by Isobel Bird
“Yes,” said Aunt Sarah. “She and your father talked about it, and she decided to have it.” She laughed. “It seems strange now, but you wouldn’t believe what we went through to keep the fact that she was pregnant a secret from your grandparents.”
“Why did it have to be a secret?” asked Annie.
“Oh,” Aunt Sarah said, “your mother’s father was very strict. He would have totally flipped out if he’d known.”
“How could you hide something like that?” Annie asked.
“It wasn’t easy, believe me,” said Aunt Sarah. “Luckily, her family lived far away. The only time your mother had to go home was at Christmas, and she wasn’t very big yet. She had the baby in May, and your grandparents never knew. Only our family did, and we all agreed never to talk about it.”
Annie was dumbfounded. She couldn’t even begin to take in everything she was hearing. Her mother had had another baby. “What happened to it?” she asked.
“She gave it up for adoption,” said Aunt Sarah. “She and Peter knew that they weren’t ready to be parents yet. They were just starting out. So she agreed to let someone adopt it who could take care of it and give it a loving home.”
Aunt Sarah was looking at Annie closely. “I know this is hard to hear,” she said. “I’d sort of decided never to tell you girls about it. But for some reason I think you should know.”
Annie nodded. “I’m glad you told me,” she said. Then another question came to her. “What was it?” she asked. “The baby, I mean. Was it a boy or a girl?”
“A girl,” Aunt Sarah said. “And Annie, anything you want to know about this, just ask.”
Annie nodded. She heard her aunt, but she wasn’t really listening. She was too busy thinking about what the news meant. A sister, she thought. I have another sister somewhere.
CHAPTER 13
Cooper picked at the piece of bread in her hand, taking tiny pieces and popping them into her mouth. She didn’t even taste it as she chewed, but the repetitive motion of grinding it between her teeth made her feel better. It gave her something to concentrate on while she figured out how to say what she needed to say.
“How’s your dinner?”
Cooper looked up. Across the table, her father was looking at her with a concerned expression. He had already eaten half of the chicken marsala he’d ordered, and he was busily cutting up the remaining portion. He looked meaningfully at Cooper’s sea bass, which remained mostly untouched.
“Oh, it’s great,” said Cooper, attempting to sound enthusiastic. She picked up her fork and jabbed the sea bass with it, taking a big bite. “Mmm,” she said as she swallowed it.
“Okay,” said her father. “You’re not fooling me. What’s going on?”
Cooper put down the fork. She took a sip of water from her glass. Finally, there was nothing else she could do to distract herself.
“It’s Mom,” she said, knowing that now that she’d begun the conversation she was going to have to see it through.
“Your mother?” her father said. “What about her?”
Cooper sat back in her chair. She and her father were at La Mer, one of the city’s nicest restaurants. Normally, Cooper loved the place, with its chic but comfortable decor and the blue lights that made it look as if patrons were dining under water. But tonight they might as well have been at Burger King.
“She’s really depressed,” Cooper said.
Her father nodded. “That’s to be expected,” he said. “A divorce is really difficult on everyone, even when you know it’s the right thing.”
“It’s more than that,” said Cooper. She paused, not sure if she should tell him the rest. “She’s been drinking.”
Her father looked up, concern in his eyes. “Drinking?” he said. “Your mother doesn’t drink. I mean, she’ll have wine with dinner, or maybe a cocktail every so often, but she doesn’t drink very much.”
“She does now,” Cooper informed him. She told him about finding her mother practically passed out on the sofa on Friday night. She also told him about the conversation she’d tried to have with her when she got back from Jane’s, a conversation that had not gone well at all.
“What did she say?” he asked.
“She told me she was fine,” replied Cooper. “She said she’d just had a few drinks to unwind after a long day.” She shook her head. “But it was more than that, Dad,” she said. “She’s been acting weird for a while now. This is just the latest thing. I’m really worried.”
Her father didn’t say anything for a minute. He pushed his food around his plate, not eating it. At one point he reached for the glass of wine beside his water glass, but then he pulled his hand away, not touching it.
“What would you like me to do?” he asked his daughter.
“I don’t know,” said Cooper. “I don’t know what you can do. I don’t know what I can do. I feel really weird talking to her. I mean, she’s my mother. She’s the one who’s supposed to worry about me.”
Mr. Rivers smiled to himself. “I think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard you admit that you’re the child in that relationship,” he said.
“You know Mom and I don’t see things the same way,” said Cooper. “That doesn’t mean I don’t love her, or that I don’t worry about her. But this isn’t something I can do for her.”
“Do you want me to talk to her?” asked her father.
Cooper sighed. “Then she’d know I told you,” she said. “She’d freak.”
“What if we make it look like I found out by accident?” Mr. Rivers suggested.
Cooper looked at him, shocked. “You mean trick her?” she asked. “How?”
“How about after dinner I drive you home,” he said. “I can come in with you. We’ll say that there’s something I left at the house that I need to pick up. There’s no reason I shouldn’t do that.”
Cooper thought about his proposal. “That would work,” she said.
“How was your mother when you left to come here?” asked her father.
“She’d had a drink or two,” said Cooper. “I think she was settling in for the night.”
