how it happened, but we arrived back in Victoria that night and then Jake wound up spending the entire weekend with me.
On Friday I went to go visit my dad, and Jake followed me. I don’t even remember inviting him to come, but when I looked over in my car, there he was with a giant grin sitting in the passenger seat.
“So where does your dad live?” he asked, reading my mind and knowing that I was still trying to piece together the shortcut our relationship had taken, and how in just one week’s time we’d gone from strangers to enemies, to frenemies to lovers, to, well … in a relationship of sorts.
I let out a big sigh and turned off the main road. “He’s in a home. We moved him out here shortly after we relocated to the island. He has severe Alzheimer’s, and most days he doesn’t recognize me, or if he does, not for very long.”
He made a face. “So he wouldn’t have even known if you hadn’t brought the candy?”
“No. But I would have.”
“And your mum?”
“Died when I was six.” I parked the car and reached into the back seat for my purse and the candy.
His cocky smirk faltered, and he grabbed my arm before I could open the door. “I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
I shrugged. “No one does. It’s not something I really talk about. But thank you.”
We made our way into the assisted living home and found my dad. As always, because he was nothing if not a man of routine (I came by it honestly), he was sitting in the overstuffed chair at the window, eating apple slices and sipping tea, watching the ducks splash about in the pond just beyond the window.
“Hi Dad,” I whispered, coming up and pecking him on the forehead, his skin cool to the touch but not cold. His color looked better than the last time I saw him.
“Freya?” He looked at me, and recognition flooded his eyes. “When did you get here?”
“Just now, Dad. Sorry I haven’t been by in a while. I was out of town again.”
“Did you bring any candy?” His eyes drifted to my purse, where a box of the maple candy stuck out like a sweet beacon. He licked his lips and then looked back up at me with hopeful eyes.
“Of course, but let’s only have a couple for now. You don’t want to overdo it.”
He shot me an irritated glare but took the box from me anyway. “I’m your father. Don’t you be telling me what to do. If I want to have all the candy, then I will!”
I raised my hands in surrender. “Fine, fine, who am I to deny you the little ounce of joy you get from eating yourself sick? What do I know?”
“Hrmmpf,” he grumbled, opening the box. “Indeed.”
We sat and chatted with my dad for a while. The conversation was rather one-sided, as often my dad would get distracted by the ducks or just completely ignore me. But once in a while, he’d have a moment of clarity and say something relevant and inspiring or reminiscent of our earlier days and my childhood. Jake remained silent throughout the majority of the trip, and my father barely paid him any mind. It wasn’t until my dad got up to go the washroom and then came back that he seemed to even know Jake was sitting in the chair across from him.
He sat back down and took a sip of his tea, watching the ducks play and dive and ruffle their feathers in the little pond. This was one of the reasons I’d chosen this home for my father, because I knew that he’d find a lot of pleasure watching the birds every day. When he put his teacup down, my dad gave me a very odd look, as if seeing me for the first time. His blue-gray eyes went wide, almost with terror, and his bushy salt and pepper brows nearly shot off his head.
“Brenna?” he whispered, staring at me. “Is that you?” There were unshed tears in his eyes as he grabbed my hand and brought the back of it to his lips. “Darling, I thought you were gone.”
The odd time when I’d come to visit my dad, especially if I wore my hair up in a bun, he’d briefly mistake me for my mother, but it would last only a few seconds, maybe a minute or two at the most. And since I’d stopped wearing my hair up, he hadn’t made the mistake again. So when he did it today, while my hair was down, it sent a frisson of alarm straight up my spine.
“Um, Dad, it’s me, Freya.” I waved at him and smiled. “It’s not Mum. I know I look a lot like her, but Mum’s been dead for a while now, remember?”
But it was if he were in a trance and heard nothing and saw nothing but my mother. “I’ve missed you,” he said softly, nothing but longing and love in his voice and eyes. And then suddenly his face took on a serious scowl. “We need to tell Freya the truth.”
I shot Jake a look, and he sat forward in his chair. “The truth about what, Mr. Lapierre?”
But my father ignored him. “I think she has a right to know that she has a brother.”
Suddenly my tongue felt like a lead weight in my mouth, and my stomach did a cartwheel and failed. “Brother?” I finally squeaked.
