Unstrung

by Laura Spinella

  There’s a window at the end of the hall on the sixth floor. Dusk is settling over Boston. Except for overnight news—a delay on the T and the robbery of a local liquor store—the city will wake uninterrupted. The next time I awake, nothing will be the same.

  At the door, India looks at me. “You’re very clever.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Theo may be so stunned to see me that your bombshell will pale in comparison.”

  “Right back at you, India. I wouldn’t think someone who doesn’t love Theo would have bothered to make this trip.”

  India’s eyes fill with panic. I’ve called her bluff, maybe forced Helen’s observations into her path. I rap my knuckles on the door before she can reply or run.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Theo

  Theo is in front of a music stand, playing Sad Romance, a melancholy but soothing classical piece. After long days he sometimes listens to popular music, but he’s more often drawn to works like this. It’s always been this way and something Theo wonders about. It does not feel like a choice but more of a default setting. It’s been a difficult day. Braemore was total chaos. Antonio was arrested for selling prescription drugs. Later, a fistfight—the kind with knives—broke out in the cafeteria. By the end of the day, Theo wondered if he should have taken a job as a prison guard. He is not feeling particularly useful. He’s not helping anyone. He questions more things than before he accepted the position at Braemore. He ponders Olivia Klein. She’s been absent for three days now. But Olivia did insist she’s prone to bad choices; perhaps this is proof. She’s also not returned his calls, which Theo finds worrisome and rude.

  His playing is disrupted by a knock at the door. Approaching the spy hole, Theo reverts to thoughts of Antonio. He wonders how far his good intentions would take him if a student were to show up at his apartment. Would he be welcoming or worried that they were high or carrying a weapon, maybe both? His address isn’t hard to find. With the violin in hand, Theo glances through the tiny hole. He sees a distorted dream; it looks like India. He blinks and looks again.

  A few moments later, India and Olivia Klein are standing in the small living room. Theo is so stunned he can’t sort the thoughts in his head—what he should say or how he should act. He attempts to place the violin on the bar bordering the galley kitchen. He misses.

  Olivia steps forward and catches the instrument. “Guess you weren’t expecting . . . us.”

  Theo glances at her, but he’s mesmerized by India. “What . . . what are you doing here?” He doesn’t mean to be abrupt. But aside from one accidental FaceTime chat, India’s been resolute about her feelings. To his surprise, Theo doesn’t jump to the conclusion that India’s come to reconcile their relationship. Turning up at his door, unannounced, wouldn’t be India’s style. Secondly, why would she bring Olivia Klein with her?

  “Theo,” India says, “we’re here to talk to you, tell you something.”

  “Is my mother all right?” The assumption comes all too easily, and an old dread clamps down on Theo’s gut.

  “Yes,” Olivia says. “I’m sure your mother’s fine. This doesn’t have anything to do with her. Not directly.” His darting glance moves between the odd pairing of women. “Could we sit?”

  He looks at the leather sofa—the one where he and India had sex more times than he can recall. He catches India’s gaze, which is also pinned to the weathered piece of furniture. They all sit, though his ex-fiancée chooses a modern, deeply curved chair across from the sofa. Theo knows it’s deliberate because India hates the chair, having complained that it is ugly and uncomfortable since the day he brought it home. She sits tall with her hands pinched between her knees. He wonders if they are trembling. The feeling of dread doesn’t ease.

  “Theo, I’m going to be blunt . . . Honest,” Olivia says. “Something I haven’t been since walking into your classroom in September.” She tucks a piece of hair behind her ear and fidgets. These are habits Theo’s noticed, mostly when he plays the violin, once when a common allergy to strawberries came up in conversation. Olivia fidgeted then, scraping at her head like she’d eaten a bowlful. It was right after Theo said, “Strawberries do that to me too, an unbelievably prickly rash.”

  “I’ve asked India to come here with me for a lot of reasons,” she says. “Mostly because you’re going to be angry with me. More importantly because I need your help. If I’d come alone . . . Well, I don’t know how cooperative you’re going to be feeling in a few minutes.”

  “I don’t understand. How do you even know India?”

