by Sarah Monzon
“No! No,” she said at a less desperate decibel the second time, folding her hands in her lap. “Nothing like that. It’s just…” She looked away. Watched a group of women as they strapped shakers of some sort to their calves.
“Just?” Amy prompted.
Olivia shrugged. She didn’t want to say anything unkind about Amy’s mom. Their mom. But every beat of her heart echoed an unanswered question. Why didn’t she want me?
“Did she…” Olivia licked her lips, kept watching the group of women in the distance. Her questions would be easier to ask if she didn’t have to look into Amy’s open gaze. “Did she ever explain why…” Her voice shook.
“Why she put you up for adoption?” Amy asked softly.
Olivia nodded. She inhaled a deep breath, hoping doing so would push down the emotion that wanted to leak out of her eyes and clog her throat like cotton.
“Yes, but…” Amy’s head tilted, considering. She flashed a glance to the same group of women Olivia had been studying. “Would you like to meet her? Hear her explain it to you?”
Olivia straightened and swiped at her cheek. “She’s here?”
For the first time that day, Amy hesitated. Cautious. Like she just realized that the territory they’d uncovered could possibly be riddled with land mines. Even so, she pressed on. “Yes. But she doesn’t want to force anything that you don’t want. The ball is in your court.”
Olivia continued to watch the women. Half a dozen, each dressed in a matching costume of moccasins, leg shakers, and red skirt with three yellow stripes near the bottom. Somehow, she knew. Intuition or something. Maybe they shared an unseen bond, one forged in the womb when her body fed and gave life to Olivia’s, that murmured to her spirit and tugged gently enough to make her pay attention.
“She’s over there, isn’t she?” Olivia scrutinized the face of each woman, wondering if that same unexplainable nudge would alert her to the one who’d given her life.
“Yes,” Amy breathed.
Half hidden behind another, one woman stared back at Olivia. Her face gave nothing away, but even the distance couldn’t disguise the regret shinning from her eyes. Conviction and recognition gripped Olivia’s heart.
My mom.
Tears pricked her eyes. She blinked them back, desperate to rid herself of the obstruction so she could look clearly on her mom again. Her heart twisted. Fear poked. But if she allowed fear to be the voice of reason behind her decision—fear of hurt and rejection—she’d be listening to the mouthpiece of a liar. One that imprisoned, not one that set free.
She broke eye contact and squeezed her fingers. Looked back at Amy and noticed Mom and Dad sitting at a picnic table not far away, where the majority of the food vendors were set up. Dad’s spoon, swollen with blue ice, paused midair as his gaze connected with hers. He gave her an encouraging smile and nodded.
A truth she’d known logically but had been holding at arm’s length buried deep inside her. Every scraped knee, every family vacation, every bedtime story… David and Eileen Arroyo were her mom and dad. They always had been, and they always would be. No matter what other family she might discover or add to her life.
Her gaze darted back to the circle of women. To one in particular. She looked hard. Deep. Past the layers of regret and fear…and found love.
The uncertainty that had plagued her vanished. She wasn’t the only one scared and afraid of rejection in this equation. And whatever Charlotte Kinnard’s story was, Olivia wanted to hear it. “I’d like to meet her.”
Amy’s bright smile returned as she unfolded her legs and rose. Olivia watched Charlotte. Once she saw Amy heading her direction, she stepped out from behind the other woman. Her gaze darted to Olivia before she took a tentative step forward. Amy met her in the middle and put an arm around her back.
Olivia stood and waited, never taking her eyes from Charlotte’s. They were a dark-brown color, almost black. Her hair shone and reflected the sunlight, as black and brilliant as a crow’s. Her face was smooth, though Olivia noticed small wrinkles around her eyes and mouth the closer she came. But she looked young. Much too young to have a twenty-eight-year-old daughter.
Amy and Charlotte slowed and then stopped in front of Olivia. Charlotte’s eyes clouded with tears. Her hand rose slowly, and then her face crumpled, hiding it behind her palms as her shoulders shook.
