The Note

by Hunt, Angela

  “Was he really, honey?” Mary Grace spoke in a low, composed voice.

  Peyton shrugged. “I thought so. Anyway, after going to the hospital and seeing to Garrett, I went home and took a bunch of pills. But they didn’t work, so I decided to help them along. Here—see for yourself.”

  With an effort, she unbuckled the leather watchband at her wrist, then stretched her arm toward King and Mary Grace. “This is what can happen when you’re young and alone.”

  She’d been afraid King would squint in embarrassment and avert his eyes from her scar, but his eyes only darkened with concern.

  Slowly, she lowered her gaze. “My dad, who’d come from Jacksonville as soon as he heard about Garrett, found me at the house. Called the ambulance and saved my life, I guess, though I didn’t want to be saved. And then, in the hospital, he discovered the surprise I’d been planning for Garrett. I was pregnant.” Her gaze shifted from King to Mary Grace. “For months afterward I was a mental and physical wreck. My father got a judge to appoint him as the baby’s guardian.”

  “Was this okay with you?” Mary Grace asked.

  Peyton shook her head. “I was drugged and half out of my mind. I didn’t care, I didn’t feel, I wasn’t interested. My psychiatrist had no qualms about declaring me mentally incompetent. It doesn’t matter whether or not it was okay with me; I wasn’t there.”

  King’s eyes narrowed with sympathy. “My word, MacGruder, you’ve never said a thing—”

  Peyton lifted her hand, cutting him off. “I don’t like to think about it, and sometimes it doesn’t even seem real. I scarcely remember those months, and the pregnancy was like a dream. One day I had a big belly and the next day I didn’t. If not for the stretch marks on my stomach and the scar on my wrist, I might have a difficult time believing any of it actually happened.

  “But the baby was born and delivered to a social worker. I never saw it. Didn’t want to, really. They knocked me out for the delivery, but they needn’t have bothered—I was in a mental fog anyway. Only after the birth was I able to slowly find my way back to myself.” She met King’s gaze. “My father made an adoption plan for the kid; placed it with a family.”

  “Boy or girl?” Mary Grace asked, two deep lines appearing between her eyes.

  Peyton took a deep breath. “Girl. I didn’t know anything about what happened to her for weeks—months, actually. But gradually, as I grew stronger, my therapist gave me the truth in spoonfuls. Over the course of our sessions he told me I’d had a girl on September 2 and she’d been placed with a family in Florida. He also told me I was lucky to have a father who cared enough to take care of all the details.”

  “And you?” King asked, his mercurial eyes darkening. “What did you think?”

  Peyton lowered her gaze. “For a long time I just felt numb. It’s like when your foot goes to sleep and you can’t feel it. But then, when the blood begins to flow again, it stings and aches and nearly drives you crazy.

  “As my emotions reawakened, I found myself hating my father. My baby, all I had left of Garrett, was gone forever. So I hated the man who took her away. My therapist said it was wrong to feel that way, but I hated Dad for everything, even saving my life. Oh, I never came out and actually said so—after learning the buzzwords of psychobabble, I managed to convince my doctor that I’d put away my resentment. For years I’ve even managed to play the role of dutiful adult daughter. But if you want to know the truth, I’ve resented my father for years, though time has boiled that emotion down to an emphatic dislike. I’ve never wanted to have anything to do with him, because seeing him, even hearing his voice, brings back the past more vividly than I ever want to remember it.”

  She looked up, torn by conflicting emotions and the smoldering memories that had flamed to life. She felt as though she had disrobed in front of them, revealing her stretch marks, the scar, the hatred and the harshness she’d locked away in her heart. What must these two think of her now?

  “Go on, honey.” Mary Grace’s hand reached out and enclosed Peyton’s wrist. “What happened after you left the hospital?”