  “I’m nothing if not resourceful, Theo.” Olivia smiles, then doesn’t. There’s that tickle of familiarity he cannot place. “Maybe that’s the first honest thing you should know about me. I’m good at ploughing through most anything if it’s a means to my end.” Theo’s glance moves to India. He has no clue what Olivia is talking about. “When I first came to your classroom, I told you I followed Shep Stewart’s 9-11 stories, right?” Theo nods. “That part is true. But I didn’t follow them for the reasons I said. I didn’t read them because I was interested in Andrea Wakefield, Tara DeMarco, or even tuned in to the tragic life of Joaquin Perez. I was only interested in your story, Theo. Your life.”

  Theo stares, wondering if, along with quirky, impulsive, and musically gifted, Olivia Klein is mentally unstable. Perhaps she’s brought India here against her will. “I . . . I don’t understand. Why would you be interested in me?” Olivia looks nervous, an expression she wore on the first day of class but not since.

  “Theo, just listen to what Olivia has to say. While it’s not what I’d call . . . honorable . . .” India shoots a look at Olivia. Theo can read it like the most familiar diatonic scale—she does not approve of Olivia, but she is not completely unsympathetic. “What she’s going to tell you is true. And it’s important.”

  Olivia sits up taller; she grips her hands in her lap like a prayer. “Theo, do you remember a brief conversation we once had about birthdays? You were surprised that I knew yours, right? December thirty-first.” Theo nods, thinking back to his first in-depth talk with Olivia. “I made some excuse about your mother having mentioned it in one of Shep’s stories, or suggested that you’d said it, though you couldn’t recall anything of the kind.”

  “We were in the café, near Braemore. We, um . . .” He looks at India once more. “We ended up talking about relationships, how sometimes they don’t work out.”

  “That’s right. And you were correct about your birthdate. You never told me; your mother’s never mentioned it. Another time we talked, you said you walk when things are bothering you. I told you I did the same thing.” Theo nods and shrugs at the disconnected information. “Of course, a lot of people could say something like that. It’s not such a peculiar habit. Certainly not something that could be described as . . . inherent.” Theo nods again, though an urge to inch away from Olivia is now present. “And, um . . . And we . . . the two of us, we could take a walk like that to the Boston Conservatory right now. Once there, we’d find a dozen violinists, all gifted musicians. Couldn’t we?”

  “I guess. But I don’t see—”

  “Theo, how many of those violinists would have a gift precisely like ours? The way we perceive music, understand it, feel it—regardless of my lack of passion or your intensity? How many?”

  Theo thinks for a moment, though clearly this is not an odds calculation. And it’s true. It’s nearly inexplicable, the way he and Olivia interpret music. “It’s abstract . . . singular. We seem to share . . . Funny, right before you got here, I was thinking about things we have in—” Theo dead stops. But his heart gallops off in a pounding rhythm, his brain rushing to catch up. He shuffles farther down the sofa. But for the first time since they arrived, Theo is more focused on Olivia than India. In fact, he’s suddenly hyper-focused on her face—the shape of it and her smile. Of course, she is not smiling right now, she looks more like she’s about to face a firing squad. “Jesus,” he gasps. Olivia is no
dding. “Tell me you’re not saying . . .” Theo’s head moves in the opposite gesture.

  “I know your birthday, Theo, because I was most decidedly there the day you were born.”

  “You don’t have any children,” Theo counters. “You told me a story about being pregnant once. You said that you lost the baby—a miscarriage after a car accident.”

  “You’re right. I did tell you that story. But it wasn’t true, not the miscarriage part. The baby survived, Theo. You survived.”

  He continues to shake his head. “That can’t be. For one . . . for one my biological parents were from New Zealand. That’s where I was born.”

  “You were born in New Zealand because that’s where my brother lives. He has for almost thirty years. The miscarriage is a lie I’ve been peddling since it all happened. I . . . It seemed like the right decision at the time. I told the lie to my parents. Eventually I told it to my husband and best friend. Worst of all, I told it to Sam Nash.”

