twenty-two

BLUFFTON, SOUTH CAROLINA

2010

Families were formed of many combinations and with one Facebook “friend request” Kate’s family had increased plus five. As weeks passed, Emily asked questions as they came to her; Kate answered and then asked her own. They learned about each other’s habits and likes and dislikes, about what they had in common and what they didn’t.

Kate fought the urge to act like a “mother,” but what else was she? What was the plan for a birth mother who reentered a young girl’s life? Did she just send notes of adoration? Did she try to see her? Become involved in everyday life? What she’d give for a blueprint or outline. She’d read so many books when she was pregnant—there was not an absence of advice then, but now?

None.

While the rest of the world returned to their normal routine, Kate oscillated between jubilation and melancholy, between joy and fear. All these years and time, and her daughter was now part of her life, but what if she messed it up now? Every day seemed a new way to ruin the good, the newly found goodness. Finally two months after her visit, the Jackson family wrote to say that they were heading to the Florida panhandle for vacation and would love to stop in Birmingham and meet Jack.

Jack had taken three days to think about it before calling Kate.

“Why wouldn’t you want to meet her?” Kate asked, cradling her cell phone between her shoulder and ear as she arranged shirts on a rack.

“This isn’t something to be taken lightly.”

“I didn’t say it was. I just wondered.”

“I’ve told you. This isn’t something anyone in my life knows about. This isn’t common knowledge. I tried to forget.” Each sentence seemed a word of its own: simple and complete.

“But you didn’t.”

“Didn’t what?”

“Forget. I mean, how could you?”

“At times I did. And now, when life has some kind of balance, I don’t want to mess it all up again.”

“Jack, she just wants to know her story. That’s all anyone wants, I think. To know where they came from and why. You never have to see her again. Just give this to her. To me.”

“Yes,” he said. “Okay.”

“Great, so I’ll see you soon.” Kate hung up, leaning her head against the wall.

“You okay?” Lida asked, coming from behind Kate.

“Yep.” She shook her head. “I really don’t get Jack at all. Here is the one person he has wondered about and worried about for his whole life and he almost doesn’t want to see her?”

Lida smiled, but her lips were closed and the smile sad. “It must be hard for him.”

Kate nodded. “I know.”

And she did know. Jack’s heart had long since healed, and opening doors and windows to this piece of the past might make him feel and remember things he’d obviously kept far from his life. She did know.

*   *   *

The edges of Kate’s body felt frayed and loose as she waited on the outdoor patio of the pizza place in downtown Birmingham. This was where they’d agreed to meet. Jack hadn’t invited them to his house; he hadn’t even invited her to his house. This meeting was separate, a thing outside his life. A secret.

Kate again looked out to the streetscape, cars passing, heat mirages working their way across the sidewalk like water. Her cell phone rang and Emily’s dad, Larry Jackson, informed her that they were running late, as they were lost.

“Jack isn’t here yet either,” she said. “Take your time.” And just as the words came out of her mouth, she saw him: Jack walking toward her with sunglasses covering his eyes, a smile when hearing his name.

“I’m here.” He sidled around the round iron table and hugged Kate. “I was hoping I’d get to see you alone for a second before they showed up. I’m nervous as hell,” he said.

“Don’t be. They are so easy to be around. So sweet. They aren’t here to judge you.”

“Okay.” He shuffled from foot to foot, his hands loose and unsure where to go or what to do.

She loved so many things about Jack, from the way he smiled to the gentleness he had with other people. The way he moved with surety through his world and then quickly showed, through the smallest gesture, a vulnerability she believed only she noticed. She adored his need to do the right thing always, his hand always finding the small of her back when she needed steadying, the way he looked at anyone and everyone when he spoke to them, as if they were the only ones in the room or even in his life. These were the things, the things of him, that she hoped the Jackson family would notice, the beauty of him that made her heart so full that nothing else fit.

“They’ll love you,” she said with absolute conviction.

“You might be biased.” He laughed that low, beautiful laugh just as they looked up and saw the Jackson family walking toward them.

“Sorry we’re late,” Larry said, holding out his hand to the father of his daughter.

“No problem,” Jack said, shaking Larry’s hand. “I’m Jack Adams.”

“Nice to meet you. I’m Larry and this is my wife, Elena, and my daughter, Emily.” He turned to face his wife and daughter, protective in his stance and words.

Jack shook Elena’s hand and then stood before Emily. She ignored his hand and threw her arms around him. “Hi, Mr. Jack. I am so happy I finally get to meet you. So happy.”

In this stunning moment, Jack forgot to hug her back. His arms dangled at his side, useless until Emily laughed and he lifted those arms and hugged her in return.

She stepped back and stared at him. “I look more like you, don’t I?”

He nodded. “I think so, yes.” He paused. “Where are your brothers?”

