Claim

by Janet Nissenson

  “Tessa.”

  He took her into his arms, holding her tight as her body quivered with unshed tears. She buried her face against his warm, strong chest, breathing in his wonderful, comforting scent as though it might help to purify her mind from the chaotic, troubling thoughts that were being tossed around at the moment.

  Gently, Ian began to guide her back down the wobbly front step towards the street. “I think we’ve both seen enough here,” he told her firmly. “Let’s head into town as I mentioned. Unless, of course, you’d rather go directly back to Minneapolis.”

  “No.” She gave a brief shake of her head. “I think your idea of trying to find out some more about my mom was a good one. And that the high school is the best place to start.”

  Ian was just about to unlock the passenger door for her when a rusty old pick-up truck pulled into the driveway of the house next door. Moments later a woman who looked to be in her mid-sixties got out, and Tessa wasn’t sure who looked the worse for wear - the woman with her frowsy gray hair, unkempt clothing, and lined face, or her beat-up vehicle.

  The woman stared at Tessa and Ian as though they had just landed from outer space, and Tessa guessed that the two of them looked terribly out of place in this rundown, rural neighborhood - with their expensive clothing and even more expensive car. And Ian, of course, simply possessed that air of refinement and elegance in every pore of his gorgeous body. No matter what he wore or the type of car he drove, it would always be obvious to anyone that he was someone important, someone who had wealth and power and class.

  “You two lost or something?” the woman called out. Despite her shabby clothing and rough mannerisms, she seemed friendly enough.

  “No,” replied Tessa, summoning up a smile. “We were just about to leave, actually. This house belonged to my grandmother at one time, and my mother grew up here. I just - we were in Minneapolis for business and decided to make the drive out here.”

  The gray haired woman walked over to them now, taking in the top of the line BMW sedan, Ian’s black leather jacket, Tessa’s designer purse. And then, as she got a good look at Tessa’s face, her eyes widened.

  “My God, you look exactly like your mother, don’t you?” she exclaimed. “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen her, more than thirty years, I think, but it all comes back to me now. I don’t recall her name, but that face and hair - well, hard to forget someone that pretty. And you’re her spitting image, young lady.”

  Tessa’s smiled widened. “Thank you, you’re very kind. And my mother’s name was Gillian. Gillian Pedersen. I’m her daughter – Tessa - and this is my fiancé, Ian Gregson.”

  Ian extended his hand towards the older woman. “Did you know Tessa’s grandmother then? Or any of the family?”

  The woman shook Ian’s hand briefly. “Not well, no. Your grandmother - Corinne - kept to herself a lot. Most of the time, anyway. You know, when she wasn’t having one of her episodes.”

  Tessa was on instant alert at the woman’s rather matter-of-factly uttered statement. “Episodes? How do you mean?”

  The woman hesitated. “How much did your mother tell you about, well, your grandmother? And about her life here? Oh, by the way, I’m Annie Lange. My husband Tim and I have lived here a little over thirty years. Moved here when your mother was already a teenager. That’s why I couldn’t remember her name, since I really only saw her around for a year or so before she left town.”

  Tessa’s hands began to tremble again, whether from cold or fear, and she shoved them into her jacket pockets. “My mother never talked about my grandmother,” she acknowledged. “Or about growing up here. She always changed the subject whenever I asked. But I always knew that things weren’t - well, happy for her here.”

  “I don’t think they were either,” replied Annie gently. “Your mom was never around much, seemed to avoid coming home as much as possible, and then just took off when she was around seventeen, eighteen. Never saw her again. But Corinne got real bad after that, started having more and more of her episodes. She’d raise a ruckus of one sort or another, sometimes just stood in the road in the middle of the night and scream at the top of her lungs for no reason. A few times she’d curse at one of the neighbors, say all sorts of crazy things, even throw rocks at their houses or cars. Most of the time she’d just go back into her house afterwards, and then we wouldn’t see her again for a week or two. Other times, when it got real bad, someone would call the sheriff and they’d come and take her away for awhile. But she always came back. Until, well - you know she passed on about ten years ago, right?”