  “Sam . . . Nash.” Theo instantly recognizes the name. Like a weirdly wired science experiment, he connects to the other half of his missing DNA. He recalls Olivia’s description of the man she was briefly married to, the one who played baseball. Theo thinks of his six-year-old self, a boy who stormed a soccer field with the inbred agility of a pro athlete. He remembers thinking, I’m just like my dad, because my dad was a football player! Theo rakes a hand through his wavy brown hair, remembering eleven. It was the age it occurred to Theo that superior athleticism was encouraged by David McAdams, even admired, but not inherited. He feels a thwack of realization, the origins of his talents. He wants to stand, but Theo is unsure if his athletic legs will hold him up. He looks at India.

  “It’s true, Theo. Olivia came to my house this morning. She told me the same things she just told you. I, um . . . I just couldn’t imagine you hearing this alone. That’s why I’m here.”

  “Why? Why didn’t you tell me?” he says to Olivia. “Why did you come into my classroom and pretend to be nothing but a stranger?”

  “Theo, I didn’t plan it. Nothing I’ve done is as calculated as it looks.” She grimaces. “But then and again, it never is. Ending up in your classroom . . .” Olivia pauses, perhaps rethinking her elucidation. “Oh my God, Theo, there’s no single reason that will make sense. It just happened—because Sasha was standing in my music room telling me I had to choose something in the way of community service. Because I’d spent the weekend in jail, the direct result of doing nothing more than being Olivia Klein. Because my mother showed up at my door, reminding me of the same thing she always does—how everything I touch turns into a disaster. That even as a grown woman, an adult, I hadn’t escaped the disappointment of my youth. I . . . I felt so completely awful. I wanted to grab onto something good. In the moment . . . with that day’s Shep Stewart stories staring up at me . . .” Her fervent pace slows. “Instinct said you were that something good.”

  Olivia pulls in a tremulous breath. Her clear blue eyes pool and she blinks furiously. “I needed to see if I’d managed to do anything right. The Ledger stories, they made you sound so accomplished, so . . . perfect. The moment I met you, Theo, I knew that lying my way into your life was worse than the things I’d done to get me there. Classic Olivia Klein impulsiveness.” She says this as if it’s a viable excuse for what he’s hearing. “My mother . . . your grandmother . . .” Her mouth, his mouth, curves to a deep frown. “She wasn’t without a point.”

  “I don’t . . .” Theo takes a breath. “Days went by. Now months.” Theo’s eyes are so wide he thinks they may pop from his head. “You could have told me after the first day of class or the tenth. You might have said something during any number of conversations, over coffee, at my mother’s charity event. You confided in me, Olivia. You trusted me enough to tell me your husband was having an affair. And yet . . . yet you kept right on lying about who you were. I don’t understand. What kind of person does something like that?”

  For a moment Olivia doesn’t speak. Her gaze bounces around the small room. “Someone like me,” she says. “Theo, listen to everything I’m saying. It was never my intention to tell you. We weren’t supposed to have this . . .” Her arm circles the empty air. “Conversation. The friendlier we got, the more deceptive my presence became. I promised myself I’d walk away when my community service hours were over. That getting to know you was a gift I didn’t deserve. In turn, I never wanted you to suffer . . . well, exactly what you’re feeling right now—betrayed, and not thinking very much of the woman who gave birth to you. Vanishing as suddenly as I appeared . . . What is it they say? Never rob a bank without an exit strategy. I had an exit strategy.” Theo hangs on to his composure, though barely. “It’s just at the door, I got caught on a trip wire.”

  Theo looks to India. “I was surprised when she told me. Not as shocked as you are, I’m sure, but surprised. And everything you’re feeling . . .” India’s chin quivers. She smiles small. “Like I said, despite what’s happened between us, I didn’t want you to hear that alone.”

  Theo closes his eyes. He wants time to turn back, to before Olivia Klein invaded his life, to before the day India left him. Really? A part of Theo wants to go back to before September 11 and ask David McAdams what he should do if his birth mother were ever to show up masquerading as a human being. When Theo opens his eyes, Olivia is looking into his. “So if not telling me was your grand plan, what earth-moving thing—other than honesty or my right to know—drove you to this?”