My dad’s brows were drawn tight. “I don’t care that you had a baby at sixteen and gave it up. But I think our daughter has a right to know she has more family out there. Once we go, she has no one. Maybe she can find him.”
I thought my head was going to explode, but I needed to know more. Why had my father never told me this before he got Alzheimer’s? When I was younger but old enough to understand? If he hadn’t mistaken me for my mother, would he have taken this secret to the grave? Would I have lived my entire life not knowing that I had more family out there somewhere? Or was this all a manifestation of the Alzheimer’s, one of his many confusions and stories?
I hated deceiving my father, but if he thought I was his wife and I could get him to tell me more about this brother I apparently had, then I would do anything I had to.
I hinged forward and cupped my father’s cheek. “You’re right, Roland, but I can’t seem to remember which hospital I had him at, do you remember? Or the baby’s father. It was so long ago, things are a little fuzzy.”
He gave me an incredulous look but then softened and leaned into my hand and closed his eyes. “It’s okay, sweetie, we’ll tell her together.”
“Where, Roland?” I demanded a little bit more forcefully. “Where did I give birth?”
“I think she has a right to know,” he started mumbling, looking around for another piece of candy and grinning when he spotted the box on my lap.
“Roland!” I snapped. “Where did I have the baby? Who was the father?”
Smiling sweetly, he kissed my palm and took my other hand in his. “I think it’s time we told Freya though. She’s old enough now. I think she’ll understand. We can do it together.”
I ground my molars together to keep myself from crying at the stunning truth that I had a sibling, so close, yet still so far away. But I swallowed, knowing that I would not be getting the answers I needed today. So instead, I smiled, closed my eyes and leaned into his hand. “I think so too, Roland. She deserves to know.”
He gave a small nod, and then his eyes drifted to Jake. “Who are you?” Then back to me. “Freya? When did you get here?” And just like that, I was me again.
“Dad,” I said, reaching into my purse for a water bottle and swallowing the lump that had formed in my throat, “this is Jake. He’s my, uh … he’s my boyfriend … I guess.”
“You guess?” Jake snorted. I chose to ignore him. Now was not the time to be getting into a discussion over the status of our very whirlwind and somewhat unorthodox relationship.
“Since when do you have a boyfriend? Aren’t you married to Ted?” My dad shook his head in confusion. “I remember walking you down the aisle. You wore your mother’s Celtic knot.”
I nodded with a smile, wishing that I had the pendant on me at that moment. “You’re right, Dad, you did, but Ted’s dead. I told you that last time and the time before that. He died in a car accident a few months ago.”
My dad made a face that wasn’t quite a pout. “Hmm, well, I hate to speak ill of the dead, but I hope you’re happy with this young man, because I don’t think Ted made you very happy.”
I felt Jake’s hand rest on my back, sending a small shiver of longing coursing through my body. “He makes me very happy, Dad.”
“How’re you doing?” Jake asked tentatively as we got back into the car and headed for home. “That was a lot of new news to take in all at once. You have a brother!”
I raised my eyebrows and nodded, letting out a big sigh. My chest felt unusually tight, and a tension headache was starting to build right between my eyebrows.
“Yeah, I don’t know what to believe. I mean I don’t think this is one of his made-up stories. But how did I not know about this until now?”
He shrugged. “When was your dad diagnosed with Alzheimer’s?”
“About six or seven years ago. I can’t quite remember. It was early onset but didn’t really start to show up as more than just mild confusion and forgetfulness until the last few years. Now it’s really sped up.”
“Maybe he meant to tell you but honestly just forgot.”
“Maybe … ” I hummed, still thinking that I didn’t have the whole story and wondering what else my dad had been hiding. My mind began to wander. Had my mother really died from a brain aneurysm in her sleep when I was six, or had she died some other horrible way and he was just covering it up? Was Roland even my real dad? All these new questions popped up, and I felt myself get dizzy. The car swerved, and I struggled to right it before we darted into the opposite lane. I jerked the wheel hard to the right, causing the car next to me to honk.
“Whoa, whoa!” Jake hollered, grabbing the wheel and righting it before I mowed down a pedestrian. “Maybe I should drive. Give you some time to think.”