  Peyton shuddered softly. “Three months after the baby’s birth, they discharged me from the psychiatric ward, and I moved into a sort of halfway house—my father wanted someone to keep an eye on me. For a year I lived there and took classes at the junior college— that’s when I began to study journalism. The world seemed strangely off-kilter, but I learned how to cope by repressing the bad memories and living day to day. And all the while, I kept going to my therapy sessions and seeing Dr. Stewart. He taught me how to fend off the panic attacks that had begun to come out of the blue and cripple me. I taught myself how to put the pain away, to bury it in the sea of forgetfulness.”

  She gave King a halfhearted smile. “Did you know the Jewish people have a ritual about that? On Rosh Hashanah, they walk down to the nearest stream of running water and empty their pockets, letting the water carry the lint and dust away. They call the ceremony tashlikh, and perform the ritual to remind themselves that God casts all their sins into the sea of forgetfulness and forgiveness.”

  As Peyton fell silent, a car passed on the street, the sound of its tires a quiet shush on the road. Peyton studied the exposed flesh of her hands, knowing they waited for her to continue.

  “The writing helped,” she finally said. “After so many months of interior silence, words poured out of me like someone had turned on a spigot.” She lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “I learned that I have a gift for putting things together in a clear, concise package. I transferred to the University of Florida, finished on scholarship, and took a job as a copy kid for the Gainesville Sun. Amid answering phones, running copies, and making industrial-strength coffee, I learned how to write under pressure. Dr. Stewart read my work—obits, mostly, written according to the paper’s fill-in-the-blanks formula—and praised my progress.

  “When he pronounced me well, my father begged me to come to Jacksonville to be near him and his brood. I moved instead to Orlando. I wanted to be away from him and away from Gainesville and its memories. And there, working for the Orlando Sentinel, I learned everything else I know about newspaper work. Burying myself in my job, I developed a pretty good reputation as a sportswriter.” She looked at King. “After that, I came to Tampa, where you and I started to butt heads.”

  “I know that part of the story,” he said, a small smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

  Silence fell over the table, and Peyton rubbed her thumbnail. “I wish that were the end of it,” she said, her voice heavy. “But today a fourth prospect for the note found me in the little park in front of the newspaper building. Her name is Lila, but her family has always called her ‘T’—for ‘Tagalong,’ because she used to tag along behind her four big brothers.”

  King’s brows silently slanted the question: What else?

  “Lila showed me a Bible,” Peyton said, the words beginning to come faster. “On the presentation page, her father wrote her name and birthday—and the handwriting matched the writing on the note. Even though you can tell the note was written by someone being jostled by turbulence or whatever, there’s enough similarity to erase all doubt.”

  “So that’s why you’re upset?” King crossed his arms and leaned on the table. “Because Julie St. Claire is presenting the wrong person in her special?”

  “I couldn’t care less what Julie St. Claire does.” Peyton narrowed her gaze. “She’s going to do whatever is best for her ratings, and Tanner Ford looks great on television. No—I’m upset because Lila Lugar’s birthday is September 2, 1982.” She shifted her gaze from King to Mary Grace, whose compassionate blue eyes seemed to invite a confidence. “I’m certain Lila Lugar is my daughter.”

  Silence, thick and heavy, wrapped around them like wool, punctuated only by the steady ticktock of Mary Grace’s cuckoo clock.

  “Why—that’s wonderful!” King attempted a smile. “Isn’t it?”

  Was it? She’d lived nearly twenty years with a
heart resigned to eternal separation, so how was she supposed to face the future? She’d shoved her child and her father into a deep and secret place, knowing that she could never even search for her baby without having to explain those dark days in 1982. How could she face her biological daughter and admit she had once tried to take both their lives?

  “I don’t know.” Peyton turned tear-filled eyes upon him. “I asked her if she’d ever want to meet her birth mother, and she said no. But then she said she would like her bio mom to know that she appreciated the gift of life, and that she’d enjoyed a wonderful family with the Lugars.”

  “That’s wonderful, honey.” Mary Grace patted Peyton’s hand.

  Against Peyton’s will, a sob rose in her throat. “But she lost everything in the crash—her mother and father. So now she has no one but me, so maybe I’m supposed to—”

  “She has four brothers,” Mary Grace interrupted, her strong fingers caressing the back of Peyton’s hand. “And probably grandparents, too. And friends.”