  Ian answered for her, since Tessa had grown increasingly pale with every word out of Annie’s mouth, and clutched his arm tightly for support.

  “Yes, we did know that,” he said. “And that her death was ruled a suicide. But we don’t have any other details. And since Gillian passed away almost ten years ago herself, there’s no one else Tessa can ask about her family.”

  Annie reached out to pat Tessa on the arm. “I’m sorry about that, honey. Your mother was such a pretty girl, but it was obvious how unhappy she was living here, how hard things were with your grandmother. And I’m sorry I don’t have more information to give you. As I said before, Corinne was something of a recluse, especially after your mother left. She didn’t talk to any of the neighbors, hardly ever came outside unless she was having one of her episodes. And, frankly, most of us were all too happy to avoid her. Because, you know, she was sort of -”

  “Crazy?” finished Tessa. “Don’t worry, I figured that out pretty quickly. My mom - she was sick, too. She didn’t have outbursts like you described with my grandmother, but she had a severe case of bipolar disorder.”

  “Do you know if either Corinne or Gillian had any friends elsewhere in town?” inquired Ian. “Someone who might be able to share some information with Tessa?”

  Annie shook her head. “Not really, no. Like I mentioned before, we hadn’t been here all that long when Gillian left town. And none of us around here paid much attention to Corinne. We were just happy when she stayed inside her place and kept quiet. Not that there’s many of us left in this neighborhood any longer. You can see for yourself how many vacant houses there are. When the big recession hit back in 2008, the factory in town closed up and lots of people lost their jobs and their houses. Things are gradually starting to recover, but it’s going to take some time yet. As for your grandmother’s house - well, I doubt anyone will ever buy it considering the shape it’s in.”

  “Thank you for the information,” Ian told her gently. “We appreciate your time. We’re going to head back into town now, maybe stop by the high school and see if there are any teachers who might remember Gillian.”

  “Good idea. Oh, and while you’re there, you might want to look up old Doctor Phelps. He’s been the town doctor here for almost fifty years from what I understand. Mostly retired now, sold his practice to a younger doctor, but I think he still sees a few patients now and then. And he knows everyone. You’ll find his office in between the realtor’s and the post office. As you probably noticed driving in, Oak Grove’s not a very big place, so you can find everything pretty easy.”

  Tessa thanked the woman again, and then gratefully took refuge inside the plush confines of the car. The snow was falling a little heavier now, and she shivered even as Ian cranked up the heater.

  He drove back towards town silently, waiting for her to speak first. But when they reached the main street and she still hadn’t said a word, he prodded her gently for a reply.

  “Tessa? What would you like to do next, love? Did you want to stop by the high school? Or should we head back to Minneapolis? It’s up to you.”

  She shook her head. “Neither of those, actually. I’d really like to find this Doctor Phelps that Annie mentioned. If he’s been here almost fifty years, then I’m sure he knew my mother. And grandmother. This isn’t a very big town, as Annie said, and if he was the only doctor, he must have known them.”

  Ian
hesitated. “Are you sure about this, Tessa? You might - well, hear some things that aren’t particularly pleasant. Especially in light of what Annie just told us about your grandmother’s erratic behavior.”

  “I need to know, Ian,” she pointed out, feeling eerily calm at the prospect of hearing that her grandmother had suffered from the same kind of mental illness that Gillian had. “I need to know if this sort of thing runs in the family, if I’m at risk for developing it, or passing it on to our children. And this doctor may be the only person who has that information.”

  Ian opened his mouth as though to argue the matter further, but Tessa figured he gave up on the idea upon seeing the stubborn, determined look on her face. Instead, he merely nodded and turned back onto the main street, finding the modest building that housed the doctor’s office easily.

  The small waiting room was empty when they walked inside, and the receptionist looked up from her computer screen in surprise.

  “Oh. I didn’t think we had any appointments until after lunch,” she mused. “I must have missed something. Let me check.”

  “We don’t have an appointment,” Ian told her. “We were actually hoping to speak with Doctor Phelps for a few minutes if he’s in today.”

  The receptionist, a young, rather awkward girl of about twenty, gaped up at Ian, and Tessa resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Her gorgeous fiancé had that effect on women wherever he went, it seemed, whether it was in a big city like London or San Francisco, or a small, rural town in Minnesota.