Olivia’s heart hitched. One step, all it took to breach the distance between them. She drew Charlotte close until her head rested on Olivia’s shoulder, and she patted her birth mother on the back.
Through the sobs Olivia could make out the repeated words I’m sorry…I’m so sorry.
Olivia made shushing sounds as she rubbed her hand down Charlotte’s spine. Never had she imagined the reunion going like this. After a moment, she took a step back and placed her hands on Charlotte’s upper arms. Her birth mom still kept her face buried in her palms, her shame and grief palpable.
Olivia pressed her fingers into Charlotte’s upper arms. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.” She looked at Amy. “I’ll be right back.”
She didn’t have to go far before she caught Dad’s attention. He’d been watching the whole thing from his perch at the picnic table. They locked gazes, and he seemed to be able to read her desire without a word. He stood and helped her mom slide from the bench seat, keeping his hand clasped with his wife’s.
Olivia stood in the middle, David and Eileen heading toward her from one direction and Amy and Charlotte huddled together from the other. The lost feeling that had drifted around inside her evaporated. She wasn’t a lone survivor, someone tossed about by whims of which she had no control. If anything, she was doubly blessed. Doubly loved.
A vision of Adam staring down into her eyes before he captured her lips in a kiss flashed across her mind.
Maybe triply loved.
Warmth spread through her limbs to her fingertips. She reached out to grab her mom’s hand, tugging her parents to the blanket, where they joined a seated Amy and Charlotte.
After arranging herself on the wool tartan blanket, Olivia reached over with her free hand and gripped Charlotte’s. Her mom to her left and her mom to her right.
Charlotte blinked but no longer hid. This close, Olivia guessed Charlotte to be no more than a dozen-plus years older than herself.
Olivia squeezed her hand. “I want to say thank you.”
Charlotte bit her lower lip.
“Thank you for making the brave decision to give me the best life you could.” She held on to Charlotte’s gaze before looking at Mom and Dad. “I haven’t always realized that was what you’d done, and I’m sorry for that.” Her head swiveled to recapture Charlotte’s gaze. “I thought I needed an explanation, but I don’t.” She pressed her hand tighter. “Just…thank you.”
Charlotte nodded. Blinked a dozen times in a second. Took a deep breath. “My story…our story…it’s not so different from so many others. I was young. Only fifteen. Still a child myself, so how could I raise one?” With her free hand she pinched the blanket and rubbed the material between her index finger and thumb. “I may have made a bad decision, having sex, but I never thought of you as a mistake. Even then. But I knew…as much as it ripped my heart out of my chest…I knew I couldn’t give you the life you deserved.” She sniffed. “The day they took you away, that was the hardest day of my life.”
Mom let go of Olivia’s hand and rummaged around in her purse. She found a pack of travel tissues and handed one to Charlotte.
“Your worst day,” Mom said, “was my best day. Thank you. Thank you for entrusting us with your greatest treasure.”
Charlotte nodded and used the white tissue to dab at her tears.
Everyone was silent, absorbed, Olivia was sure, in their own emotions and thoughts as she was in hers.
“I…” Charlotte moved to uncover a book atop one corner of the blanket. “I wanted to give you something, if that’s…if that’s okay?” Questioning eyes looked to David and Eileen and then
Olivia for approval. Finding it, she continued, “It’s an inheritance of sorts. Something passed down in our family.” She handed it to Olivia.
Olivia ran her hand over the cloth-covered hardback book. The corners were scrunched and no longer at hard, right angles. Parts of the cloth covering was bare, as if it had come in contact with many hands. She looked up at Amy and then Charlotte. “What is it?”
“Open it.”
Olivia lifted the cover, her eyes scanning the handwriting on the first page.