  King picked up on Mary Grace’s thought. “I don’t know if you should go rushing into that situation. The girl has gone through major trauma with the plane crash, and now with the note. Think twice before you go running to her with life-changing revelations.”

  “Then why did she come walking into my life?” The cry rose up from within Peyton like the wail of an injured animal. “I can’t help but feel that this means something, that the note was given to me for a reason. I must be supposed to take this girl under my wing—”

  “Listen to me, child.” Mary Grace’s grip strengthened, as did her voice. “Perhaps you are, but not right now, and for several reasons. First, King’s right. The girl has gone through too much in too short a time; you can’t drop this bombshell on her now. Second, she told you she doesn’t want to meet her birth mother.”

  “Maybe she needs to,” Peyton said, sniffing. “We don’t always know what we need.”

  Mary Grace shook her head. “Maybe later, child, when you’ve both had some time to heal. But baby, let me tell you something—looking at the situation from where I sit, you don’t need to worry about that girl. She sounds like she’s doing fine; she’s coping. She’s mourning the loss of her parents, but that’s only natural. What isn’t natural is you.”

  Peyton stared. “What?”

  “You, honey.” Mary Grace’s tone softened. “The relationship that’s not right here is the one between you and your daddy. He loves you, child, and you have to be as blind as dirt not to see it. He loves you, he’s caring for you, and he’s done nothing but care for you all these years.”

  Peyton lifted her chin. “He doesn’t care a whit for me. His other kids take all his time and energy.”

  Mary Grace laughed. “Honey, love isn’t something that can be parceled out, giving a smidgen here and a smidgen there. No. People who love give their whole hearts, and that’s what you’ve been receiving. Your daddy’s heart will always belong to you, and sounds to me like you’ve given him nothing but a false-fronted Valentine.” Dropping Peyton’s wrist, Mary Grace leaned forward, her hand coming up to support her sagging jaw. “When’s the last time you talked to him?”

  Looking at King, Peyton saw gentle rebuke in his eyes. Of course, he knew. He’d seen the unopened letters in her kitchen junk basket and in the napkin holder. He knew and he agreed with Mary Grace.

  “My father took my baby.” Peyton underlined the words with a viciousness she didn’t quite feel. “He didn’t wait for me to recover; he just took her.”

  “He took charge of that little girl because he knew you weren’t able to,” Mary Grace said, her eyes soft and shining. “He placed her in a home where she was loved and pampered. Four boys and one girl? You can’t tell me she wasn’t treated like a little princess.”

  Peyton glanced at King, hoping to find an ally, but he only crossed his arms.

  She turned back to face Mary Grace. “My father was never there for me. After my mother died, I had to stay with Grandmom until she got sick. Then I went to boarding school while he began his residency, then he got married again . . . and I stayed away.”

  “Did he never ask you to come home?” Mary Grace asked.

  “Sure.” Peyton shrugged. “But by then I didn’t feel like I even knew him. And I had learned to get along without him.” She shivered as the curtain lifted on memories she hadn’t revisited in years. “I felt like an orphan at school. I had to learn about menstruation from my health teacher. I stole my first bra from a Kmart because I couldn’t bring myself to carry it to the cashier. I can’t count the times I nearly died of shame and embarrassment and humiliation, and there was nobody to tell me anything. All the other girls had mothers. I didn’t, and I couldn’t ask my father about any of that stuff.”

  “Didn’t he ever try to talk to you?”

  “I suppose. But when we did speak, he stumbled over embarrassing topics. I finally told him not to worry, I’d learned everything from my girlfriends at school. And at school I told my girlfriends that my dad and I had a great relationship, that he would give me anything I wanted. He did send money when I asked, but what I needed was his love.”

  “What makes you think you didn’t have it?” The question came from King, who looked at her with eyes that seemed to read the secrets imprinted on her heart. “He provided for you, he reached out—honestly, Peyton, what more did you want?”

