Chapter 5
I remembered the telephone call because Denise had acted strangely afterward.
She had stood in the kitchen for nearly twenty minutes, staring at the phone.
When I asked who had called, she said it was someone from an old charity committee.
I hadn't questioned her.
That was how our marriage had worked for years.
I trusted her.
She expected me to.
Now I wondered how many times I had mistaken silence for peace.
I placed the adoption record in front of her.
“Who called this house three months ago?”
Denise stared at the paper.
“Olivia.”
Angela gasped.
“You spoke to her?”
“Briefly.”
“Did she know who you were?”
Denise shook her head.
“She believed I was an old friend of her mother's.”
“Did you tell her about Raymond?”
“No.”
“Did you tell her that you knew where she was born?”
“No.”
I leaned forward.
“What did she want?”
Denise wiped her face.
“She had been searching for information about her biological parents. Her adoptive mother had recently died, and she found some documents among her belongings.”
Brianna sat down.
“So Olivia was looking for her family.”
“Yes.”
“And you sent her away?”
Denise shook her head quickly.
“I didn't send her away. I told her I needed time.”
“How much time?” Michael asked.
“Too much.”
That answer was the first thing Denise had said all evening that sounded completely honest.
I looked at the photograph of Olivia.
She was a grown woman now.
Somewhere in North Carolina, she had built a life without knowing that her biological history was connected to ours.
I wondered whether she had children.
Whether she had ever looked in the mirror and wondered where her eyes came from.
Whether she had spent her birthday wondering why her biological mother had given her away.
I knew what it meant to be betrayed by someone you loved.
I could not imagine discovering that your entire origin story had been hidden from you.
“Do you have her number?” I asked.
Denise nodded.
“It's in my phone.”
“Call her.”
She looked startled.
“Now?”
“Yes.”
“I can't do that tonight.”
I stood.
“Then I will.”
I reached for her phone.
She pulled it toward herself.
“Marcus, please. I need to speak to her first.”
I stared at my wife.
“Why?”
“Because she deserves to hear the truth from me.”
For a moment, I considered refusing.
Then I thought of Angela.
I thought of the way she had clung to me and begged me not to stop being her father.
I thought of the photograph of Olivia as a little girl.
I finally nodded.
“You have until tomorrow evening. After that, we contact her together.”
Denise agreed.
The dinner table remained untouched.
Nobody wanted food.
Eventually, Angela took Brianna upstairs to help her calm down.
Brandon went outside to call his fiancée.
Michael stayed behind with me.
He sat across from me in the living room, his elbows resting on his knees.
“Dad, I should have told you about the letter sooner.”
I shook my head.
“You were trying to understand something that didn't make sense.”
“I went too far when I used your information to request the test.”
“You did.”
He looked down.
“I was scared that if I asked Mom directly, she'd lie again.”
I studied my son.
He had always been the quiet one.
He was the child who tried to solve problems before anyone noticed there was a problem.
I placed my hand on his shoulder.
“Next time, you come to me.”
He nodded.
Then he asked the question I had been avoiding.
“Do you still feel like we're your children?”
I stared at him.
“Michael, I taught you how to shave. I held you when you broke your wrist. I sat through every terrible school play because you wanted me in the front row.”
He gave a weak smile.
“You fell asleep during the second one.”
“I was working night shifts.”
“I know.”
I squeezed his shoulder.
“DNA can tell us where our blood came from. It cannot tell us who stayed up all night when we were sick. It cannot tell us who held our hands when we were afraid. It cannot erase a lifetime.”
His eyes filled with tears.
“Then why does it hurt so much?”
“Because somebody took away your right to know your own story.”
He nodded.
“And we're going to get that right back.”
The next morning, I drove to work but spent most of the day staring at the same spreadsheet.
My supervisor eventually came to my office and asked whether I needed to go home.
I told him I had a family emergency.
For once, I didn't feel the need to explain anything else.
At six that evening, I returned home.
Denise was waiting in the living room.
Her eyes were swollen.
A glass of water sat untouched on the coffee table.
“I called Olivia,” she said.
I stopped.
“What happened?”
“She agreed to meet us.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow afternoon.”
I nodded.
“Did you tell her the truth?”
Denise hesitated.
“I told her I knew Patricia.”
I stared at her.
“That isn't the truth.”
“I couldn't say everything over the phone.”
I felt anger rising again, but I swallowed it.
“Then tomorrow, you will tell her everything in person.”
Denise nodded.
We drove separately to a quiet restaurant the next afternoon.
I arrived first.
Angela and Michael came with me.
Brandon and Brianna were on their way.
Denise entered ten minutes later.
She looked as though she had aged ten years overnight.
At three fifteen, a woman in her late twenties walked through the door.
She had dark curls, a confident stride, and a small scar above her left eyebrow.
I recognized the feature immediately.
It matched the man in the photograph.
She approached our table and looked directly at Denise.
“I'm Olivia.”
Denise stood.
For several seconds, neither woman spoke.
May you like
Then Olivia asked the question that made Denise begin crying.
“Why did you know my mother, and why have you been hiding from me?”