I shook my head. “What? Oh … yeah, maybe.” Without even really thinking about where I was, I pulled over.
“Okay, okay,” he said, fear in his voice as he ushered me around to the passenger side and helped me climb in. “Let’s get you home before we cause an accident.”
I buckled myself in and sat staring blankly ahead as Jake expertly weaved us through traffic. My whole life, my whole world as I knew it, it was turning upside down … again. I thought finding out my husband had been leading a double life was upside down enough, but now to find out I had a brother …
We pulled into my parking garage, and Jake got out of the car. I just continued to sit there. He walked around to my side and opened my door. “Come on, let’s go upstairs,” he whispered, leaning across me to unbuckle my belt and help me out. I let him lead me like a puppy on a leash. My eyes struggled to focus as we walked through the concrete bomb shelter that was my parking garage, took the elevator up and made our way down the hall to my suite.
“What can I do?” he asked, watching me toe off my shoes and leave them in the hall. “Freya?” I haphazardly flung my purse into the coat closet and shut it.
“Jake,” I sighed, lying back onto my bed, “I just want to be alone for a bit … please?”
His face fell into a frown, but he nodded quickly and walked out, closing the door behind him. I felt bad for how I had treated him, but the headache had progressed, and I was now having a hard time seeing straight. At the moment, Jake’s feelings were not my top priority. He’d go home and we’d talk later in the week, once I was able to make heads or tails of my situation, but for now, I just needed to close my eyes and be alone.
It was several hours later when I woke up to find a blanket drawn across me and the blinds lowered. I knuckled the sleep out of my eyes, scuffing slowly in my slippers and opening up my bedroom door only to be knocked back a step by a delightful aroma. Someone was cooking. Wandering into the kitchen, I found Jake puttering. A purple and white orchid sat in a beautiful yellow pot, and a bottle of decanted red wine was breathing on the counter.
“Wh— I … I thought you went home?” I asked, coming up to the counter and accepting the glass of wine he’d just poured.
He gave me a puzzled look. “Why would you think that?” He tossed on oven mitts in response to the beeping timer and opened up the oven to retrieve a mouthwatering loaf of homemade focaccia bread.
What couldn’t this guy do?
“I don’t know. Because I asked to be alone.”
“And I left you alone.” He shrugged. “Doesn’t mean I was going to leave you. You feeling any better?” He stirred a pot on the stove and grabbed two plates from the cupboard.
“A little bit,” I said, sliding onto a bar stool at the counter to watch him, completely fascinated with how comfortable he felt in my kitchen, in any kitchen for that matter. The man was certainly full of surprises. “My headache is just a dull tapping now, thankfully. And I think I’ll try again with my dad, maybe dress up like my mum, put my hair in a bun. I don’t like the idea of tricking him, but I need answers.”
He nodded, dishing up what looked to be chicken penne in a rosé sauce with Caesar salad and focaccia bread. My stomach gurgled at the barrage of delectable smells wafting toward me. He pointed at the orchid. “That’s for you, by the way.”
I fingered a silky petal and studied it. It was beautiful. “Thank you. But why?”
“Do I need a reason?”
“Who are you?” I blurted out as he set dinner in front of me and joined me at the bar.
A playful smirk tugged the corner of his mouth. “What do you mean?”
“Dinner, flowers, taking care of Connor. You’re perfect. So who are you? What’s your goal here? Because honestly, you seem just too good to be true.”
He took a bite of his salad before answering. “I like you, and you’ve been through so much. I think you deserve to be taken care of for once. You take care of everyone else, but,” he sipped his wine and looked at me over the rim, his eyes so intense that I felt my breath catch in my chest, “who takes care of you?”
“So, you want t-to take care of me?”
He shrugged. “At least for now. You just got some pretty crazy news. You’re allowed to feel, to be emotional and break down. You don’t have to remain stoic for everything.”
“I—”
“Just enjoy it. Now eat your food.” He handed me my fork and motioned for me to dig in.
So I did.
Meanwhile this weird and wonderful feeling was creeping up my neck and throughout my body, a warmth, and like a fist it squeezed my chest and around my heart.
I was being taken care of.