“Jen, wait,” Bryan said, but she’d left the room.
Dread filled his heart as he followed her down the hall.
“Go away.” Nicki’s muffled voice reached Bryan as he watched Jennifer enter her room.
“As soon as I’ve told you a few things.” Jennifer’s voice was firm, strong. He had a feeling it was the only thing about her that was.
Nicki was lying on her bed, her head buried under her pillow when he entered the room.
Jennifer was sitting on the bed beside her. She reached out, her hand hovering over Nicki’s back before it slowly descended. Nicki flinched as Jennifer touched her. Jennifer’s hand stilled, but she didn’t remove it from Nicki’s back. After a couple of seconds, she started to move it again, rubbing it slowly up and down the child’s spine. Just as slowly, she started to speak.
“I made some major mistakes when I was growing up, Nicki, but none that I regretted as much as I did giving you up. But I was little more than a child myself when I had you. And a pretty mixed-up child at that.”
Nicki lay as still as a statue, obviously listening to every word. Bryan swallowed, his throat thick as he watched mother and child, as he listened to the woman he loved lay herself open to the child who had just rejected her.
“You see, I didn’t have the same kind of childhood you did. My parents didn’t love me like yours loved you. I never felt special—just in the way. I was a mistake, like your friend Sally. My parents were already in their mid-forties when I came along, and I grew up as little more than an intrusion in their lives. I spent the first fifteen years of my life trying to please them, but what I didn’t realize was that my mere presence was displeasing to them, no matter what I did.” Jennifer’s voice wavered, and she stopped speaking for a moment, but she didn’t stop touching her daughter.
Bryan watched that contact, suspecting that they both needed it more than either of them would be willing to admit.
“My parents forgot my fifteenth birthday. There was no celebration waiting when I got home from school, not even a card propped on the counter. So I waited for them to come home from work, thinking they were planning to take me out to dinner. I hoped it would be to one of those places where they bring you a little cake and sing ‘Happy Birthday.’ I really wanted that little cake.”
She smiled ruefully. “They didn’t come. But Billy Wilson did. He was one of the most popular boys in school and we’d gone out a few times. I could hardly believe it when he said he actually wanted me to be his girlfriend. I had no idea what he saw in me. My clothes weren’t fashionable, my face was plain, my mother was constantly telling me I was too tall—I kept growing out of my pants. But here was Billy, on my birthday, with a bouquet of flowers just for me.
“He told me he loved me, and I was so starved to hear the words that I believed him.”
Jennifer stopped, tears brimming in her eyes, but she blinked them away. Bryan stood by the wall, his hands clenched behind him. He didn’t want to hear any more.
“He told me that if I loved him back, I’d do whatever he wanted me to do…”
Bryan ground his teeth together.
“Two weeks later he was spreading it around school what I’d done. The boys all looked at me differently, made nasty remarks. The girls shied away from me. What little bit of faith I’d had in myself was gone. I felt completely worthless.”
Nicki turned over, her eyes accusing. “So that was my father?” she asked. “A stupid selfish boy who wasn’t even very nice?”
Bryan could cheerfully have gagged his niece. Jennifer had been through enough just in retelling the story. She’d obviously already judged herself a million times and come up wanting. She didn’t need her daughter’s condemnation on top of that.
“No.”
What? Bryan straightened in the doorway.
“Then who was?” Nicki asked, still accusing.
“His name was Tommy Mason. He worked for my father. He was Billy’s best friend. Or at least he was until Billy turned on me. Tommy came to my rescue. He told me how beautiful I was, how sweet to have cared so much for Billy, to have trusted him so much. After a while we started dating. Tommy had a lot of money for a boy his age, and he spent most of it on me. He was always doing little things to make me feel special. It was only later that I learned he was just like Billy, except that he’d invested more into getting what he was after because he had more at stake.”
Jennifer stared into space, and Bryan knew that he and Nicki had lost her to a time before either of them had been a part of her life. Her face was twisted in a grimace of self-loathing so strong it was hard for Bryan to believe she was the same woman he’d known all these months.