“Camp,” Elena said. “They go to the same camp in Maine every summer, but Emily hates camp. Hates being away from home.”

“Me too,” Jack said. “I’m a homebody, too.”

The air lightened and they sat at the table, shuffling positions in the awkwardness of the moment. When they’d settled down and the menus were handed out, it was Emily who spoke first. “Okay, I want to hear some stories. I want to know about you,” she looked at Jack. “I mean, I’ve talked to Kate a ton on e-mail and stuff, but I don’t know anything about you except the facts. And who cares about the facts?”

Elena touched her daughter’s arm. “Emily, don’t push.”

Jack smiled at Elena across the table. “She’s not pushing. I want to tell her everything. I just don’t know where to start. Ask me something.”

“Well, I mean if you guys didn’t have a first date, I wouldn’t be here, right? These are the things I’ve wondered for my whole life. How did you meet? Isn’t that what you’d wonder?” Emily looked at her dad and he nodded.

“Yes, Em. But I was just thinking that might not be where I’d start the conversation,” Larry said, his hand placed over hers, his large fingers covering his daughter’s smaller ones, her hand disappearing all together beneath his.

“Yep, Dad because you’re you and I’m me.”

“Help us all,” Elena motioned to the sky.

“We never really had a first date,” Jack said. “Katie and I grew in the same town. I don’t remember not knowing her or loving her. We went to elementary through high school together until my family moved here to Birmingham at the end of my junior year.”

“So,” Emily broke into the conversation. “You always knew each other.”

Jack laughed. “Always. She was unavoidable.” He smiled at Kate. “Inevitable.”

Kate’s skin expanded to allow his warmth to settle inside. For so many years she’d felt tight and small as if she needed to keep things enclosed and locked, as if her insides might explode if she didn’t keep control, and this unfolding was a relief.

“Inevitable?” Emily said the word as if she tasted an exotic flavor. “That’s so cool. Like I was inevitable.”

“You were,” Jack said. “Of course you were.”

“So you fell in love when you were my age?”

“I did, yes. I won’t answer for Katie.”

The conversation broke apart as the waitress came over and took orders. But it was Emily who picked up threads and continued as if they hadn’t stopped. “So, you fell in love and then what?”

Jack looked to Kate. “You want to take it from here?”

She shook her head. “Nope. She asked you. Go on.”

“Well, my family moved here and then Katie and I went to different colleges. When she graduated, Katie took this amazing job far away and we tried to see each other when we could. It was when she came to visit me here that you came to be.”

“Wow.” Emily sat back in her seat, sipping Coke through a straw. “That is awesome.”

Unasked questions, unanswerable questions, grew from “I loved her” to “adoption,” but those were left alone for the moment.

Emily slurped the last of her Coke and the lunch order was placed before them. Facts were shared about life and jobs and school. “You know,” Jack said after Emily said her favorite class was creative writing, “your aunt is a writer.”

“I know,” Emily said while taking another bite of pizza. “I read this funny blog she wrote about finding the right preschool or something like that.”

“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Elena said, handing a napkin to Emily. Elena laid her fork on her uneaten salad and leaned forward. “Yes, that’s actually how we found you guys. We went on the Internet looking for Kate, but her sister Tara kept coming up. Hopefully, she’s handed down some of those writing skills to Emily.”

“No way I can be that good and get published for real and all that,” Emily said.

Jack took her hand. “You’re already that good. I mean, I haven’t read your writing, but you’re already that good because I know…”

Elena stood and turned. “I hate when you say that. I hate when you say you’re not good enough.” She rushed toward the bathroom, her exit so sudden that the awkward silence was unsettling, a cold wind.

Kate turned to Larry, “Is she okay?”

“Yes, this is hard for her. She just needs more space with it than the rest of us,” Larry said, glancing over his shoulder and then taking his daughter’s hand again. “She gets upset when you say you aren’t good enough at anything. She feels like it’s her fault.”

Kate’s eyes filled with tears and shame. “Is it because we were talking about my family? I’m sorry. Should I go after her?”

“No.”

“No.”

Larry and Emily spoke simultaneously.

“She’ll be fine,” Emily said. “But never, ever go after her when she leaves. Right Dad?”

He nodded. “It’s not because you talked about your family.”

Jack stood. “I think I should go now. I don’t want to cause problems. I just wanted to meet all of you.” He looked down at Emily.

Emily stood and faced him. “Mom will be sad if you leave without saying good-bye and … just stay a little bit longer. I promise it will all be fine. I promise. Just stay.”

“And who can refuse you?” he asked, that smile again on his face.

When Elena returned with her red eyes and stoic smile, good-byes were said, and shaky hugs offered. Jack and Kate stood together watching the Jackson family get in their car and wave.

“You think I made Elena upset?” Jack asked as he sat on a bench at the edge of the sidewalk and Kate sat down next to him.

