“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye…  we shall ...

Jenny returned to her chair, moving with the stunned mechanics of an accident victim. She stared at the pad in her hand, numbed by one too many pieces of bad news. Gradually, she realized someone was talking.

“Jenny? Honey, are you all right? Is there anything I can do?” Rose Hawthorne stood there, her kind face knotted with worry. Rose was a soft, billowy woman with natural pink cheeks and irrepressible blonde curls skewered into a knot from which they always escaped. She had quick, bright eyes and always smelled faintly of flowers. She had been Jenny’s kindergarten teacher.

Jenny felt the tears start. Rose was another person it was safe to cry with. “Uncle Billy is dead.”

Rose dropped down beside her, pulling Jenny’s head against her gardenia-scented shoulder. “There, darling, there now. It’s all right to cry.” Rose handed her a soft pink tissue. “Have you eaten anything?”

“Of course. Well, Charlie and I brought muffins and orange juice. Would you like that?” Rose signaled for Charlie to join them. How thoughtful these women were.

“She’s in a coma. There’s been no change for hours. They warn us not to expect too much, but how can we not? She’s spent her whole life being a tough, won’t back down woman.” Her voice faltered. “Why would she be different now?”

Jenny shook her head. “Immediate family only. And we’re only allowed in on alternate Thursdays between 2:00 and 2:05. a.m.” At Rose’s shocked look, she explained, “We’re only supposed to be there a few minutes at a time. Seems like as soon as we go in, they need to do a procedure and send us out again.”

“Jenny, I—” Charlie bit her lip, trying to make up her mind about something. Then she reached into the canvas work bag and pulled out a book-shaped package wrapped in brown paper. She balanced it on her knees, tapping it with busy fingers. “Maybe I’m jumping the gun,” she said.

Jenny’d exhausted her capacity to handle complications. She wanted to snatch the package and tear it open. With difficulty, she sat on her hands.

“Your mother came to my house one night last week on her way home from work, carrying this package,” Charlie said. “She was behaving strangely. Nervous. Distracted.” She lapsed into another nerve-wracking silence. “If she wasn’t the world’s bravest person, I’d say she was scared. She asked if I’d keep it for her. Of course I said yes. When a friend asks for a favor, what else do you say? She said if anything happened to her, I was to give it to you. I thought it was silly, you know, but she was asking. I never imagined anything would happen, and I don’t know if this…” A tear streaked its way down her cheek.

In the harsh light, Charlie looked washed-out and old. Jenny felt guilty for her impatience. This was Charlie’s tragedy, too.

“I don’t know if this is what she meant by something happening,” Charlie said. She pulled out a tissue and dabbed at her eyes. “And I can’t ask her. So here.” She held out the package. “I’m giving it to you.”

“What is it?” Jenny asked.

Charlie shook her head. “I have no idea. Maybe there’s a note inside.”

A small man in blue hospital garb with a dry, supercilious face came through the door carrying a clipboard. The room fell silent, all the eyes fixing on him. “Mr. Cates?” he said. “Mr. Elmer Cates.”

Jenny went over to him. “I’m Jenny Cates,” she said. “His daughter. Your patient is my mother.”

“I’m afraid I need your father, honey,” he said. “I need an adult to sign this form.”

“I am an adult,” she said, trying not to sound huffy. “What’s this all about?”

He signaled for her to follow him back through the doors into the blank, airless hallway where other groups with red eyes and strained faces had gathered around tired men and women in printed blue scrubs that looked like toddler’s playwear. “Your mother needs an operation,” he said. “There’s been swelling, putting pressure on the brain. We need to relieve that pressure to prevent further damage.”

“I thought you took care of that last night,” she said.

He shoved the clipboard at her, angrily clicking the pen to life. “Look, you can sign it or not,” he said. “She needs the operation.”

“What’s the operation supposed to do?” she asked. “What are the risks? Do we have any choice? Is there a ‘wait and see’ alternative?”

