Open Secret

by Janice Kay Johnson

  She sagged onto the couch, admitting, “I’d have been upset if she’d sent it to me. Maybe even mad.”

  Mark didn’t say anything.

  “Okay, okay,” she muttered. “I’ll respect his decision, and hope that he’ll change his mind eventually.”

  “Damn it, Carrie, I’m not issuing directives here. You go with your gut.”

  Hearing the perturbation in his voice, she said, “It’s me I’m irked at. You’re right. I would have hated being pushed. I don’t know why I was even tempted to do that to him!”

  Mark laughed. “Because you know what’s best for him?”

  “I do know! We’re nice! Why won’t he give us a chance?”

  “Because he’s an idiot?”

  “I said he was a jerk.” She sighed. “Okay, I’ve bugged you enough. Go tuck Michael in. Say hi from me.”

  “How about you say it yourself tomorrow night?” His voice became uncertain. “Not very romantic to have dinner with a guy and his five-year-old, is it?”

  Moved by the realization that he wasn’t all that sure about her, either, she said, “I would love to have dinner with this particular guy and this particular five-year-old.”

  Voice a notch rougher this time, he said, “Good. Five-thirty, six o’clock?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  After ending the call with him, she dialed Suzanne’s number. She didn’t want to tell her about Gary, but she felt this urgent need just to…connect.

  Suzanne was home and seemed happy to hear from her. They talked about little stuff: funny snippets from the news, work politics, a blanket Suzanne was knitting for an AIDS baby project. They made plans to get together that weekend to go to an arts festival.

  At the end, Suzanne said wistfully, “It’s funny, but when the phone rang, for a minute I thought…”

  “You thought what?”

  “That it might be Lucien. Gary. That he’d had second thoughts.”

  Carrie bit her lip. “That’s pretty quick.”

  “I know it is. But he might decide to call. He must have been…well, thinking about all this.”

  “Maybe. But remember how long it took me to be willing to meet you. And this is a guy. Aren’t they always more stubborn?”

  Suzanne laughed. “They claim they’re more decisive.”

  “But we know they’re fooling themselves, right?”

  She laughed again. “How true! Okay, I won’t hold my breath. Oh, Carrie, I’m so glad you called tonight.”

  “Me, too,” she said softly.

  Hanging up, she wished she wasn’t now keeping a secret from Suzanne. Maybe she should tell her when the time seemed right.

  She wrapped her arms around her knees and sighed, knowing perfectly well that she couldn’t bring herself to tell her sister that their brother had sounded somewhere between indifferent and irritated when he said, “You’re strangers to me. Let’s keep it that way.”

  Hope might be fragile, but it beat the alternative.

  DURING HER LUNCH hour the next day Carrie went to the UW to find out more about the fifth year teacher certification program. The tuition wasn’t horrendously expensive, but the program was full-time and she wouldn’t be able to work more than a few hours a week.

  Not enough to support herself. She knew her parents would be glad to help, but how could she graciously forgive them and then say, “Oh, by the way, how about paying my rent while I go back to school?”

  Wow! How quick she’d been to think, Mom and Dad would help. Embarrassed, she saw herself again as she had the day she showed her photo album to Suzanne. She was spoiled.

  As awful as the rift with her parents was, maybe it was healthy for her, she thought in shock. She couldn’t deny that it was past time she made her own decisions. Time to grow up and behave like the adult she was, not the indulged child she used to be.

  Then she had another jarring thought. Maybe the fact that she’d flitted between interests and careers had nothing to do with the fact that she’d had this powerful, deep-seated need to make herself into the daughter she’d have been if she had been born to them. Maybe she really had just been flighty because they’d loved her too much and made it possible! Hadn’t she gone into every major in college, every job, thinking, I’ll try this out? Knowing she had an out? Had she ever thought, This is my path?

  If she hadn’t had her parents’ support, she guessed she’d be making the best of working as a nurse, whether she loved it or not. Chastened, she realized how lucky she’d been not to have to do that.

