”
“It’s Emma,” I said.
“Okay, Emma. I’ll see you at four.”
I hung up the phone and wrapped my arms around Jenny.
“We’re meeting her at four.”
“Here you are!” MommaJean waved to us from a table in the little restaurant. “How was your morning?”
“It was . . . interesting.”
We sat down and she
hugged Jenny.
“What did you find out?”
“Actually, a lot,” I said. “Brannon’s sister had left a letter for him with the agency. I called her and we’re meeting today at four at the coffee shop, the one across from your store.”
“So you’re going to have even more new family?”
Jenny nodded.
“Well, that’s exciting. Aren’t you excited?”
Jenny nodded again.
“You don’t look very excited.”
Jenny stared at her hands in her lap.
“It’s just all so weird,” she said. “I didn’t even know Daddy had a sister until a few weeks ago. He never told me about her. But she has the same name as me.”
MommaJean shook her head.
“Seems like there’s a lot about your daddy he hasn’t told you.”
“We found out that Brannon and his sister were put in foster care because their birth mother was abusive,” I said.
“She’s in prison,” Jenny said.
“Good Lord!” MommaJean’s eyes opened wide. “That’s awful.”
“It’s pretty bad,” I agreed.
“So is this sister younger than Brannon or older?”
“Younger,” I said. “She got adopted, but Brannon didn’t.”
“Well, that explains a lot, doesn’t it?”
“What does it explain?” Jenny asked.
MommaJean shifted in her seat and cleared her throat.
“I don’t want to talk bad about your daddy,” she said. “But he had a dark side. When Hailey married him she was head over heels in love, happier than I’d seen her in a long time. But . . . well, that didn’t last.
“She didn’t want to tell me at first, how he’d get so mad sometimes he’d hit her. I tried to convince her to leave him, but then she got pregnant and she said he changed. He was real gentle with her then, she said, like when they first met.”
“Did you ever meet Brannon?” I asked.
She shook her head.
“I didn’t even know his name till after she married him. She called me sometimes just to let me know she was okay. But I never saw her again. Not once. After her last letter, I tried to get the police to look for her. But they didn’t do much. They said she was an adult, and the only one who could report her missing was her husband, because that’s who she lived with.”
The Seventh Mother Page 30