He shrugged. “I’ll make it simple for you, sweetheart. She has it, and maybe she survives. She doesn’t, she dies.” He waggled the clipboard and the pen.

Jenny took them. “This is informed consent?”

He didn’t answer.

She looked at her watch. Six hours since they’d had any information, and repeated, “This is what you call keeping the family informed?”

“Look, dear, either sign it or don’t. Your choice. I haven’t got time for this. I’ve got people in serious conditions waiting.”

She signed the form, holding back tears as she forced words around the lump in her throat. “What can you tell me about her condition, other than that she needs the surgery?” Anything, she thought. Just give me something hopeful to cling to.

He shrugged. “Besides the swelling? Nothing new.”

She lost it then. Just sign it, Dear. Honey. Sweetheart. Hadn’t anyone ever taught him about dealing with women? With people? Her mother would have eaten this guy alive. The thought of someone so insensitive working on her mother sickened her. She hoped for an inverse relationship between skills and bedside manner. She squinted at his name tag. “Actually, the person in serious condition is you, Dr. Feeney. You’ve lost your humanity.” She rushed back through the swinging doors.

A nurse. She should find a nurse. They were the ones who’d tell families what was happening. But not while her voice was shaking and she couldn’t hold back tears. She walked out and down corridor after corridor. Walking blindly, the passing scene nothing but a blur. Where on earth had her father gone? She reached the far end of the hospital and stared out the window. A glorious day with clear blue sky and golden sun. She was a college student on spring break. Shouldn’t she be sitting on a beach somewhere?

She retraced her steps to the L.L.Bean Special Care unit. L.L.Bean. Such irony. She knew it simply reflected philanthropy, but the idea of a well-known supplier of outerwear and sporting gear appending its name to a wing serving helpless people wired to banks of machines struck her as absurd. Her mother wasn’t snazzily dressed in a velvety-soft microfleece night shirt, clutching a moose mug as she gazed out at the snowy landscape. She was wearing a faded blue and white johnny, tugged down to accommodate all the electronic leads glued to her chest. Her feet weren’t cozy in slippers, but in elastic stockings to keep her circulation going.

Her eyes blurred, vision obscured like a downpour on a windshield. She passed the volunteer behind the desk with a nod, grabbing a handful of tissues from the tiny box on the desk. Why, in a place so full of tears, did they have such tiny boxes?

Her father was outside the waiting room, talking with Adele and Andy Mason. “Daddy,” she said, “where have you been? They were looking for you to sign a consent form. They need to do another operation. I signed it, but you should see if you can get more information about what’s going on.”

He rushed off without a word, leaving her with the Masons.

Adele hefted a basket. “Got enough food in here to keep us all for days,” she said. “Andy said you were hungry.”

Jenny reached around the basket and gave the old lady a hug. “Thanks for coming,” she said.

“Hey, where’s my hug?” Andy complained.

“Hug an old thing like you, Dandy? Why would I do that?”

He picked her up in bear hug, swung her around, and set her back on her feet. “Because I’m your friend,” he said. “What’s the news?”

“She’s in a coma. Now they say she needs surgery—something about relieving pressure on the brain. That’s all they’ve told us. Except to expect the worst.”

“Not from Lila,” Adele interrupted. “They’re seeing what they see, not knowing what we know. Your mother is tough.”

Jenny agreed.

The pale, limp Lila who was plugged into all those machines looked awfully vulnerable. Every time she stood near her mother, watching the multi-colored rows of blips on the monitor, hearing the mechanical breathing, she had a powerful wish to transfuse some of her own life. She would have given it all to save her mother. Her father would have, too. Any of her friends would have. How odd to go through conversational rituals when every one of them wanted to beat on the ground, holler, storm through the doors and demand action. When even gentle Rose would have gladly dismembered Lila’s attackers.

“Everything okay at the house?”