“Good,” Mr. Rivers said. “I mean, it’s not good, but it might work for what we want to do. If I can catch your mother in the act, so to speak, I can legitimately talk to her about this.”
“Man, you really are a lawyer, aren’t you?” Cooper said.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” her father teased.
“In this case I guess it isn’t,” said Cooper. “I just hate that we have to do it at all.”
Mr. Rivers took another bite of chicken. “Your mother is in pain,” he said, sounding sad. “When people hurt they do a lot of things to try and feel better. Your mother is just trying to stop hurting. I understand that.”
“Then why aren’t you doing the same thing?” asked Cooper.
Her father fixed her with a look. “You ask a lot of questions,” he said. “Are you sure you aren’t going to be the next lawyer in the family?”
Cooper snorted. “Right,” she said. “I’m going to be lucky to graduate from high school with my grades.”
“Speaking of which . . .” her father said.
Cooper narrowed her eyes. “I don’t think I like the sound of that,” she said.
Her father looked at her. “It’s probably time we started talking about college,” he said.
Cooper groaned. She’d been trying to forget about the college issue ever since T.J. had brought it up during their walk. She’d sort of been hoping that in all of the tumult surrounding her parents’ divorce they would just forget about it somehow. I should have known better, she thought grimly.
“You have to go to college,” said her father.
“Why?” Cooper said petulantly, although inside she knew he was right.
“Have you given it any thought?” asked Mr. Rivers, ignoring her rhetorical question.
“I haven’t even finished junior year,” responded Cooper. “How am I supposed to kn
ow what I want to do more than a year from now?”
Her father put down his fork and wiped his mouth. “You can’t tell me you haven’t even thought about what you might want to study,” he said. “I don’t buy that for a minute.”
Cooper remained silent. The truth was, she had thought about what she wanted to study, and the problem was that she hadn’t really come up with any concrete ideas. She was interested in a lot of things—music, writing, and art, to name a few. But she also found things like religion and philosophy interesting, particularly since she’d begun studying Wicca. She thought she might like to study those things, but she didn’t know what she would ever do with a degree in something like philosophy. And while she loved playing music, she wasn’t sure it was something she could ever make a living at.
“No one is asking you to decide the rest of your life right this second,” her father told her. “But it is important to pick a school that will help you get where you want to go.”
Cooper knew what he was getting at. Mr. Rivers had gone to a famous Ivy League school. She knew that one of the reasons behind his success was that he was still friends with a lot of the people he’d gone to school with. He had often told her that getting ahead was 75 percent hard work and 25 percent networking.
“I don’t want to be in any kind of business where the school I went to matters,” she said carefully. She respected her father and what he did, even if she often teased him about it, and she didn’t want to make him feel bad. “I want to go to a school where I feel like I’m free to explore,” she said.
She saw a smile flicker across her father’s face, but it disappeared before it turned into a smirk. She knew he thought she was being idealistic. But she was really just being honest. Something else she’d learned from her study of witchcraft was that being open to lots of possibilities was important for finding out who she really was and what she could do with her talents.
“I’m serious,” she said.
“I know you are,” replied her father. “I’m not saying you’re not. It’s just that you sound a lot like I did when I was trying to decide where to go to school.”
“You?” Cooper said. “I thought you always wanted to be a lawyer.”
Her father shook his head. “I wanted to be an archaeologist,” he said, laughing.
Cooper gave him a look indicating she thought he was pulling her leg. Her father, the lawyer, an archaeologist? The idea was too funny to take seriously.
“I did,” he said, noting her expression. “I loved reading about adventurers when I was younger. I thought it would be wonderful to go to places I’d never been and see what I could find there.”
“But . . .” Cooper said, wondering how his life had taken such a dramatic turn.
“But my father wanted me to do something practical,” said Mr. Rivers. “So I studied history in college to satisfy myself and then went on to law school.”
“Sounds like a compromise to me,” Cooper said.
“I guess it was,” said her father. “But I like law, so no regrets.”
“None?” asked Cooper doubtfully.
“Well, maybe a few little ones,” her father said. “The point is, I want you to do whatever it is you dream of doing, but I also want you to be a little bit practical.”
“Fair enough,” said Cooper. “I’ll start thinking about schools.” She hesitated before adding, “What do you think of Rummond?”
“Rummond?” her father said. “The school in Minnesota?”
“Uh-huh,” said Cooper, trying to sound nonchalant.
“I guess it’s an okay school,” said Mr. Rivers. “But there’s nothing special about it. Why?”
“Just asking,” Cooper said. “I have a friend who might be going there.”
Her father nodded. “This friend,” he said, “his name wouldn’t be T.J., would it?”
“Wow,” Cooper said, suddenly engrossed in the dessert menu. “Did you see they have flan?”
“Cooper . . .” Mr. Rivers said.
Cooper put down the menu and looked at her father. He was looking back at her warmly. “Don’t tell me my daughter is actually considering going to a school to follow some boy.”
Cooper rolled her eyes. “I was just asking,” she said. “You don’t need to put me on the witness stand.”