Nicki just sat silently, a one-child jury who’d already convicted the defendant.
“They had a—” Jennifer stopped as a single tear slid down her cheek. She closed her eyes. “A bet. If I’d do it with Tommy, Billy would give him ten dollars. If not, Tommy owed Billy.”
Bryan’s dinner was about to come up on him.
“Why’d he spend all that money on you if he was only gonna win ten dollars?” Nicki asked. Her eyes were softer, not forgiving, exactly, but more like the Nicki he knew.
“It wasn’t the money that was at stake, it was his ego. He had to win to prove to his buddies that he was as much a man as Billy was.”
“So what’d he do when you told him, you know, about me?”
Jennifer smoothed the hair away from her daughter’s brow. “He said he wasn’t your father. He told my parents that he hadn’t been the first boy I’d been with, and that he was sure he hadn’t been the last. He claimed that there was no way even I could know who your father was.”
“What did they say?”
“They believed him.”
Bryan left the room. The anger surging through him frightened him. He didn’t want to do something he’d regret, especially in front of Nicki. His fists ached to smash into something, preferably this Tommy Mason’s face.
Pacing out in the hall, he heard his niece ask, “Was it the truth?”
“No,” Jennifer said firmly. “After Billy, there was only Tommy, and only that one time.”
Bryan had to stop himself from putting his fist through the wall.
“That still doesn’t explain why you couldn’t keep me.” Nicki wasn’t ready to forgive her for that. Bryan wasn’t sure she ever would be. In her eyes, Jennifer had abandoned her, regardless of how happy Nicki had ultimately been.
He couldn’t stand by and let her torture Jennifer anymore. “Let’s give it a rest, eh, Nick?” he said, coming back into the room.
Jennifer shook her head at him. “It’s okay. She has to know the truth if she’s ever going to understand.”
Bryan didn’t like it, but he leaned against the doorjamb and let her continue.
“I gave you away because I loved you, Nicki.”
“How can you say that?” Nicki’s look was hard again.
“Because it’s true.” The peace that settled across Jennifer’s face surprised Bryan almost as much as her next words did. “I nearly changed my mind, you know.”
“You did?”
She did?
“Uh-huh.” Jennifer smiled sadly. “I’d given in to my parents early on in my pregnancy, agreeing to give you up before you were more than a speck in my belly. They wouldn’t give me a second’s peace, telling me they wouldn’t have any part of my baby—”
Bryan could just imagine the terms they’d probably used to describe the child Jennifer had been carrying.
“—and they weren’t going to have any part of me, either, if I didn’t do what they said. I was scared. I was young. I wasn’t even old enough to get a work permit or drive a car. I didn’t see how I could take care of myself, let alone a baby. So I did just what I’d always done. I gave in to them and agreed to give you up for adoption.
“But a funny thing happened during those months I carried you. You became the light of my life, the best thing that had ever happ
ened to me. You taught me what love was all about for the very first time. Every time you kicked me, I’d feel like smiling, and when you moved in the middle of the night, waking me up, I’d sit up and play with you, trying to get you to move some more. You were mine. And I wanted to take care of you and protect you for the rest of my life.”
“So why didn’t you?” Nicki asked.
“I did,” Jennifer said softly, “I had to have you by cesarean, and so I was unconscious when you were born, but that night, the night before I was due to leave the hospital, I talked a young nurse into bringing you in to me. I hadn’t signed the papers yet that would release you to someone else, and I didn’t intend to ever do so. But when I held you in my arms—” tears filled Jennifer’s eyes, but she was still smiling at Nicki “—you were so small, so defenseless, so precious, I knew I couldn’t take you home to that unhappy house. You deserved so much more. I couldn’t bear to think of you growing up the way I had, with my parents frowning their disapproval upon you. And secretly I was afraid that maybe I’d be like them. I didn’t know any more about raising a baby than they did, and I might be just as awful at it. After all, I’d failed at everything else I’d ever tried. It was then I knew I couldn’t keep you. So I made a promise, instead.”