  “A few weeks ago, Sam Nash came to town. He wanted to apologize for things that happened before you were born, things that led to our breakup.”

  Theo listens, trying to get his head around the idea that while his father was a college football hero, his birth father is one of baseball’s all-time greatest closers. Theo thinks about a box of boyhood belongings; inside, he is almost sure, is a Sam Nash baseball card. He desperately tries to recall the man’s face; he’s more likely to recall his stats. Theo’s stomach clenches as a more specific memory surfaces.

  Theo and his father once went to a Red Sox–Angels game at Fenway. Sam Nash pitched a shutout ninth inning. The Sox lost. Theo was angry and upset that day too. He remembers his father saying, “Give him credit, son—the guy is responsible for a lot of spot-on pitches.” Apparently, David McAdams was more accurate than he knew. But the facts are too much to grasp. “So when Sam Nash showed up, what? You finally confessed everything to him. And now he wants to meet me or something?”

  “No,” Olivia says, her gaze dropping away. “Not quite. When Sam showed up I didn’t tell him either. He still doesn’t know you exist.”

  “Theo,” India says, drawing his attention. “Sam Nash is very ill. He has leukemia.”

  “Acute myeloid leukemia, which has relapsed,” Olivia clarifies. “He actually came here, to Boston, after beating the disease once. Six or seven months ago, Sam got a solid medical report from his doctors in California—that’s where he lives. It was as close to a clean bill of health someone can get with this disease. When he showed up here, the fact that I was doing time in your classroom . . . Suffice it to say his sudden reappearance felt like curious karma. Even so, with the rest of my life, my marriage to Rob, in such a chaotic state, I didn’t tell Sam about you. Since then, Sam and I have seen each other. We’ve talked. We made peace with much of what came between us. And I did consider telling him . . .” Olivia pauses, perhaps wrestling with the odd fit of honesty. “But I didn’t do it.”

  Theo connects precarious dots; he sees the one that’s a bull’s-eye on Olivia Klein. “You didn’t do it because telling Sam Nash meant you’d have to confess—not only to me, but to your husband and everyone else you’ve lied to for twenty-six years. Am I close, Olivia?”

  She swallows hard. “You’re not completely off. Although I truly believed it was in everyone’s best interest to leave it alone.” Olivia presses her prayerful hands to her mouth for a moment. “When you told me . . . When you said you were adopted, Theo, yo
u never said you’d been dying to meet your birth parents. In fact, you seemed ridiculously pleased with the ones you had. I didn’t see an aching need from you to alter that reality.”

  Theo is taken aback by her bluntness. Yet, he cannot argue this point. On occasion, Theo has fantasized about his birth parents. What adopted child doesn’t? At the age of eleven, shiny images of strangers are a quick fix when your mother is angry because you knocked over the fish tank. Flawless birth parents are easily conjured up when you make a C in AP chemistry. You’re positive your hyper-perfect biological parents would never go on, like your adoptive mother, about how a C may ruin your Ivy League chances. On the other end of the spectrum, in a few darker moments, Theo has wondered about the unknown. Who is he and how did he come to be? But Olivia is right. Theo’s never seriously considered seeking out his birth parents. Not when he ended up with the best parents a child could ask for.

  Yet Olivia’s next words, they smack of twisted mother-son telepathy. “When I saw the relationship you have with Claire, when I listened to the way you talked about David McAdams, why in the world—especially considering my questionable presence—would I want to introduce myself as your birth mother? Sure, if I’d been honest from the start . . . But even then, I had no desire to be compared to what you view as perfection.”

  Theo is quick to pounce on what is clearly inherent brusqueness. “Don’t be ridiculous, Olivia. Claire and David McAdams weren’t perfect. They just didn’t lie to my face.”

  Olivia looks at India, who seems to shrink from Theo’s declaration about his parents’ honesty. She glances away from both of them.

  “Nevertheless,” Olivia says quietly. “No matter what you think of me, the reason I’ve come here, told you all this, is because Sam needs your help. It’s possible, Theo, that you’re the best chance he has to achieve another remission.”