December 24, 1935
Grandpappy has given me this book for Christmas. It’s full of empty pages, but he says we’re going to fill them up. Just him and me. I asked him what we were going to fill them up with, and he smiled at me like he held a deep secret. He bent down until his mouth was right by my ear, and then he whispered, “Our legacy of freedom.”
It all started more than a hundred years ago, he said. When his grandmother ran away from her owner and his grandfather found her, rescued her, and protected her. He said there’s more to the story. Much more. But he won’t tell me until tomorrow. Guess I’m going to have to wait, although I want to find out what great-great-grandpappy had to protect her from and what it has to do with me.
“I know you have your own family and it has its own history, and I hope I’m not overstepping or anything, but I wanted you to have this. Maybe it could help you or answer some questions that you might have.” Charlotte sounded uncertain, almost as if she were still that fifteen-year-old girl. “I hope that’s okay.”
Olivia couldn’t believe she held the story of where she came from in her hand. “What about Amy?” She closed the book and extended it to her sister. “You should have this.”
Amy didn’t reach out to take it. Instead she smiled. “I’ve already made a digital copy. You keep that.”
Mom reached over and fingered the edge of the book. “Would you mind if I read it too?” She gave Olivia a bright smile. “We may all be supporting characters cast in the story of your life, but I don’t want to miss out on the prologue.”
Olivia leaned to the side and rested her head on Mom’s shoulder. It hadn’t been that long ago she’d thought her identity had been stripped away from her. Who would have thought she’d end up with a broader understanding of herself—and those closest to her—than she’d had before?
Chapter 34
Adam checked his watch for the fourth time in as many minutes. Where were they?
“Do I need to take that thing from you?” His mom leaned over and whispered, though she needn’t have bothered. No one would be able to hear her over Trent shouting out ridiculous answers. Summer stood at the easel chalkboard, the same one all the Carrington siblings had played with as kids, tapping frantically at a picture of obviously-Trent-didn’t-know-what with a white stub of chalk, pieces flying at her excitement. The hourglass timer trickled its last grain of sand, and Summer groaned.
“It’s migration!” She threw her hands up in the air. “How could you not get that?”
Trent crossed his legs out in front of him, unaffected by his wife’s frustration. “Sweetheart, you may be brilliant with a camera, but you can’t draw worth a lick.”
She anchored her hands at her hips and gave him a disgruntled look before turning to Amber. “Help me out here. You got it, right?”
Mom watched the exchange, so Adam turned his wrist toward him and tried to stealthily catch the time.
Anita Carrington still had eyes in the back of her head. “I saw that.”
Amber pulled on her ear. “Sorry, Summer. I didn’t get migration from a bunch of Vs and Ws.”
Summer pronounced a pout as she placed the chalk on the holder and plopped down next to her husband. “They’re supposed to be geese flying south for the winter. You know, migrating.”
Trent pecked a kiss to Summer’s cheek. “You’re beautiful when you get all riled.”
She backhanded his chest, but at the same time blushed and allowed a smile to peek through.
Dad rubbed his hands together. “Who’s up next?”
Adam slid his phone from under his thigh and clicked the Home button to illuminate the screen. Still nothing.
He wished he could have blamed Pictionary for his agitation, but it wasn’t the game’s fault. He never should have agreed to let Olivia pick Michael and Jack up from the airport. At least not alone. But his mom had left a pointed voicemail on his phone reminding him of family game night and the fact that he’d missed the last one. If he missed two in a row, he’d likely be the recipient of an intervention of some sort.
Adam stood and pocketed his phone, running his other hand through his hair, the strands stiff with product. He’d have to get out of the habit of doing that again now that he dressed for the courtroom and not the food truck. “Anyone want a drink?”
“Sweet tea, please,” Amber requested, followed by an “Oh, that sounds good” from Summer.
He nodded, then walked around the wall that divided the living room from the kitchen. As he opened the refrigerator and retrieved the pitcher of tea, he pulled out his phone and texted a quick message to Olivia.
Where are you guys? I need an ETA.