  “Uh, yeah, he’s - he’s in,” the girl stammered, surging to her feet so fast she knocked a stack of files off her desk. “Let me, uh, see if he has time free. That is, he should, since he’s not seeing patients today. Um, what - what was this about anyway? If you need an exam, it’s really Doctor Janssen you should see, Doctor Phelps doesn’t see patients much anymore.”

  “We just want to talk to him for a few minutes,” explained Ian gently. “My fianceé’s family used to live here in Oak Grove, and we wondered if Doctor Phelps might have some information about them. Could you tell him, please, that Gillian Pedersen’s daughter would like to speak with him?”

  “Uh, yeah, for sure. Um, just a minute.”

  The skinny, gawky receptionist stumbled off down the hallway, almost tripping over her own feet.

  In spite of her jangling nerves and ever-growing sense of dread, Tessa managed to grin at Ian knowingly.

  “Another female you’ve managed to charm, Mr. Gregson,” she teased. “I’m guessing she’ll be raving about the hunk who walked into the office to her friends later this evening. You’ve probably made her day, if not her week.”

  Ian glared at her. “I certainly wasn’t trying to charm her,” he corrected. “As for making someone’s day, you certainly made mine earlier this morning, love. Have I told you how much I enjoy your version of a wake-up call?”

  Tessa’s cheeks flushed a bit as she recalled the early morning blow job she’d indeed woken him with, as well as the way he’d very eagerly returned the favor. “It’s always a mutual pleasure,” she murmured. “And I -”

  She was interrupted by the return of the young, clumsy receptionist who burst back into the waiting room announcing, “Doctor Phelps said to bring you right back. It’s the second office on the left.”

  Tessa glanced up at Ian, badly needing his reassurance at this point, and leaned against him gratefully as he slid an arm around her waist. He guided her down the short hallway to Doctor Phelps’s office, and ushered her inside the opened door.

  Doctor Phelps was of medium height, with thinning gray hair, and looked to be in his mid-to-late seventies. The eyes behind his bifocals were clear and sharp, and the look on his face as he greeted Tessa was one of both recognition and regret.

  “Even if Chloe hadn’t told me who you were a moment ago, I would have known immediately that you were Gillian’s daughter,” he told her earnestly, clasping her hand in a surprisingly firm grip given his age and slight frame.

  “Thank you for seeing us without an appointment, Doctor Phelps,” Tessa replied, smiling at him gratefully. “This was something of a last minute visit here to town, and a neighbor suggested we stop in to see if you could tell me anything about my mother. And, well, my grandmother as well, I suppose.”

  Doctor Phelps nodded, and motioned for her and Ian to take seats in front of his old, leather-topped desk. “Of course. I’ll tell you what I can, though it’s been a good thirty years at least since the last time I saw your mother. Is - is she well?”

  Tessa gave a brief shake of her head. “My mother passed away almost ten years ago. An - an accident.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that, my dear,” Doctor Phelps told her regretfully. “You must have still been a teenager when you lost her.”

  “Yes.” Tessa glanced down at her lap uncertainly, then up at Ian. “Oh, I’m so sorry. I haven’t introduced you. Doctor Phelps, this is my fiancé, Ian Gregson.”

  The doctor’s eyes widened as he and Ian shook hands. “Of the Gregson hotels, perhaps?”

  Ian nodded. “One and the same. Tessa and I were at the Minneapolis property on business and decided to make the drive out here somewhat on the spur of the moment as she said. I just recently discovered that this was where her mother was born and raised, and we were hoping to talk to someone who might have known Gillian when she was younger. Or perhaps find out if she had other family in town.”

  Doctor Phelps regarded them both curiously. “This wasn’t information that Gillian ever shared with you, Tessa?”

  “No.” Tessa shook her head. “My mother never discussed her childhood, but I always had the impression that she was terribly unhappy growing up. And, well, there were things she said to make me suspect that she might have been abused or mistreated. And after reading her books, I know that for a fact now.”