“A promise?”
“I promised God that if He’d give you a happy loving family, I’d let you go. I wouldn’t look for you, or bother you, and I wouldn’t ever replace you, either.”
Bryan finally understood. More than just a fear of being a bad parent had kept Jennifer from registering to find Nicki. She’d made a pact with God, and if she broke her half, He might not uphold His. Bryan had never felt such a surge of love for the woman he wanted to make his wife.
Nicki looked at Jennifer, as if not quite sure how she felt anymore. “So when did you get rich?”
“After I got out of college. I took over my parents’ business and for the first time in my life I did something right.”
Nicki nodded. She still didn’t look at Bryan—she hadn’t since she’d run out of the living room—but she’d certainly calmed down.
“Can I ask you something?”
Jennifer brushed her fingers along Nicki’s arm as if she couldn’t get enough of touching her. “Sure.”
“How long have you known who I was?”
“I just found out tonight.”
“You did? You mean you didn’t know when you were nice to me at the beach, when you bought me that swimsuit? You did that just because you liked me?”
“Just because I like you, sweetie. You’re a pretty special young lady.”
Nicki shrugged off Jennifer’s praise, as if not quite sure how much weight it carried. “So Uncle Bryan just told you tonight?”
Bryan suddenly wondered how she had found out. He’d been so concerned about her reaction to the news that it hadn’t dawned on him to wonder how she’d come by it.
“No. This did.” Jennifer pulled a picture out of the pocket of her dress and handed it to Nicki.
“It’s me!” Nicki said, gazing in awe at the battered photo. “It’s the same picture we have in the album.”
Jennifer nodded, tears in her eyes again.
“You mean you didn’t know until I turned that page and you saw this picture?”
“That’s right.”
“Omigosh,” Nicki said, looking at the picture again. “How come it’s so beat-up?”
“It’s been through twelve years of my life with me, honey, every hour of every day.”
“Always?” Nicki asked, her expression defenseless all of a sudden.
“Always.”
Nicki’s gaze was glued to Jennifer’s; Bryan had a feeling they didn’t even know he was still there. “You must have loved me an awful lot.”
Jennifer smiled. “With all my heart, Nick.”
“Is it okay if I hug you?” Nicki asked, suddenly awkward as she finally looked at Jennifer in a new light.
“I thought you’d never ask,” Jennifer said, gathering her daughter into her arms for the first time in twelve years.
Bryan slipped from the room.
THE DINING-ROOM TABLE was strewn with the makings of a miniature double-winged biplane, similar to the one the Wright brothers flew. Bryan had always admired them, not only because their early experimentation had opened up the skies, but because of their quest to have their freedom no matter what the cost.
Freedom had always meant that much to him, as well. More than a home, more than a wife or children, more than possessions. He left Nicki in with Jennifer, left them to forge a relationship that didn’t include him, and went out to work on his plane. It was ridiculous for him to feel left out. He had no reason to feel threatened. And lonely wasn’t a feeling he’d ever had time for. There was always that unknown something beckoning him from just over the next hill. So why couldn’t he hear its call now?
He split a piece of balsa with his razor-blade knife. He could finish the plane with just a few more hours’ work. He was anxious to see how it flew. Maybe he and Nicki could take it to the coast over the weekend and send it up over the ocean. A day alone with Nicki sounded good to him. He had a plan. With renewed purpose, he set to work.
NICKI FOUND HIM in the dining room after spending an incredible hour getting to know her birth mother. He was so intent on the little piece of wood he was shaping he didn’t even notice her. Figured.
She moved closer to the table and picked up a packet of glue.
His head shot up. The wood in his fingers cracked into two pieces. Nicki held her breath. She’d heard him swear before when that happened. And this time she’d caused it.
“Where’s Jennifer?” he asked.