“No, I don’t. But I can’t imagine how this must be for her. I mean, I don’t think this was something she imagined. We dreamed of it, but I can bet she didn’t.”

Jack nodded, his arm slipping over Kate’s shoulder, familiar.

“Can we just stay here in the warm sun for a few more minutes. Just stay here knowing that our daughter is good and fine and well?” Kate asked, quiet and leaning against him.

“We can stay here as long as you like.”

Eyes closed, warmth rushing through her hollow body, Kate felt somehow reborn and new. “The waiting was worth it. My God, she is so beautiful. And all of us sitting there together.”

“It’s more than I’d ever hoped for,” Jack said, and yet his voice was colder than the words were meant to be.

“The waiting was terrible though,” Kate said. “There were days I would’ve combed the earth for her if I’d known how.”

“Me too,” he said, his voice warming slightly. “But I couldn’t. It would’ve been terribly wrong. You can’t give something up and then ask for it back.”

Kate lifted his sunglasses so she could see the green, see the truth. “Are we talking about more than just our daughter now?”

He shrugged.

“Say something,” she pleaded.

“What do you want me to say?”

“I don’t know. Whatever you want. Whatever you want to say, say.”

“I’m glad we saw her. I am. That’s the truth. But it has to stop here.” He looked away. “To bring in all that pain again makes no sense at all and surely you don’t want to either.”

“What if it’s not pain?”

“Of course it is.” He removed his arm from her shoulder and slid to the other end of the bench.

“I don’t get it.” She was thrown off-balance, as if he’d slid to the other end of the world, an adult teeter-totter.

“Don’t you think I wanted to be with you? Days I wanted to go to Arizona and talk some sense into you?” A haze of summer heat and anger settled between them, palpable. “Shit, even after I was married I wanted to do that. It never seemed to end.”

“How was I ever supposed to know that’s how you felt? You only wrote that one letter. That one yearly letter.” Kate’s voice shook.

“I can’t always do exactly what I want to do. None of us can. If I’d done every single thing I wanted over the past thirteen years, I can’t imagine how many people, including myself, I would’ve destroyed. This is not about what I did or didn’t want to do; it’s about what I had to do. Don’t you even get that? You act like I didn’t want to write to you or see you.”

Kate dropped her face into her hands. “Then why didn’t you?”

“There was always something, Katie. Always. A real something. And then it did end. I did finally stop wanting it all.”

“Why not now?”

He stood then and looked down at her. “You have a boyfriend who has an engagement ring in his bedside drawer.”

She looked up at him. “I know that.”

“Just because Luna found us—” he seemed to stumble. “Look, Katie—Kate—that was then and this is now. We can’t dig into the past and fix it. It’s already happened. Done.”

“But our daughter isn’t in the past anymore. Our daughter. Luna.” Kate stood now, facing him with her voice strong. “This is not a small thing. She found us and this changes everything. She’s here.”

“She’s always been here. We just now saw her again, but she’s always been here.”

“With us, I mean. She’s here with us.”

“No.” He waved his hand toward the street. “She’s still with her family. Her mom and dad.”

Kate sat, and she looked up at him through the tears that made him appear murky and wavy, a dream almost.

“You can’t always make things come out the way you want them to come out.” He took a breath and then spoke on exhale. “This was a perfect day and I just don’t want to ruin it with anything we’d do or say now. I think we should just go. Just leave this the wonderful way it is.” He looked away. “I heard what you said when Rowan came to get you, about ending one chapter and starting another. And that’s exactly what we both need to do.”

The ground was slipping, moving away as if she could for the first time feel the roundness of the earth. “I understand,” Kate said.

“I’m not sure you do. I’ve never told my son. My ex-wife. My family.” Jack ticked each name off on his fingers. “If I focus on all of this—on you, on her—it takes away from living my life right now. She has a great life. Let’s leave her be.”

“It’s not like that. You can’t pretend her life doesn’t exist so you don’t have to upset yours.”

“You never told Rowan,” he said. “So let’s not forget that. You might not ever have told him if he hadn’t shown up at my house.”

Regret rolled around inside Kate’s belly, trapped under her ribs. “You’re right. I hadn’t told him, but I was trying to find a way. I wasn’t taking that engagement ring until I found a way to tell him.”

He avoided her gaze, staring off as if she weren’t pleading with him. “I don’t know how to fix this for us.” His voice was as distant as the years between them.

“I’m not asking you to fix it.”

“I think it’s best if we give ourselves some time to think about this. Let it be…”

“Okay,” Kate said. She touched the side of his face, a last gentle gesture, and then walked away. She wanted and needed him to call out to her, to call her back, but he didn’t, and she continued to walk until she reached her car.

Once, a day, a time, and a place had existed when Kate had believed that nothing could separate them—not anger, not un-forgiveness, not other loves, nothing at all.