A Certain Twist in Time

by Anita K Grimm

  “Hold on just a minute,” Mrs. Gordon said. “Even Matt doesn’t know about Charley. He couldn’t have told Brad, and Brad couldn’t have told Emma.”

  “That doesn’t prove a thing, Mrs. Gordon,” the CPS worker said. His face was beginning to redden and he had a hard set to his jaw. “She could have Googled him on the internet.”

  “Maybe it doesn’t prove anything to you,” Mr. Gordon replied, “but my wife is something of a history buff, especially when it comes to her family background. Give her a chance.”

  Mrs. Gordon scooted the rocker a little closer. “Tell me what you know, Emma, dear.”

  Afraid I’d be dragged off any second by Mr. Collins, I dove right in. “I know Charley was born in 1866 and Joey was born in 1870. They lived with their folks in a cabin about two miles northeast of the Rosses and their father worked at the sawmill. Later, so did Charley. I know Joey and Charley had two older sisters and an older brother who had died as children and two older sisters who lived. The dead children were buried at a little private cemetery just south of their cabin. When Joey was six, he fell off some rocks and nearly drowned in a small spring. Charley saved him. Later, when Charley was sixteen, he nearly died of a terrible infection caused by a splinter in his arm when he fell onto a split rail. It was considered a miracle that he survived.”

  Mrs. Gordon stared at me, her jaw slightly dropped, her eyes as unblinking as a fish. “That’s unbelievable,” she whispered. “Even I don’t know every detail you know.”

  “Like I said, she could have Googled all this on the internet,” Mr. Collins said, clearly disgusted by the whole thing. “She can’t prove that just knowing this stuff makes her a relative.”

  “That information isn’t anywhere on the internet,” Mrs. Gordon informed him. “Joseph Perkins is mentioned, but only as far as the information on the plaque at City Hall. No mention at all is made of his brother, Charley, though Charley served as sheriff here for a number of years. He never married as far as we know, just kind of drifted on and disappeared.” Mrs. Gordon smiled at me.

  “If he never married, how could Emma be any relation to him?” Mr. Collins asked. “Come on, Emma. We’re done wasting time. I got a long drive back from Eugene you know.”

  My heart sank. This is where my story would fall apart and there wasn’t much I could do about that. “My grandmother, Charlotte, never married, yet she gave birth to my father and he had me. Marriage and children are two separate issues.”

  Mrs. Gordon smiled. “Nobody is certain about whether Charlie married, and Emma is right. He could have fathered children before he died and Joseph just didn’t mention it.” Mrs. Gordon rose and walked down a hall to her bedroom, returning after a few moments with a large leather-bound book. “This is an autobiography written by Joseph Perkins about ten years before his death. I keep it locked in our safe, and neither Matt nor my husband has read it. No one now living other than me has read it, yet look here.”

  She sat back in the rocker again, turning pages and pointing out pieces of stories I had mentioned, including the boys’ birth dates and childhoods.

  “Well, that’s all very interesting, I’m sure, but it still doesn’t prove a thing,” Mr. Collins insisted, “and it certainly doesn’t say how Emma knows she is related to Charley Perkins.”

  Right. How in the hell was I going to prove it? All eyes were focused on me. My mouth felt almost too dry to make words come out. My heart pounded.

  “I have come to know a secret I thought would forever remain a secret,” I said. “I have discovered who fathered Charlotte Ross’s child.”

  Gasps could be heard in the room. I couldn’t let that bother me. “She wasn’t raped. She was deeply in love. The young man felt the same and had proposed marriage. But circumstances beyond their control made it impossible for them to stay together.

  “For almost two agonizing years, my grandmother suffered the taunts and accusations of both school kids and adults in Sweet Creek. She was accused of having had an immaculate conception with supernatural forces and of carrying either the second coming of Christ or the Devil’s own child. Can any of you imagine how that would feel? Even her own mother called her a harlot and a whore and called my father a bastard. And Charlotte bore it all in silence . . . until she couldn’t bear it for another day.”

