by Cris Anson
“Just what is your purpose, Fantine? You walked into Thor’s Hammer so businesslike and no-nonsense, went right up to Soren and shook hands, put a frown on his face. Now here you are with a briefcase over your shoulder, looking like someone with an axe to grind, or papers to serve. What the hell kind of game are you playing?”
“No. Let me ask you what your game is. Tell me, is your name really Don?”
He raked his hands through his thick, dark hair, reminding Fantine of how it felt to have all that smooth silk flowing through her fingers. Then, as a glaring truth slammed into her, she felt as if a crippling bolt of lightning had powered throughout her body, and barely managed to keep her knees from buckling.
“You’re a Thorvald too.” Her spine straightened. “Around the mouth, the strong jaw. It wasn’t apparent before because I wasn’t looking for it, and it was so dark in the pub. The stark difference in coloration would throw one off too. But the resemblance is there when I see all of you together. You all have the same way of cocking your head when you’re listening, the same way of planting your feet in a stubborn stance.”
“I know I should have explained away the ‘Don’ bit, but it didn’t seem pertinent at the time. I didn’t mean to pull a fast one on you, it just happened that, uh, other things got in the way.”
Fantine felt the blood leave her face. He’d all but admitted it, but she needed to hear the truth spoken, not just assumed. There might be other Thorvalds. “Are you—” she almost couldn’t articulate it, “Rolf Thorvald?”
“Yeah. I’m sorry if I…”
She didn’t hear the rest of his apology. What screamed in her mind was, the man she’d welcomed into her body and her heart was Rosalie Dwyer’s grandson.
“Why don’t we all sit down,” the bartender said. “And start from the beginning. Ms. Mercier?”
He gestured to an upholstered chair and Fantine gratefully sat. He positioned Don—no, she had to get used to thinking of him as Rolf—in the center of the sofa then he and Magnus flanked him, as though guarding him. That, she could understand. She was sure they knew, or at least suspected, what her news would be and wanted to protect him, to support him.
Taking a deep breath, she began, “I’m here at the request of an old woman named Rosalie Dwyer. She and my grandmother were lifelong friends and I love her as much as I love my own grandmother.”
Fantine took a moment to study the three brothers arrayed before her on the long, navy blue sofa. Yes, more and more she could see the resemblance, if she discounted the shades of hair and skin and eyes.
“A few weeks ago she came into possession of a letter written to her long-dead son back in 1979. I won’t bore you with what resources I used to research the question raised in this letter, but that search has led me here. If I may, I would like to ask you some questions about your family.”
Rolf looked wary. The other two looked—resigned? The wood sculptor nodded, so she continued.
“Your mother’s name is Alana Thorvald?”
“Yes, but you already know that.” Magnus seemed to be appointed spokesman.
“Is she still alive? If so, do you have a current address for her?”
“We think she’s in Alaska, but we haven’t yet tracked down exactly where she lives.”
“Does the name Randolph Dwyer mean anything to you?”
The brothers exchanged looks, shrugged. Magnus answered. “Never heard of him.”
Fantine took a deep breath, opened her attaché case and withdrew the letter, still in its faded blue envelope. “This is the letter she found.”
Magnus grabbed it. She watched his face as he noted the postmark, the initials on the envelope’s flap, then read the letter. He seemed to pale. Swallowed hard. Handed it to Rolf.
“Here, Bro. Looks like Mom’s handwriting, from what I can remember.” He leaned back on the sofa and casually draped an arm across the back of it, obviously ready to support Rolf—or restrain him.
Rolf stared at the blue scalloped paper, read it over several times. Fantine could see moisture spiking his lower eyelashes as he blinked repeatedly. “Mom,” he whispered. Raising his head, he looked at Magnus. “That’s why Dad hated me.”
As Soren took the letter from Rolf’s unresisting hand to read, Magnus grabbed Rolf in a loving headlock and drew him to his chest. “This doesn’t change a thing,” he growled. “You’re still our baby brother. You hear?”
“Rolf,” Soren said from his other side, leaning toward him and stroking his shoulder. “We’re with you all the way.”