  Carrie read about the teacher certification program again, feeling different inside. She was committing herself—and, all on her own, she had to make this choice work.

  Okay. She could go part-time, taking as little as a class a quarter, but then it would be years and years before she’d be done. In the meantime, she would still be having to write gems like, “Verify that an exhalation port is present to exhaust CO2 from the circuit.” Ugh. If she could find something else to do while she went to school part-time…

  Carrie opened the classifieds again and scanned the columns without much hope. There were plenty of listings for apartment managers, drafters, drivers, mechanics, sales jobs… Dispatcher? Could she do that? Maybe, but the pay was disappointing. Motorcycle sales—she entertained a brief fantasy of herself in black leather, leg slung over a gleaming Harley, before her pencil moved on. Restaurant hostesses, receptionists, siders. Nope, nope, nope.

  There were always nursing jobs, of course. Maybe she’d like something in respiratory or radiology better than what she’d done. But that felt like moving backward, not forward. It made more sense to stay where she was. The company was happy with her, the pay good.

  She sighed and discarded the paper in the recycling bin in her pantry closet.

  What if she asked friends whether anyone was interested in having a roommate for a year? That would keep costs down. She could sell her car, take the bus. Of course, her parents had given her that car, which meant she’d be taking support from them after all.

  She made a face. They’d bought not only the car but half her furniture and wardrobe. Who was she kidding? She was a leech!

  Which hadn’t seemed to matter when she’d felt loved and secure, when they were just her parents, the same mommy and daddy they’d always been. She’d known they were well-off financially and wanted to help her.

  They did love her, she knew they did. But she wasn’t the same person, which made all the difference in the world. Carrie knew suddenly that even if all could be forgiven and forgotten, she would never go back to depending on them as she had in the past.

  During dinner that evening at Mark’s she kept marveling at what a great father he was. Michael was an amazing little boy, unusually poised in the company of an adult he didn’t know well. He looked her right in the eye and answered questions with an earnest solemnity that charmed her. And she loved sitting on the floor with Daisy’s head on her lap. She really missed having a dog.

  Mostly she loved just being with Mark, seeing him on his home turf instead of in the artificial environment of a restaurant. He’d promised someday to take her along when he was doing a stakeout, although he had warned her that she’d be bored to death. Still, she wanted to see him in action, even if that action involved slouching low in his car seat and keeping his gaze trained on a house or motel room.

  Tonight, when he walked her out to her car after dinner, their kiss changed quickly from casual to urgent. She grabbed on for dear life and leaned into him. In response, he splayed a hand on the small of her back and pressed her up against him so that she felt his erection thick against her belly.

  Daisy whimpered and yanked on the leash, startling them both. Mark groaned and let Carrie go. Her knees were shaking when she opened her car door and all but fell into the seat.

  Desire seemed to make Mark’s face more gaunt as he stood there, backlit by a streetlight half a block away, one hand on her open car door. He looked over his shoulder toward the
house. Voice thick with regret, he said, “I’ve got to get back.”

  “I know. I…” She took a breath and tried to get the key in the ignition. “Good night, Mark.”

  He looked down at her for a silent moment, then slammed her door, stepped back and lifted a hand. She got the engine started and flashed what she hoped was a bright smile as she pulled away.

  Why had she even hesitated about asking him if he could find a way to spend the night with her? His touch made her dissolve. She hadn’t known she could feel so helpless and needy and even desperate.

  An odd little sound escaped her throat, something close to a sob. Maybe that was exactly what scared her, the idea of giving in to a need so powerful.

  But it wasn’t as if she was a virgin! She’d been serious enough about a couple of guys besides Craig to have sexual relations with them. She enjoyed sex, for goodness sake.

  Enjoy? Remembering the kiss, she knew “enjoy” was entirely too tepid a word to describe what making love with Mark Kincaid would be.

