A Son's Tale

by Tara Taylor Quinn

  Her father’s voice was as stern as always and Morgan couldn’t help but steal a glance at him. He was dressed impeccably, his gray suit and white shirt expensive and crisp, and his expression bore the calm and the control she knew.

  Morgan looked away. But not before she saw her mother, dressed in a pink linen suit Morgan had never seen before, sitting at the table next to George Lowen with a look of compassionate support turned on her husband.

  Because George spoke the complete truth.

  In Morgan’s determination not to expose her son to the emotionally cold and removed life that she’d known as a child, in order to preserve his freedom to be whomever he wanted to be when he grew up, not just his grandfather’s clone, she’d put her son’s life in danger. Sammie was a Lowen, no matter where or how they lived. And, as had dawned on her the night of Sammie’s disappearance when she’d had to take those horrible phone calls, Sammie was possibly prey to creeps who wanted to hurt her father.

  There was no sound from behind her, as though Julie were as frozen as Morgan felt.

  Filled with stark cold fear, Morgan barely heard her father take his seat. She knew the judge thanked him before asking if her mother had anything to say, but because she expected the negative response, she didn’t even know her mother had replied in the affirmative until she heard her begin to speak.

  Grace’s first words struck at the ice around Morgan’s whole being, thawing just enough of her to allow her to feel. Grace told the court what a good daughter Morgan had been and was to her, and what a good daughter she’d tried to be to her father.

  Listening intently, Morgan waited, hoping that her mother was finally going to do what Morgan had been begging her to do her entire life—stand up for her. Tell the world, or at least her father, that he was cold and heartless and unbending where Morgan was concerned. Let him know that she was a person in her own right, with enough sense to make her own life decisions.

  Or, at least, enough sense to be listened to instead of merely brushed aside like a wayward ant at his picnic.

  “I love my daughter as only a mother can love a child, which makes what I have to do the most painful thing I’ve ever done, and I hope and pray, Morgan, that some day you will understand and forgive me.”

  Her mother’s voice cracked. And then she started to speak again. When Morgan heard the woman who had given birth to her, who had given her the only emotional nurturing she’d known during the first years of her life, giving the judge intimate details of her life, chronologically exposing her deepest shames, the foolish mistakes she’d made, when she heard her mother speak of her inability, even now, to see the bad in people, she wanted to lay her head on the table before her and die.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  “THANK YOU, DR. WHITTIER. I can’t believe it, but it looks like I’m really going to graduate.”

  Rising from the chair in front of Cal’s desk, Shane offered his hand.

  Standing to shake hands, Cal smiled at Shane Arnett, a young man in his mid-twenties who’d been in and out of his classes for more than six years. “It’s been a long haul, Shane, but you had it in you.” As soon as Shane completed one more paper in Cal’s English Lit Review class his graduation application would be approved. “Do you need any help with your job search? I know some people. I can put in a good word for you.”

  Shane shook his head. “No, sir. I know it’s hard to believe but I’m ahead of the game on this one. I put in applications last spring, did all my interviews and just this week was offered a one-year teaching position at Silmore Junior High, contingent on obtaining my degree.”

  “Congratulations!” It was that rush of having helped someone accomplish something worthy that got Cal up every single morning of his life. “If you ever need anything, or there’s anything I can do to help, you have my number.”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you.” At the door, Shane turned. “You know, a lot of teachers offer to be there for you, to give you all the help you need, but you’re the only one I’ve ever had who really has supported me every step of the way. As many of your classes as I dropped, you never gave up on me.”

  “Because you never gave up on yourself,” Cal said. The point was critical. He’d done nothing more than support the decisions Shane had made. The effort had come from him. “If you were willing to give yourself another chance, who was I to tell you you couldn’t?”

  Shane chuckled. “Another chance?” he said. “Try seven of them. Hell, even my own dad gave up on me.”

  Shrugging, Cal said, “Some of us need to try more times to succeed, but the ultimate success is no less valuable. Book learning is important, but you graduate with an understanding far more valuable to you in life. You know now that the important things are to not give up on yourself and to keep trying.”

  Cal’s words rang in his ears after the young man left. He’d had another student on his mind all morning. And for most of the night before, too.

  Morgan had been scheduled in court two hours ago. Surely the hearing wasn’t still going on. But she hadn’t called.

  Surely, if she’d won, she’d have called.

  And if she hadn’t, she had to believe in herself as Sammie’s parent and keep trying. Money might be able to buy a judge, but it couldn’t buy love.

  Why hadn’t she called?

  Rather than waste more time asking questions for which he had no answers, Cal pulled his cell phone out of the pouch on his belt and pushed the speed dial number he’d programmed a week or two before.