But Rolf shrugged them both off and stood up, wobbling a little.
It wasn’t my fault. It wasn’t my fault. The refrain reverberated in Rolf’s head like a mantra. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. His father—or rather, Erik Thorvald—had heaped his anger on Rolf because his mom had abandoned them so she could be with her lover. To be with Rolf’s real father. All these years he’d thought she left because she didn’t love him, because there was something wrong with him.
Then why hadn’t she ever come back for him? Why hadn’t he claimed him?
Wait a minute. What had Fantine said early on? He replayed in his mind what he’d only half paid attention to…she’d said something like, the old woman had found a letter from her long-dead son. Long-dead son.
He spun on his heel, pinned his gaze to Fantine. “How did this woman’s son die?”
“A plane crashed while trying to land at one of the Alaskan Pipeline pump stations.”
“When did it happen?”
“I think it was late 1981. Late November, early December maybe. I remember how we were putting up Christmas decorations when we were told. I’ll get the precise date for you.”
Turning back to Magnus, he demanded, “When did Mom leave?”
Magnus stared at him with a strange expression. “November 24, 1981.”
Rolf leaned against the wall, allowed his back to slide down until his butt hit the floor, his legs sprawled awkwardly in front of him. “It sounds like they never connected. She got there and there was no one to meet her. No one to take care of her. And she couldn’t go back home to face Da—Erik.”
Soren came to him, sat down alongside him on the floor, shoulders touching Rolf’s in a gesture of solidarity. “Easy, Bro. We don’t know exactly what happened. See, that’s all the more reason for us to track Mom down. She might want to reach out to us but figures it’s too late, that she’d disrupt our lives.”
“Well hell, why should she worry about it now when she’d already disrupted all our lives so many years ago?”
Magnus joined them, flowing gracefully down into a lotus position on Rolf’s other side. “It all makes sense to me now. She thought by disrupting our lives for a short time, she’d give us all a better life in the long run. Only it didn’t turn out that way.” He slapped his palms against his knees. “That settles it. I’m going to Alaska.”
Rolf’s head whipped around.
“It’s the only way. I’ll arrange to meet the investigator in Anchorage and we’ll take the last steps together. I won’t be able to sleep nights if I don’t make the effort.”
He slung an arm around Rolf’s shoulder. “Meanwhile, Bro, you have a grandmother to meet.”
Rolf couldn’t get his mind to process that. A grandmother. He had a grandmother, a woman who would be able to tell him all about his father. A father who maybe had black hair and brown eyes, like him. A father who, maybe, had loved him after he’d gotten the letter from his mom announcing Rolf’s birth.
From what seemed a great distance away, he heard Soren’s voice saying, “Let’s go downstairs. Chef should have the coffee urn perking by now. Rolf probably needs some time alone.”
Alone. Rolf would never have to feel alone again. He had a father. He had a father.
* * * * *
Fantine sat at the restaurant’s kitchen counter sipping an excellent cup of coffee, silently mulling over Don’s—no! Rolf’s—reaction. He’d want to meet Nonie, s
he was sure of it. And if she was honest with herself, she was happy that they’d still be in contact with each other. She’d fallen for his bad-boy charm, to say nothing of the dynamite sex, but now she understood him a bit more. Now maybe the yearning she’d sensed in him would have a target.
She chanced a glance at the two older Thorvald brothers standing at the far end of the kitchen, giving her the space she’d requested with her body language. They seemed to accept the fact of Rolf’s parentage, perhaps even expected it. And she, too, had to accept the fact that she’d screwed the man Nonie had sent her to search for.
She stroked the attaché case lying before her on the counter. She hoped they would all be interested in its contents once Rolf came downstairs.
Halfway through her second cup of coffee, she heard slow footsteps coming down the stairs from Soren’s apartment. Taking a deep breath, Fantine swiveled on her stool to watch Rolf enter the pub’s kitchen.
His eyes searched for then locked on hers. He walked up to her, embraced her wordlessly. She could feel the slight trembling in his arms.
“Thank you,” he said, pulling back slightly. “Now a lot of stuff makes sense.”