Nicki felt funny having him refer to her mother by her given name, and yet, she didn’t know what else to call her. She couldn’t call her Mom. Not ever. She already had a Mom. She felt guilty even thinking about it, like she was hurting Mom by even knowing Jennifer.
“Nicki? Did Jen leave?” he asked, getting up from the table.
“No. She’s still in my bedroom. She said I had to come talk to you.” Nicki hadn’t wanted to, she’d just wanted to leave, but Jennifer hadn’t budged.
“I’m sorry this was all such a shock to you, honey. I wouldn’t upset you for the world, you know that, don’t you?”
Nicki shrugged. She didn’t know what to think.
He came around the table and put his arm around her. It felt so good to have him hold her, but something made her shrug his arm away.
“Hey!” He knelt down in front of her. “What’s going on here, Nick? We’re a team, you and me, remember?”
“If we’re a team, then why didn’t you tell me the truth about her?”
He hesitated, and Nicki knew he was trying to think up something to tell her. Which meant he wasn’t going to tell her the truth.
“I was going to tell you, honey. I just wanted to make sure you liked her first. I planned to tell both of you tonight, except that I had to work late.”
He’d known she was her birth mother for months. Even back when all that mattered had been finding her other mother, he’d already known who she was.. And he’d told Nicki he was still looking. Even on her birthday he’d said that.
He’d lied to her. And that hurt so bad she didn’t even want to look at him.
“I want to go stay with her.”
“What? Why?” He jumped up, clutching her shoulders as if he could keep her with him by sheer force. “You don’t need to leave here. We live close enough for you to visit her every day if you want to.”
“You’re hurting me!” Nicki said, trying to pull away.
“Sorry.” He loosened his hold, but he didn’t let go of her. He rubbed her shoulders softly with his fingers until they felt better. But she didn’t. He’d lied to her.
“I don’t want to visit her, I want to stay with her, find out what she’s like.”
“You can spend a couple of nights with her, I guess, if that’s what you want. It’s summer
and you wouldn’t be missing any school.” He went back to the table, picking up a new piece of balsa wood and his littlest pair of scissors.
He’d given in so easily Nicki almost started to cry. But she wasn’t going to do that. Not in front of him. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t. It wasn’t like she hadn’t known, anyway. Uncle Bryan was a free spirit; he was used to being on his own. She’d thought maybe he’d changed, that with Jennifer around he’d want to settle down, but her birth mother had just told Nicki that she and Uncle Bryan weren’t going to be seeing each other anymore. She hadn’t said why, but Nicki figured it was because Uncle Bryan wanted it that way. He was always the one who broke things off.
Nicki figured she’d better go before he broke things off with her, too. She couldn’t stand to stay, worrying about when he’d do it. She’d been worried for months about cramping him. And now she had Lucy, too. But she also, finally, had someplace else she could go.
“I don’t want to just visit her,” she said again. “I want to move in with her. Lucy, too.”
He didn’t even look up. “You can’t do that, Nick. You belong with me.” His voice sounded strange. Faraway. Was he paying attention to her at all?
“No, I don’t. I’m not really a Chambers. Or a Hubbard, either. I’m a Teal. I want to go live with my real mother.” It killed Nicki even to say the words. She held her breath, waiting for Uncle Bryan to tell her she was wrong, to take her in his big strong arms and tell her he’d never let her go.
He was quiet for so long Nicki wondered if he’d forgotten her. He worked on his little piece of wood until he got it just right and then glued it to the front of the model he was building. It was another airplane—an open one with two wings on each side. It would probably be fun to fly. They could put a little man in the cockpit and then they’d have to fly it almost perfect or the man would fall out.
“Is it okay with Jennifer?”
She jumped when he finally spoke. He’d never used that voice with her before, like she was someone he didn’t know very well. Was he already that glad to be rid of her?
“Yes.” At least she hoped it was. She’d only asked her birth mother if she could spend the night with her.
The Birth Mother Page 21