  The phone rang. And rang some more. After eight long rings, his call was diverted to voice mail.

  “Morgan? It’s Cal. Just wanting to know how things went this morning. I’ll have my phone on all day. Call when you can.”

  With a frown on his face, he hung up.

  * * *

  CAL WAS STILL FROWNING when he left Wallace just after three that afternoon, wondering what he’d find when he got to the elementary school. Would Sammie still be there waiting for him? He hadn’t been told otherwise.

  Morgan hadn’t called at all. And when he’d tried her a second time, he was sent straight to voice mail.

  Was she purposely avoiding him? Had she taken the whole day off or just the morning?

  Had her phone’s battery died?

  No, she had a backup battery. And a car charger, and a wall charger in her purse, too, so she never had to worry about being disconnected from Sammie. Had she told the court that this morning? Told them how Sammie factored in to every single move that she made every single day? Hell, according to Sammie, she hadn’t dated in years because she wasn’t going to risk a negative fallout for Sammie.

  Parking in the lot outside Sammie’s school, he strode down the walk like he belonged there. Headed toward Julie’s office the same way. A swell of relief at the sight of the boy told him how much he was wrapped up in Morgan and her son. That was something he’d have to take care of later. At that moment, Julie was approaching him. With a motion of her head, she showed him into a private office.

  “Sammie? Could you give me just a second alone with Dr. Whittier?”

  She knew something. And by the look on her face it wasn’t good.

  “Jeez, Ms. Wallace. I want to know about court, too.”

  Julie’s gaze faltered and Cal said, “Just for a second, Sammie, okay? Your mom probably wants to tell you about it herself.”

  “Okay.” Sammie didn’t sound happy, but he didn’t dawdle as he walked
over to where the school nurse sat ready to engage him in conversation.

  “Have you heard from her?” Cal asked immediately. Morgan’s reasons for today’s silence ceased to matter.

  Julie shook her head. “I was there for most of it,” she said. “For all of her parents’ testimonies and some of Morgan’s. Then, in the middle of hers, the judge called a recess and I had to leave to get back here. I just took the morning off.”

  “How did it look from what you saw?”

  “Not good, Cal.” The woman looked like she might cry. “The judge’s decision aside, just having to sit there and hear your parents talk about you like that…it couldn’t be easy.”

  He wanted to know every word that was said. And had to get to the facts and back out to the young man who was waiting for him, who also had a stake in what went on that day.

  “Do you think they swayed the judge?”

  “I have no idea. He seemed nice enough. And her father’s testimony was definitely skewed. The man’s dangerous, the way he can take a bit of truth and put it out there in a way that doesn’t resemble the truth at all. I wish I could have stayed to hear all of Morgan’s testimony. She was doing a good job, but she wasn’t visibly upset.”

  He thought of Shane Arnett, of the man’s ability to continue to believe in himself when even his parents had given up on him, and knew he had to get to Morgan.

  “She didn’t call you afterward? Didn’t let you know how things went?”

  “She called to tell me that it was over and that she’d talk to me later about it. That she couldn’t go through it right then. She said she needed a little time alone to pull herself together before she had to pick up Sammie. She asked me to call immediately if Sammie had a problem, but she wouldn’t tell me where she was or what she was doing. She did say that you’d still be coming by to pick up Sammie as usual.”

  “It doesn’t sound promising,” Cal said, studying Julie’s concerned expression, searching for some sign of encouragement. “But worst case scenario, if the judge made his decision on the spot and awarded full custody to her parents, then wouldn’t they have come to pick up Sammie?”

  “Unless they’re allowing her to tell him herself, and to help him pack and then bring him to their house. They’ve said all along that they want her to have unsupervised visits. It’s not like they think she’s a flight risk or unsafe for Sammie to be around.”

  “What if she were married?” The question was logical. But moot, since there was no one in her life to marry and everyone who knew her knew that.

  “The question never came up,” Julie said, her eyes narrowing. “Since she hasn’t had a date in years, I don’t think anyone sees marriage as a consideration. I also don’t see how the guy could have made a decision so…so life-altering in the span of a few hours. There’s evidence for him to consider in addition to today’s testimony.”

  The door opened and Sammie peeked his head in. “Come on, Cal, can we go? Mom’s going to be coming and I won’t have much time to practice.”

  Getting his mind back to what mattered—the ten-year-old boy whose future was at stake—Cal told Julie goodbye and focused solely on Sammie during the drive home.

  * * *

  THERE WAS THIS LITTLE glen, a natural clearing in the midst of trees where the stream that flowed through her father’s property slowed down to a trickle, that Morgan had discovered when she was about five or six years old. She’d run away from home because her father had told her that she couldn’t play Little League baseball because she was a girl.