Dandy nodded. “Lights off. Doors locked. I’ve asked the police to keep an eye on the place. Oh, while I was in the kitchen, your boyfriend, Drew, called. He wants you to call. Says it’s important.”

“Drew thinks everything he wants is important.”

Dandy made a defensive gesture. “Up to you, Jen. He said he knows you don’t want to talk to him but to ask you to please call anyway. Something about the apartment. He sounded frantic.”

She was sure she knew what this would be about. Something bad had happened. Another bad thing. She wasn’t up for more bad news.

“Here’s the number.” Dandy handed her a piece of paper. “Has your dad eaten?”

“I don’t think so.”

“We’ll go see,” he said, opening the door and holding it for his mother and the basket to pass through. “You call that guy. He sounded upset.”

“He should be.”

Dandy just gave her his “don’t go being an uppity woman with me” look. He’d been giving it to her since she was thirteen, when she first became an uppity woman.

Obediently, she went to the end of the corridor and got out her phone. It wasn’t the apartment number. He must already be at home. When he answered, she said, “It’s Jenny.”

“Oh, Jen. Thank goodness. I must have called a thousand times. Listen, don’t hang up on me, please. I’m at home. I guess you know that, since you called me here. Betty called me. Yeah. Guess I know how you feel about that, too.”

“Like hell you do.”

“Look, just let me say this, okay, then you can call me every name in the book. Someone broke into the apartment last night and completely trashed it. They tried to set it on fire, but I guess the couple upstairs smelled smoke and called the fire department, so things aren’t bad. Just messy. I wanted you to know, in case, you know, you came back or something. I didn’t want you to think I did it. I’ll clean it up when I get back but like, right now, I can’t face it. Sorry. You’ve got the number here, right, in case you need me?”

“I’ve got it.”

She pictured their neat little apartment a shambles like her mother’s office. It was the first place besides Hallowell she’d thought of as ‘home.’ What on earth was going on? She wanted to take refuge in some internal place like her father could. But she had a photographic memory. She’d always be able to recall her mother’s limp, white hand. The crumpled form. The vivid red of the blood contrasting with the dark, dark hair. The vulnerability of her mother’s white neck when her father pushed the hair aside looking for a pulse.

“Jen? You still there?”

“Yes.” She was going to cry again.

“I’m sorry about your mother. I know how much you love her. And I may be a no good shit, but if you ever need me for anything, I’m here.”

“I’ve got to go.” She closed the phone, stumbled back to the waiting room, and collapsed against Dandy’s chest. “Poor Dandy. You get all the hard jobs, don’t you?”

“Sit down and eat,” he said gruffly. Dandy was a taciturn Mainer, like his mother. Being thanked made him uncomfortable. He poured out strong black coffee from a thermos. “You take sugar and cream in yours, right?”

She took the coffee and the thick turkey sandwich on homemade bread, but after one huge bite, she wasn’t hungry. Hollow and empty but not hungry. Carefully, she folded the sandwich back into its wrapper. “Sorry,” she said. “I can’t eat right now. I just found out…”

She took a few slow breaths, willing her throat to relax. She needed to get these words out. “I just found out Uncle Billy’s dead. Drove his truck into a lake last night in the snowstorm. But I don’t think it was an accident.”

Adele was watching her with intent, bright eyes. When Jenny said this, she nodded. “Ever since I saw those two trying to break into your folks’ place, I’ve thought something mighty strange was goin’ on.”

“Now mother, you can’t go building a federal case out of a couple of housebreakers,” Dandy said.

“Andy Mason, you don’t know what you’re talking about,” his mother said. “When’s the last time you heard of a couple rural Maine housebreakers in business suits with polished shoes?”

Andy stared down at his own muddy Bean boots.

“You got any more of those sandwiches?” her father asked, dropping heavily into a chair.

“Enough for the Russian army.”

“Daddy, did you learn anything?”