  Brad was the only one in the room who seemed capable of maintaining eye contact with me.

  “I won’t reveal the name of Charlotte’s great love out of respect for my grandmother, and out of respect for my father, their son. They are both dead and not here to give permission for me to reveal more than I’ve said. I can tell you that the young man who fathered Charlotte’s child was a direct relative of Charley Perkins. And no, I realize just saying that doesn’t prove anything. Yet if Mr. and Mrs. Gordon are willing to take me into their home, I think no judge would have a problem delaying my trip to Eugene until a DNA test can be completed proving I am a relative of Mrs. Gordon.”

  The living room had gone silent. I’m not sure anyone even breathed. Then Mrs. Gordon said, “How about it Jack? I’ve grown very fond of Emma and would love to raise my niece.”

  Jack Gordon grinned widely. “I would too, Annie. She should stay here where she belongs. I can get the ball rolling at court.”

  “If I have to, I’ll phone the police,” Mr. Collins threatened. “I have a court order to deliver Emma Ross to Eugene, which I aim to do.”

  “And so you shall,” Jack Gordon said, “but not until the DNA test comes back. You can’t take a child away from her relatives without cause, and unless the test proves Emma is not related to my wife, she stays right where she is.”

  “This is highly irregular and not sanctioned by the court,” Mr. Collins protested.

  “You can’t fight all of us, boy,” Simon said, standing in front of me. Brad, Matt, and Jack Gordon joined him.

  Mr. Collins’s eyes widened. His fists clenched, but he was not an idiot and could see he stood no chance against four men. “Okay, okay. She can stay the night. Tomorrow we’ll see what the court says.” Mr. Collins grabbed his hat and let himself out the front door.

  Brad let out a sigh of relief and drew me into a hug. “I knew you’d think of something, darlin’,” he whispered. “You always do.” He kissed me.

  “Hey,” Matt said. “Take care what you’re doing with my cousin, dude. We don’t stand for no hanky panky ‘round here.”

  Brad threw him a dirty look that morphed into a grin.

  I was somehow breathless, yet more alive than I’d felt since June when my parents drowned. That day my perfect life had imploded. Now, outmaneuvered by a future permanently altered by my own recklessness and a peculiar twist in time, the pieces of my life shattered by a sailing accident all settled back into a hopeful place.

  It had seemed too ridiculous to wish for a normal family. Now, thanks to that time warp, I had one, and however bizarre their sudden existence and our resulting blood connections might be, they were real family. College and my career plans had seemed hopelessly complicated while Great-grandmother Penelope pulled the strings of my captivity. Now college was not only a certainty, it would even be paid for. My parents would feel thrilled with how my life was turning out.

  Thanks to the gift of my grandmother’s diary and its clues leading to an obscure spring deep in the forest, my family’s dark scandal was now behind me. Word of what I’d revealed here today would cover the town like a blanket within a few days. Of that, I had no doubt. This was Sweet Creek, after all. They’d practically invented the art of gossip. I would start Sweet Creek High in a few days dressed like any other normal kid, and who knows? Maybe I’d even like it. Best of all, my fiancé would openly be at my side, now and forever.

  “Our Julia has always begged us for a big sister,” Annie Gordon said, beaming. “I guess a cousin will do just fine. Welcome
home, Emma.”

  I smiled as Matt’s grinning little sister skipped over to wrap her arms around me. It did, indeed, feel like I had just come home.

  Anita Grimm has been a classroom teacher, a music store owner, a CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate), horse trainer and riding instructor, the survivor of a deadly typhoon on the Tasman Sea, and a guitar instructor. Ever since childhood she has nurtured a passion for emptying out the characters playing inside her head onto the written page. She and her husband live in Southern Oregon with their hairy doorbell, a beloved dachshund.