  “I don’t know.” Her voice broke as she admitted the truth. “I just wanted . . . more.”

  “What you wanted was relationship.” Mary Grace gave Peyton an emphatic nod. “Yet that’s what you denied him.”

  Something flared in Peyton’s soul. “I did not!”

  “Yes, you did.” Mary Grace would not relent. “Didn’t you just say he came to see you? He sent money? Didn’t he come to Parents’ Day and all that sort of thing?”

  Peyton frowned. “Good grief, Mary Grace, I covered all this years ago. You sound like my shrink.”

  “But you still aren’t seeing the truth. Your dad was available to you, Peyton, probably about as much as any father is around for his kids. Your dad’s a doctor, right? So it’s not like he can be available at all hours of the day.”

  Peyton lowered her gaze, knowing Mary Grace had a point. Her dad had come to many of her school events, sometimes even dragging Kathy and the wee ones along . . . but she’d been too annoyed to acknowledge them. And once he had established his practice, every year he had given her the opportunity to choose between boarding school or a local school, and she’d always chosen to go away.

  The older woman reached out again, but this time she caught Peyton’s left arm. With one hand she held the scarred wrist, and with the other she slowly stroked the bright slash left by the razor blade. “What you’ve always considered a grave offense isn’t an offense at all, honey,” she whispered. “I think it’s time you looked at things again.”

  Peyton closed her eyes. Last Christmas, goaded more by social obligation than fondness, she’d gone to Jacksonville to attend a Christmas party given by one of her high school classmates. After the party, she stopped by her father’s house to drop off a load of perfunctory presents. He answered the front door. “Won’t you come in?” he asked, looking at her with great dark eyes that glimmered with hope.

  “No.” She backed away, moving down the elegant brick staircase while she wished it were proper to drop off presents, ring the doorbell, and run, like a trick-or-treater in reverse. “I have work waiting at home.”

  “You can’t stay?”

  She had only waved in answer, then turned and jogged toward her car, struggling to forget the haunted look in his eyes. She couldn’t wait to get back home to her computer, where the monitor would stare at her blankly and words would obediently leap or twist or curl on the page, whatever she asked them to do.

  She couldn’t stay back then . . . and shame kept her at arm’s length now.

  Night had fallen by the time King drove Peyton home. He’d insisted on seeing
her to her front door even though her car remained at the Times office because, as he teasingly pointed out, she was not exactly in a fit condition to drive.

  Now, as she unlocked her front door and caught a glimpse of herself in the foyer mirror, Peyton had to agree that while her skills weren’t impaired, she did look a little odd. She’d wept her mascara off at Mary Grace’s, and during the time or two she’d swiped at it she’d painted swooping black marks at the corners of her eyes. If a cop had pulled her over, he’d probably think he’d found Elvira, Queen of the Dark, on her way home from a come-as-you-are party.

  She turned from the mirror, a little embarrassed at her disheveled condition. “You want to come in a minute?” she asked over her shoulder. “I’m going to do a rewrite of my column and file it ASAP, but I have some time and a few Cokes in the fridge. There might even be an apple pie. I picked one up at the grocery a week or so ago.”

  “A week?” Grumbling, King wiped his boots on the mat, then followed her into the house. “Honestly, MacGruder, you’ve got to take better care of yourself. There’s probably mold growing on that pie. You’ll get sick if you eat it.”

  She turned, a little amazed that he’d actually followed her in. But he’d seen her at her worst now, emotionally and physically, so if he was still here there might be something more to this than mere friendship . . .

  “Would you care?” she asked, overcome by an attack of shyness. “If I got sick?”

  “Yeah.” Standing before her, he reached out and traced her cheek. “I’d miss sparring with you at the office.”

  “We don’t have to.” She felt herself blushing. “Spar, I mean. We might try getting along for a change.”

  His mouth curved in the slow, drowsy smile she suddenly realized she loved. “What’s this? Are you honestly thinking of proving Carter Cummings right? He always said you had a thing for me.”

  She laughed. “That’s funny—on our side of the newsroom he was always saying you carried a torch for me.”