  All she had to do was picture his face as he’d closed her car door to know that this would be different from anything she’d experienced. Her two boyfriends in college had been…well, boys. And Craig had never once looked at her as if he’d give up eating and drinking and breathing if it meant he could have her.

  Being wanted like that was more than a little scary.

  It was even scarier to know that she was starting to feel the same. And not just about making love with him. She’d hated to leave tonight. Oh, heavens, she thought, shocked. Forget tonight. She never wanted to leave.

  But here she was, in the middle of figuring out who she really was and what she wanted out of life. How could she be absolutely, positively sure that Mark and Michael weren’t filling a void for her, a need for love and family, rather than being the people she wanted to commit herself to until—how did it go?—death do us part?

  The words of the marriage vow sobered her, and yet resonated as well, in a way she’d never felt before. But it was so soon! Almost automatically, she began to retreat from the idea of forever.

  By the time she was halfway home, she could almost laugh at herself. It wasn’t as if Mark had asked her to share his bed yet, never mind his life. She was reading an awful lot into three or four kisses and the expression on his face.

  But oh that expression…! She shivered pleasurably and knew that at least she’d been smart enough to understand that Dr. Craig DeYoung could never in a million years have given her what she needed.

  MARK SAT on a stool to one side and watched as the opthamologist gently talked Michael through the choices that would determine the prescription for his new glasses. At the end, she grinned at his son.

  “Wow! You were great. See, the machine looks scary, but it’s not so bad, is it?”

  Michael shook his head. “I thought it might poke my eyes, but it didn’t.”

  “Now you and your dad can pick out some frames, and we’ll order your glasses.”

  “Ryan said I’d be a…a owl-eyes.”

  Ryan, Mark recalled, was the same brat who had ditched Michael for daring to speak to a girl. Mark knew Ryan had been over to play a few times. He’d have to ask Heidi what she’d thought of him.

  “Aren’t there other kids in your class who wear glasses?” the opthamologist asked.

  He frowned. “I guess. Corey. And Sara, but she’s a girl. And Blake. He wears glasses. ’Cept he keeps taking them off during recess and they get broken. Once Justin stepped on them. He smashed ’em.” Michael seemed to savor the memory, unlike the doctor who winced. “So lots of the time Blake doesn’t have glasses,” he concluded.

  “Why does Blake take them off?” Mark asked.

  “’Cuz his mom said to if he’s playing rough.”

  Okay. That was unanswerable.

  “Here’s an idea,” the doctor suggested. “If you don’t feel like you need them during recess, why don’t you take them off and tuck them in your desk where they’ll be safe?”

  Michael’s face brightened. “I could do that. Sure! Then I wouldn’t look so dorky.”

  “Does your mom wear glasses?” She glanced at Mark. “Or do either of your parents wear contacts?”

  “Nuh uh.” Michael shook his head. “My mommy’s dead.”

  The opthamologist looked aghast. “Oh, I’m sorry!”

  Forehead creased, Michael said uncertainly, “I don’t know if she had glasses.” He cast his dad a tentative glance. “I don’t always remember.”

  “Nope.” Not wanting to enter the murky waters of an explanation about adoption, Mark stood. “How about if we pick out some frames that’ll make you look cool, not dorky?”

  “Okay, Dad.” Michael scooted forward so he could jump from the chair.

  “Thanks,” Mark said to the opthamologist, who smiled and ushered them out.

  In the front room, they found an entire wall of frames just for kids, a heck of a lot better selection than Mark had feared. When he was a child, he’d thought anyone who had to wear glasses looked dorky, too. But he suspected there hadn’t been as many choices; he remembered the kids all wearing ugly horn-rims too big for their faces and often boasting taped earpieces.

  He thought Michael looked pretty cute in the frames they finally settled on, although admittedly he was probably prejudiced. Remembering the sad tale of Blake’s glasses, Mark agreed to insure Michael’s against accidental breakage.

  “All done,” he said when they walked out. “What do you want to do the rest of the afternoon?”