He shook his head in exasperation. “I’ve worked with autistic kids more communicative than that damned Feeney. They’re taking her to surgery now.”

“Why now? Why didn’t they do it last night? What does it mean?”

Her father sighed. “Honey, I wish I knew. I called Dr. Hadley and explained the situation. He’s going to make some calls and see what he can find out. You know how doctors are. They’ll tell each other things they won’t tell us.” He seized the sandwich Adele offered and wolfed it down. “Good,” he muttered around the last bite. “Great. Got another?”

She held out her own sandwich. “Here, you can have mine.”

“No, Jen,” he said. “You need to eat.”

“I can’t.” She unwrapped the sandwich and pressed it into his hand. When her father had finished the second sandwich and some coffee, she stood. “Daddy, can I talk to you for a minute. Alone?”

For a moment, she thought he’d refuse. Then he said, “Excuse us a moment,” to Dandy and Adele, and led her into the hall. “Jenny,” he said, looking out the window instead of her, “this is a lot more complicated than you think. I’m not ready to explain it. I know you have a right to understand what’s going on. Just give me some time, okay? I’m too worried about your mother right now to think clearly.”

She’d brought him out here to tell him about Billy, not press him about the letter, but she wasn’t letting that subject slip away. “I don’t see what the big mystery is. So what if Mom had an affair before she married you. It’s no one’s business but theirs. If she wants to deny it and he denies it, that’s the end of it. What’s the big deal?”

He ran a hand through his graying hair and returned to staring out the window. “It’s more complicated than that. More embarrassing. There may be a…”

“Tape,” she finished.

“A tape,” he echoed.

“Which Uncle Billy had. Why would Uncle Billy have a tape of Mom and Senator Buxton?”

“Because Billy is a shit,” her father said.

“Was,” she corrected. “Billy is dead.”

Her father stared at her. “Billy’s what? What are you talking about?”

A roar in her brain threatened to drown everything out. Something very bad was going on here. Her mother attacked and unconscious. Uncle Billy dead. Now her father acting like a stranger. Why didn’t her father want to explain? They’d always been honest with each other.

“I called to tell him what had happened. Uncle Billy. I know you’re mad at him, but he had to be told. The woman who answered said he was dead. Went out last night for cigarettes and drove his truck into a lake. She said to tell Mom you guys don’t need to worry about the tape. He’s… what did she say? Put it on ice? I don’t know what she meant. I don’t think she did, either. I know you know what’s on that tape, Daddy. What the hell is going on?”

She gripped his arm. “I’m not a baby. The people who are being hurt I love and care about, too. My apartment’s been trashed and burned. My mother’s in a coma. My uncle is dead. My mother once had an affair with her boss she thought was important enough to write me about. Before this happened, she was worried about a tape. And you know why.”

Very slowly, he turned toward her, his face the color of ashes. “You have your mother’s diary?”

“What diary? What are you talking about?”

The roar was getting louder. Driving home from Ohio, a lifetime ago that was only yesterday, she’d felt alien, detached from her connections with the rest of the species. Everything she’d believed about herself and Drew was false. She’d been fleeing to home, to love and good sense, order and security. Now she felt more isolated than ever.

“Your mother’s diary. She was worried about having it. I thought she’d sent it to you.”

Was the package from Charlie her mother’s diary? Jenny said, “Charlie gave me a package.”

“Billy’s really dead?”

“That’s what his pregnant girlfriend says.”

Her father started walking away. All her frustration with the things she couldn’t control and the answers she couldn’t get exploded. She went after him and grabbed his arm. “Daddy! Come on. You can’t walk away. You’ve got to tell me what’s going on.”

He turned, his mouth moving, though at first no words came out. “Jennifer… I wish I didn’t have to.”

He hesitated. “You might as well know…”

Looking like he was in acute pain, he cut her loose from everything she’d taken as a given. “Senator Buxton is your biological father.”