  She hadn’t known back then, of course, but the only reason she’d been allowed to run anywhere was because she’d wisely chosen to stay on her father’s property. Had she left the grounds, she’d have been picked up immediately and brought safely back home.

  She also hadn’t known then that she’d been watched every single second she’d thought she was trekking out on her own. She’d had her own personal bodyguard from the day she was born, though she hadn’t realized that until she was about twelve.

  One thing she’d give her father, his control of her was discreet.

  She’d brought Sammie to the glen for a picnic once. He’d preferred the woods on the other side of the property, which was where he’d run when he’d had to get away from her.

  But when Morgan needed comfort, she found it in the glen. If she needed strength, the glen gave it to her.

  Morgan hadn’t counted on having life hurt so much that she couldn’t bear to go on. She hadn’t counted on losing Sammie.

  Lying flat on her back along the stream in her private glen on Tuesday, the summer sun caressing her skin with the warmth the morning had stolen from her, Morgan felt like dying. She’d parked in a public parking lot and then taken a shortcut through some woods to the back side of the unsecured portion of her father’s property and headed straight for her glen.

  It had been waiting for her, as always. She’d cried for the first while. Sometimes out loud. And then she’d just lain there, spent. Eventually, with the glen holding her troubles for a while, she’d slept. She hadn’t rested well in weeks and, as though her glen knew that, the land soothed her to sleep.

  It was there to cushion her when, upon regaining consciousness, she crashed back to an awareness of the earthly trials awaiting her.

  Trials.

  The custody hearing wasn’t done yet.

  But Morgan was fairly certain that she was done with it.

  When the air started to cool just a bit and the sun began its slow descent, Morgan rose and made her way back out to the road and up to her car. She drove into Tyler with calm and confidence. She had a job to do. A son who needed her. And as long as there was anything he could take from her that would benefit him, she would be there to provide it to him. No matter the cost to her.

  She had no doubt whatsoever about her ability to give to those who needed her.

  Pulling to the edge of Professor Whittier’s driveway so as not to disrupt the one-on-one basketball game currently in progress, Morgan put the car in Neutral, unlocked the doors and waited. Cal had called a couple of times. She’d listened to his messages. She hadn’t returned his calls.

  Maybe tomorrow she’d be ready to have friends again. Tonight she was a mother. And she had to tend to her son.

  With that sole thought in mind, she put the car in gear the second Sammie came running down the drive.

  He was wearing new basketball shorts that matched his new shoes. Shorts she hadn’t purchased. Tonight, those shorts were another sign to her of what she must do.

  “You coming in, Mom?”

  “Not tonight, sweetie. Tell Frank thank-you and jump in. I’ve already called in our pizza order and it’s going to be ready in five. Traffic was kind of bad so it took me a while to get here.”

  With a grin and a nod, her son did as she bid.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  TUESDAY NIGHT CAL FOUGHT a good fight. But he came out of it uncertain whether he’d won or lost. Since he was fighting with himself, either way he came up a winner. And a loser, too.

  At five, when Morgan drove off with Sammie without so much as a hello, let alone a rundown of what had happened in court, he was peeved. How dare she involve him in her crisis and then just leave him hanging like he didn’t deserve to know the outcome?

  By six he remembered that she hadn’t involved him. He’d involved himself. On more than one occasion. He was the one who’d pushed. Not Morgan. She’d never onc
e called him. Never come to him at all.

  And he wanted her to.

  With that realization he took himself out for a beer, leaving his father to fend for himself for dinner—something that Frank seemed better able to do now that he had a reason to need his strength. After one beer, he went to his monthly junior arts league meeting, listened to the items on the agenda, voted and left without taking the time to socialize with anyone. Tonight he only had the wherewithal to find out how Morgan Lowen was doing.

  Tonight, for the first time in his adult life, he wanted to be needed by a woman.

  Pulling into a bar not far from the arts center, he determined that one more beer would wash away the unfamiliar desires that were trying to hijack his life and then he’d head home to bed. An early night wouldn’t be remiss.

  He missed the parking spot he’d claimed as his. And missed his turnaround to take a second shot at it. He was out on the road again instead, heading toward Morgan’s duplex. It wasn’t far.

  He considered making a ten o’clock call. They’d kind of established a pattern. He’d just see if her lights were still on and then call her from the car.

  One light was on. The small one in the living room, on the end table at the far end of the couch. The end by the archway that led into her dining room. The shades were drawn, but he could tell by the glow of the light, and by its placement on the curtains, which lamp she’d left burning.

  Pulling his phone out of its pouch, he held it up. Looked at it and then at the house.

  If she wanted to speak with him, she knew how to reach him.