  At the doctor’s puzzled expression, Tessa explained that her mother had been a writer by profession, but that the books had been lost or left behind over the years until Ian had found copies of them from used book dealers just last year.

  “They, well, the way they were written - they were very personal, very detailed,” continued Tessa. “I always assumed they were somewhat autobiographical in nature, but didn’t want to believe that some of the things that happened were based on true events.” She clasped and unclasped her hands in agitation. “But after seeing the house where she lived, and talking to one of her neighbors, I’m afraid that every single horror she wrote about was all too real.”

  The doctor didn’t reply for long seconds, a thoughtful expression on his face. “I can’t say for certain, of course,” he replied slowly, “since I haven’t read her books. But there were more than a few occasions when I treated your mother and there were visible signs of physical abuse and neglect. She was always underweight, as though she hadn’t been given enough to eat. Occasional bruises, a broken wrist once, and a few other incidences that I can’t recall in any specific detail at the moment. I remember speaking to your grandmother about these things, and Corinne always had some excuse, some explanation. And then the next few times Gillian would come in for a check-up, she’d seem fine, no new bruises or ailments, and I’d hope that I was wrong about the possible abuse.”

  Doctor Phelps sighed, as though what he had to say next weighed heavily on his nearly eighty year old mind. “Your grandmother - you know nothing about her, correct?” At Tessa’s nod he continued. “She had - problems, Tessa. Mental health problems. To be fair to Corinne, she found herself widowed with a small child to raise at a very young age after your grandfather was killed in Vietnam. I didn’t know her when that happened, she was living elsewhere, and moved here about a year later. Whether those circumstances triggered the start of her disorder, or just made it worse, I couldn’t say for certain. But by the time your mother was around eight years old, Corinne was suffering from very severe bipolar disorder.”

  Ian frowned, steepling his fingers together beneath his chin. “Was that an offi
cial diagnosis on your part, Doctor Phelps?”

  The older man shook his head. “No, just my best guess. She refused to be referred to a psychiatrist, insisted there was nothing wrong with her except a little depression every so often. I tried prescribing certain drugs, and they seemed to work for a time, until she stopped taking them or they stopped helping.”

  Tessa’s heart rate had picked up significantly at hearing that her grandmother, too, had suffered from the same sort of mental illness that had plagued Gillian. “How - that is - was she ever officially diagnosed?”

  “Yes.” He removed his glasses for a moment and pinched the bridge of his nose before replacing them. “When your mother was around eight or nine, something happened, something - very unfortunate. And it resulted in your grandmother being committed to a mental hospital for several months, and your mother placed in foster care. They officially identified her illness as bipolar disorder, and were able, for a time at least, to get it under control with the right medications and therapy. Enough so that she was eventually able to regain custody of Gillian and return home.”

  Tessa closed her eyes, afraid to ask the next question but desperately needing to know the answer for her own peace of mind. “This incident. Did - did it involve my grandmother leaving Mom locked outside of the house during a snowstorm?”

  The doctor looked startled that she would know this. “Yes, that’s exactly what happened. Did she talk about that awful night to you then?”

  “No. But she did write about it in her first book. In great detail. And, well, she hated the snow. We always lived someplace where it was hot and dry, mostly the southwest. I understand now why that was,” acknowledged Tessa sorrowfully.

  Doctor Phelps reached across his desk to squeeze her arm reassuringly. “That was one of the most heartbreaking situations I’ve ever had to deal with as a physician,” he admitted. “It was a terrible storm that night, in the dead of winter, and everyone was huddled inside their houses to keep warm. No one was on the road or wanted to venture outside. But one of the neighbors finally emerged to let their dog out to relieve himself, and noticed your mother huddled up in a little ball on the porch. Your grandmother had slipped into a deep depression, and locked the front door, didn’t hear Gillian shouting or pounding on the door when she got home from school. The neighbor brought her inside his house and called the sheriff right away. I was asked to look her over, and it was one of the worst things I’ve ever seen. Your poor mother had frostbite - she was lucky her fingers didn’t have to be amputated - and wound up developing a bad case of pneumonia. But it was the psychological damage that was the worst. And being shipped off to a foster home for six months only made things worse.”