It might have been her imagination because of the emotional intensity of the moment, but Fantine could swear he had a different light in his eyes, a straighter spine. “I brought a photo album, if you’d be interested—”
“Yes!” Rolf drew up an adjoining stool and perched on it.
The brothers came up behind them. Fantine opened her case and withdrew a battered album, its outdated black sheets holding yellowing photographs pinned in place by old-fashioned paste-on corners. Lovingly she pointed to photos of her own grandmother with Nonie, of both women cuddling infants in their arms.
Rolf reached out and flipped to the last filled page. “I need to see what he looked like as my Mom would have—”
And there it was, her favorite photo of Uncle Randolph, a head-and-shoulders shot from the seventies that showed his dark eyes, thick sideburns and unruly, long, dark hairstyle then in vogue. She watched as Rolf lightly traced the outline with a trembling finger.
“Yes,” he murmured.
Yes, she silently agreed. Father and son.
After a moment she turned the pages back to the beginning and took them through photos showing Randolph in various stages of growth, his high school graduation, posing in some of the far-off places he’d been with people she didn’t know, and the last precious few of him in Alaska.
“Wait! Turn back that page.”
Fantine did as Magnus requested, and he pointed to a photo of Randolph with a lovely blonde woman. “That’s Mom,” he murmured.
“Oh my God,” Rolf gasped. Fantine saw him swallow hard. “A picture of my mom and my dad together.
“I want to meet her, Fantine. I want to meet my grandmother. I need to know all about my father.” He turned to Magnus. “And I want you to find Mom. I need to know what happened to her.”
“So do we all, Rolf. So do we all.”
Chapter Eight
“You’re really good at handling this rig,” said Rolf as Fantine steered the RV up the ribbon of road undulating through the hills of Warren County in northwestern New Jersey. She had been driving for close to two hours now and he had been peppering her with questions the entire time.
“I’ve had almost twenty thousand miles of practice,” she responded. “Besides, it’s small, as RVs go. It’s only twenty-three feet long. It’s just a big truck. Or a very small bus.”
“Most women would be intimidated. Aren’t you afraid of anything?”
“You mean like spiders?”
Rolf chuckled. “Anything. Spiders, lightning, heights…bad boys.”
It was Fantine’s turn to chuckle. Then her eyes darkened. “The only thing I’m afraid of is losing Nonie too soon.”
Rolf’s head turned sharply to her. “Is she sick?”
“No, but after all, she is eighty-five years old. And slowing down. Her old house has eleven-foot-high high ceilings. Which makes for a long stairway. I’m trying to convince her to move her bedroom downstairs so she doesn’t have to climb eighteen steps every night and morning. It’s the arthritis in her knees. She complains it keeps her from doing too much in her garden. But she has no major health problems, thank heaven.”
He leaned toward her. “Was she really excited when you told her?”
Fantine laughed outright. “Having just mentioned her arthritic knees, I’m sure she danced all across the house. She can’t wait to meet you. I hope she doesn’t hyperventilate before we get there.”
She glanced at a road sign and flicked on her right blinker. “It won’t be long now.”
Rolf sat forward in his seat as much as the seat belt would allow, and looked eagerly out through the windshield. A quiet town with many lushly green street trees rolled by his view until she turned into the driveway of a stately colonial home with several chimneys, a wraparound porch, and dark green shutters gracing every window.
“It’s pretty big. Does she live here alone?”
“Yes. I’ve suggested she get a smaller place, but she’s lived here since her marriage and doesn’t want to move. All the comforting memories, she says.”
“A lot of upkeep.”
“She has a woman come in twice a week. Besides cleaning, she makes some freezer-to-oven meals for Nonie, especially during the summer when I’m traveling. Speaking of which, that’s where I store my RV when I’m not using it. My car’s inside there now.” Fantine indicated a carriage house in the rear.
“Do you live nearby?” he asked, taking in the white beaded-board siding, a glass-walled sunroom jutting out from the back of the house, a flower garden in the large rear yard.