Her father laughed. Then he folded his hands. “I know this is a hard time for you,” he said. “You’re dealing with your mother and me. You have to think about college and your future. There are a lot of choices to make. Just promise me that when you make them the only person you’ll take into consideration is you.”
“Don’t worry,” said Cooper. “I promise to be totally self-centered and egotistical when the time comes.”
“That’s my girl,” said her father.
The waiter brought the check, Cooper’s father paid, and they left the restaurant. Only instead of walking home, Cooper got into her father’s car and they drove back to the house on Welton Street. When they pulled up outside it, her father turned the engine off and looked at the windows. The living room was lit up.
“I’m assuming your mother is in there,” he said. He sounded sad. “It’s strange looking at that house and knowing it isn’t home anymore.”
“What’s the plan?” Cooper asked him.
“We’ll go in,” said Mr. Rivers. “I’ll tell your mother that I need to get something from the attic. That will make sense. There’s so much stuff up there it’s entirely believable that I would leave something behind. And then we’ll take it from there.”
“Sounds good,” said Cooper. “Ready?”
“Lead the way,” said her father.
They got out of the car and walked to the door. Cooper used her key to open it, and they stepped inside.
“Mom?” Cooper called out, not wanting to take her mother by surprise. A big part of her hoped that her mother would call out in her normal voice and that she would find out that the drinking incident had been a onetime thing she’d blown way out of proportion.
But there was no response. Still, there was music coming from the living room. Cooper and her father walked in there. Mrs. Rivers was on the couch, a glass in her hand. Her head was thrown back against the pillows and she was humming.
“Hi,” Cooper said again.
Mrs. Rivers opened her eyes and looked at her daughter. She smiled slowly. “I didn’t hear you come in,” she said.
“Hello, Janet,” said Mr. Rivers.
Mrs. Rivers looked at her husband, an expression of confusion on her face.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, sounding both irritated and surprised.
“Dad needs to get something out of the attic,” said Cooper, sticking with the game plan they’d established.
“Fine,” said her mother, closing her eyes and beginning to hum again.
Mr. Rivers went over and turned off the music. Cooper’s mother turned her head and glared at him. “Why’d you do that?” she asked.
Mr. Rivers looked at Cooper. “I think we all need to talk,” he said.
Mrs. Rivers laughed. “Talk?” she said, suddenly sounding a lot more sober than Cooper thought she was. “Didn’t we already do all of our talking, Stephen?”
“I don’t mean about us,” Mr. Rivers replied. “I mean about you, and about what you’re doing.”
Mrs. Rivers sat up. She looked at Cooper, then at her husband. “And what exactly am I doing?” she asked.
There was an icy silence. Cooper felt as if the room were closing in on her. It seemed too small, and she couldn’t breathe. She wanted some air. She wanted to run back outside and get away from the feelings of frustration she felt rising in her. But she tried to calm herself so that she could say what she needed to say.
“I’m worried about you, Mom,” Cooper said. “It’s like I said to you the other night, I think maybe you’re—”
She didn’t know how to finish the sentence. All of the possible endings sounded like accusations, and she didn’t want
to make her mother feel cornered. She knew how that felt, and it wasn’t a good feeling. She wanted her mother to feel loved and cared for. But she didn’t know how to do that.
“Think maybe I’m what?” said her mother. “Drinking too much? Is that it?”
“Maybe,” Cooper said, looking at her.
“I’m fine,” said Mrs. Rivers. “Don’t worry about it.” Then she looked at her husband. “Thanks for coming over,” she said. “But I think everything is under control. Do you still need to go to the attic?”
“No,” Cooper’s father said. “I don’t think that will be necessary.”
“Then I’m going to go to bed,” said Mrs. Rivers. “I have to teach in the morning.”
She stood up, unsteadily, and walked out of the room. Cooper and her father listened as she walked heavily up the stairs. Then they heard the slam of her bedroom door.
Cooper looked at her father. “That went well,” she said. “Really well.”
CHAPTER 14
Annie turned the pages of the photo album slowly, looking at each image carefully, as if searching for clues. She was sitting at the kitchen table with her aunt. There was a large cardboard box sitting on one of the empty chairs.
“I haven’t looked at these things in years,” Aunt Sarah said.
Half an hour before, the two of them had been rummaging around in the basement, peering into musty trunks and boxes and looking at junk that hadn’t seen the light of day in a long time. There had been dust everywhere, and spiders, and Annie couldn’t wait to find what they were looking for and get back upstairs. Now they were sitting with the treasure they’d gone in search of.
Annie still hadn’t quite accepted what her aunt had told her on Tuesday night. When she woke up on Wednesday morning, her first thought was that it had all been a dream. But of course it hadn’t been, and that meant that she had to deal with the information she’d been given. For most of the day she’d walked around in a fog, her head filled with images of what her sister might look like.
Her older sister, she reminded herself. She’d done the math and figured out that the baby her mother had given up for adoption would be almost seven years older than she was, which would make her twenty-three. It seemed impossible that someone could be walking around who was related to her and she didn’t even know it. What had the woman been doing her whole life? What was she like? Did she even know that she had two other sisters? How could she? Annie thought. She probably doesn’t even know who her birth mother was.