  “Can we play soccer?” His son danced beside him. “I think I’d like soccer better than T-ball, Dad.”

  Ah, well. So much for his assumption that his son would want to play the game he’d loved so much. With adoption so much on his mind these days, it was tempting to blame the fact that Michael wasn’t biologically his. But having children, however you did it, was a little like reaching into a grab bag and pulling out whatever your hand closed on. No chance for prior inspection! And the truth was, no amount of money or regret would have made you throw back what you had, dip your hand into the bag again and hope for something better.

  To heck with baseball. Soccer was probably a more exciting sport for kids, anyway.

  He squeezed his son’s shoulder. “Then let’s go home and get the ball.”

  In the car, Michael was matter-of-factly buckling himself in to his booster seat when he said, “I wish I remembered stuff about Mom.”

  Instead of starting the car, Mark turned. “I know. But you were pretty young when she died.”

  “She wasn’t my real mom anyway, was she, Dad?”

  It would be easy to give into the hurt that the innocent question dealt, but Mark resisted. “Depends on what you mean by real.”

  Perhaps sensing that he was on delicate ground, Michael looked worried. Still, he persisted. “I didn’t come out of her tummy. Right?”

  “That’s right.” Mark studied his face. “We’ve talked about this before. Carrying you in her tummy is only part of being a mom. The other part is giving you a bottle and changing your diapers and playing with you and tucking you in and loving you. And she was definitely your mommy in that way.”

  “The other mom.” Head bent so he didn’t have to look at his dad, Michael drummed his heels. “Did she die, too?”

  “What got you thinking about this?”

  “I heard you and Carrie talking. So I asked her. She said her first mom and dad died. An’ that’s why she had another mom and dad.” He lifted his head and anxiously met his father’s eyes. “Is that why I got ’nother mom and dad, too?”

  The temptation was enormous. The answer yes would end the conversation. It was an explanation a five-year-old, especially one familiar with death, could understand. His face would clear and that would be that.

  But it would be a lie. Mark thought of Carrie and the lie her adoptive parents had told, because other explanations were so much more complicated and perilous. Mostly he thought of the
consequences of that lie.

  “No,” he admitted. “Your first mom and dad didn’t die.”

  His son looked at him, stricken. “How come they didn’t keep me, then?”

  Great. Here they were, sitting in the parking lot next to Group Health, having what was possibly the most important discussion of their lives while people came and went all around them and Mark was twisted in his seat so he could see his son’s face.

  Again, though, instinct kept him from suggesting they shelve the talk until later. If Michael was going to grow up feeling good about himself, he had to know that adoption was normal, that there was nothing wrong with him. The subject couldn’t be taboo, something that could only be discussed at special times.

  So he said, “The adoption agency didn’t tell us very much about your father. Your birth mother got pregnant by accident when she was really young. She was only sixteen when she had you. She still had two more years of high school. She was maybe as old as…” He looked around. “See that girl over there, by the bike rack? The one with a woman who looks like her mom?”

  Michael nodded.

  “Your birth mother was about that age. There was no way she could get a good job or someplace to live or take care of you, especially not if she had to quit high school. She wanted you to have the home and family she was too young to offer. We were thrilled to get you.”

  “Does she miss me?” Michael asked in a small voice.

  “Yeah, I bet she does,” Mark admitted. “Maybe, when you’re a lot older, we’ll find her so you can tell her you’re fine.”

  Face thin and serious, Michael nodded. “But when I’m older, right? Not now?”

  Sensing his need for reassurance, Mark agreed, “No, not now.”

  “Okay.” With scarcely a pause, he asked, “Can we still play soccer? ’Cuz I really want to play.”

  Mark grinned at him. “You bet.”

  CARRIE SAW MARK again Friday night, then went to the garden art fair with Suzanne on Saturday. It was in Legion Park in Everett with vendor booths set up on the sward of green grass in the shade under big trees.