“I have a townhouse about twenty minutes north of here, closer to the college where I work.” She braked, put the RV in park and killed the ignition. “We’ve arrived.”
She turned in her seat to face him, reached out a hand to his. “Welcome home, Rolf.”
Swallowing hard, he said, “Let’s go.”
Instead of using the formal front entrance, Fantine led him around the back and through the unlocked door of a light- and plant-filled room.
She was struggling to get out of a wicker armchair when he first laid eyes on her.
His grandmother.
Rolf felt as if his shoes had stuck to a blob of warm tar. He couldn’t move.
“Rolf?” Her voice was timid as she lifted her arms in welcome. “Come here.”
Like a kite pulled by the wind, Rolf jerked forward then stopped abruptly. What should he call her? Nonie? Grandmother? Rosalie?
“Rolf. My grandson.” Her voice picked up volume as he approached.
She was a little peanut of a thing, ten or a dozen inches shorter than himself and a far cry from Fantine’s voluptuous roundness. If he hugged her, she’d get squashed. Spontaneously, he sank to one knee and grabbed her hands. “Nonie. My grandmother.” He bent his head and kissed her gnarled, arthritic fingers.
His throat constricted. He couldn’t say another word. His grandmother. The woman who gave birth to his father, who raised the man to be an adventurer working in Alaska. Her blood ran in his veins.
He felt her hand on his head like a benediction. He looked up, feeling the sting of tears as he noted her dark eyes, short white hair and sharp cheekbones, the lines and wrinkles bespeaking her age. “Nonie.” Rising, he said, “You’re beautiful.”
She laughed then, a hearty sound that echoed Fantine’s lusty laugh, and he wondered if that’s where Fantine had learned it. “You flatterer, you’re just like your father.”
Rolf’s knees almost buckled. “Am I? Am I like him? How? Tell me everything.”
She gazed up at him. “You have his hair, that’s for sure. And the shape of the eyebrows. The set-back ears.” She touched a finger to his cheek. “The shape of your jaw, though. It’s stronger than Randolph’s.”
“That’s how I knew he was a Thorvald,” Fantine added
. “Seeing the three of them together, you knew they—” She must have realized that whatever she said would be awkward, because she continued with, “Why don’t we sit down?”
“Right, right,” said Rolf. Of course the old woman was frail. He should have been more aware of her physical state. For too long he’d been concerned only about himself and his desires. His brothers—he gulped then corrected, his half brothers—could take care of themselves. This old woman needed him.
He didn’t think he’d ever been needed before. It was a daunting feeling.
He liked it.
“There’s lemonade in the fridge,” Nonie was saying as she sat back down on one of four cushioned wicker armchairs surrounding a low, chrome-and-glass table.
“I’ll get it.” Fantine disappeared into the less sunny portion of the house.
Just then the fattest cat he’d ever seen meandered into the sunroom and sniffed at Rolf’s shoes. He bent down to scratch behind the cat’s ears.
“That’s Hercules. Come here, you little sweetheart.”
Hercules meowed, opened his mouth wide in a yawn, and wandered back out of the room. “Pretty independent, isn’t he?”
“He’s been my companion for almost ten years. He’ll warm up to you, just wait and see. You won’t be able to get rid of him.”
Rolf sat in an adjoining wicker chair, forearms resting on his knees, his gaze pinned to hers. “Nonie.” He tasted the name on his tongue. Then laughed. “Grandmom. Grandmother. Nana. Grammy. Nonie.”
Smiling, she reached for his hand. “Nonie is sufficient.”
He grabbed it, relishing the connection, feeling the calluses from what Fantine had told him were her hours in the garden. “No,” he said softly. “It’s not sufficient. It’s wonderful. Spectacular. Marvelous. I can’t really find the words.”
Fantine returned and slid a tray on the table. Rolf reached out a hand to her while still holding one of Nonie’s. “Thank you. For finding me. For…” He stopped, choked up. “For everything.”
Fantine slid a cool hand down the side of his face. He closed his eyes and leaned his cheek into her palm. When he opened them again he thought he caught the tail end of Nonie’s sharp stare before she glanced away.