“It’s good to see you like this.”
His mom’s voice made him fumble his phone, but he caught it midair and returned it to the front pocket of his pants. Turning, he elbowed the refrigerator door closed and set the pitcher on the counter. He pulled down three glasses. “Like the lawyer look better, do you?”
She leaned her hip against the counter and studied him. “I like the peaceful look.”
He poured tea into the glasses. So much had changed in the last few days. Still required some getting used to. But the absence of crushing weight? The free, untethered, unchained expanse in his middle? God was helping him embrace that.
His phone vibrated. Well, maybe a little tethering still existed. Lightness filled his chest. But this cord that wrapped around and bound him he didn’t want to be released from. Ever. Because it wound and covered him heart and soul. Instead of squeezing the life out of him, it imbued him with a sweet strength and determination to meet every challenge head on. Not alone. Never alone.
A triple-braided cord is not easily broken.
His mom stepped forward and grabbed two of the glasses. “I’ll take these out.”
As she rounded the corner, he slipped his hand into his pocket and ran his finger over the braided length newly attached to his keychain. He’d found it in an envelope taped to his front door the day after he’d met with Curtis Haywood. A note accompanied the keychain with a verse from Ecclesiastes. A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken. You, me, and God, Adam. A triple-braided cord. Nothing can break us. Xoxo, Olivia.
He took a sip of sweet tea and pulled out his phone to check the text. Five minutes. Downing the rest of his drink, he placed the glass in the sink and returned to the living room.
“Ready?” he asked as he picked up a new piece of chalk. No way would he risk fingernails on the board from a small stub.
Dad scratched his chin. “I thought it was Amber’s turn.”
Adam bore his gaze into Amber and gave a small shake of his head. Her eyebrows creased, but she shrugged. “Go ahead.”
He positioned himself to the side of the board so everyone could see.
“Aaanndd…” Trent flipped the sand timer. “Go!”
Adam pressed the chalk to the board, first drawing a sorry excuse for Florida and then moving to the other side of the board to draw England with dots in between to connect them.
“Transatlantic!”
“Christopher Columbus!”
“Pounce De Leon!”
Adam shook his head at each guess. He knelt down to reach an empty part of the board and drew a stick figure. Head, body, one leg, one arm.
“Is that supposed to be me?” A new voice asked, and the shouts of wrong answers
turned into shrieks from the women of the family as they all whipped around and stared at Michael standing behind the back of the couch. Jack stood beside him, long brown hair pulled back in her signature ponytail, a smile dimpling her cheeks.
Mom didn’t even bother with going around the furniture. She launched herself over the couch like a track-star athlete, throwing her arms around her middle child and squeezing him tight.
Adam grinned as everyone in his family laughed and smiled and wiped away tears of joy. Eventually Mom released Michael, and he was able to hug everyone else.
Adam slapped Michael on the shoulder. “It’s good to have you back.”
Michael studied Adam a moment before grinning. “You too.”
Adam moved on to give Jack a warm hug. She lifted herself on her toes, placing her mouth next to his ear. “That girl of yours is a keeper.”
He pressed a kiss to her temple. “So is my brother’s.” He lifted his head and looked around. Where was Olivia?
As if reading his thoughts, Jack pointed behind her. “She said she didn’t want to get in the way of a family reunion.” She squeezed his arm. “If you ask me, you better make her family real soon so she doesn’t think that way.” Jack winked, then stepped to the side to get swept up in a hug from Summer.
Adam walked around his dad and made his way through the arched entryway into the foyer. Olivia stood on the other side of the screen door, inspecting one of his mom’s wind chimes as the sun backlit her and cast her in a dark silhouette. It reminded him of the first time she’d pushed her way into his food truck and, consequently, his heart. This woman, so full of spunk and determination, touched places inside him he didn’t even know could be reached.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
She startled, then grinned guiltily at him through the screen. “Sorry. They make such an interesting sound that I wanted to see what they were made of.”