“Hello,” the boy said. He paused. “This is Nathan. Is this…?” He didn’t know what to call me.
“This is Lucy Drobyshev. Is it really you, Nathan?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry to be skeptical, but I’ve had…People can be cruel sometimes.”
“I know. I was afraid you might think it was a hoax. I asked my dad how I could prove it was me, and he said to tell you your first date was at the Café Budapest. He was wearing his police uniform, and you put a rose in your hair.”
“Oh my god, it really is you.” For a moment I was too choked up to speak. Through my tears I said, “There’s so much to talk about. Where do we start?”
He laughed nervously.
I said, “You’re all grown up now. Nineteen next month.”
“I, uh…I thought my birthday was February second?”
“Actually, it’s January seventeenth.” What other lies had his father told him? I said, “Do you go to college now?”
“Yes, I’m a freshman.”
“What about your sister?” I held my breath.
“Sarah’s a senior. She’s a great student.”
I felt a surge of relief, knowing she was okay. “I’m not surprised about that. You were both so smart. She started reading when she was three. Where do you…?” I was going to ask where he went to college but cut myself off. He’d been cautious so far, his answers short and spare on details; I’d have to be careful and not seem to be probing.
“Ma’am?”
“I’m sorry. I’m a little overwhelmed right now.” A strong feeling suddenly came over me—a mother’s feeling—and I realized he was nearby. “It’s amazing to be talking to you like this. You sound like you’re so close.”
“Yes, I’m in Boston.”
“And you’ve come to see me.”
“Yes, but…I have to…I don’t want you to call the police or anything. I don’t want to get my dad in trouble.”
“Oh no, no, don’t worry. I won’t do that.”
“It’s just, I mean…I couldn’t stop you if you did, but…”
“It wouldn’t be much of a reunion then, would it?”
“No, ma’am. I guess not. But Sarah said she…”
“You can trust me, Nathan. Would you like to come here to the house? Or we could meet someplace? Whatever makes you comfortable.”
“I’ll come to your house. I know the address. I could be there in about half an hour.”
“That would be wonderful.” I wanted to tell him to be careful, take your time, look both ways before crossing the street. “Would you like me to make some coffee? Or tea? I could walk up to the bakery and get some sweet rolls.”
“Just coffee.”
“Okay, see you soon.”
I hung up the phone. Out in the kitchen my hands shook so badly I got coffee grounds all over the counter. I called William’s cell phone, and he picked up immediately.
“It’s him,” I said. “It’s really him. He’s here in Boston. He’s coming to the house in half an hour.”
“Oh, Lucy, that’s fantastic.”
“I have to go get ready.”
“Of course. Call me afterward.”
I ran up to the bedroom, looking at one outfit then another, as conflicted as a teenager about to go on her first date. I settled on a white sweater and black slacks. “Nathan,” I said aloud to the photograph on the mantel. This was about today, not all those lost yesterdays. But I would tell him about my journals, show him how I never stopped counting the days. I brushed my hair, took off the sweater and changed into a beige one, took off the slacks and put on jeans, pulled the sweater over my head and got a red Western shirt with mother-of-pearl buttons, ran a leather belt through the loops of my jeans and cinched it tight. I looked like a desperate divorcée in a honky-tonk bar. I went back to the white sweater and black slacks, brushed my hair again, and pulled it back with tortoiseshell hair combs. Lipstick? Something pale. No mascara, though my eyes looked puffy. I tried on a bunch of shoes and ended up in plain black flats, then went downstairs and peeked out the front window to see if I could see him coming up the street. I ran back up to the bedroom and got the photograph of him and Sarah to put it on the mantel in the living room.
When he knocked on the door, I opened it and smiled and said, “Come in.”
He stepped into the foyer, a tall, thin boy with a backpack over one shoulder and a watch cap in his hand, a few nicks on his handsome face from shaving. My eyes were filled with tears and his with questions.
I said, “Did you have any trouble finding the house?”
He shook his head. “I took a cab.”
He stuffed his cap in his pocket, and I hung his parka on the coat tree. Neither of us said more until we were in the kitchen and I asked him how he liked his coffee.
“Milk and sugar,” he said.
“Just like your dad.”
He nodded hesitantly, wary at the mention of his father, his eyes darting around the room as if he were looking for something he could remember. I put the milk and sugar on the table and watched him stir it in his coffee.
For the first few years after they were gone, I saw Sarah and Nathan everywhere—in playgrounds, in the lines of schoolchildren holding hands as they crossed the street, in shopping malls and movie theaters—embarrassing myself and scaring others as I’d stare and move closer, trying to get a better look. Intellectually, I knew that their faces would change as they matured. Still, I was convinced that when I saw them, really saw them, I would know them in an instant. Now, searching the boy’s face, I could find only the slightest traces of the child I remembered: the green eyes and small mouth, Matt’s coloring and dark wavy hair.
I said, “Let’s take our coffee into the living room. We’ll be more comfortable.”
As I led him through the dining room, he paused and looked up at the ceiling. “I think I…”
“What?”
“I remember that fruit basket around the chandelier.”
“That was one of first things I fell in love with when we saw the house. I repainted it myself.”
“My roommate’s family has one like it in their home. I had a feeling of déjà vu when I saw it there.”
“Where does your roommate live?”
He hesitated, uncertain how much he wanted to reveal, then said, “Providence.”
We went into the living room. He sat in an armchair, I on the sofa.
I said, “Have you…?” at the same time he said, “What do you…?” and we both laughed nervously and tried again. No one had invented a vocabulary for a moment like this. The two of us would have to make up new words and fumble with the old ones, as if we spoke different languages or came from different cultures, trying to discover what was acceptable and what was taboo.
I said, “It’s hard to know where to start, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“And you’re not sure you can trust me?”
He shrugged. “It’s not…I mean…my sister’s going to kill me when she finds out I came here. She and my dad are incredibly close.”
I nodded. “She and Matt always were. Is that what he still calls himself?”
“No, it’s Adam. My name was changed too. I’m Elliot.”
“And Sarah?”
“She’s still Sarah, only she spells it without the h.”
He reached in his pocket and handed me a photocopy of the old newspaper clipping from the Herald. “This is how I found out about you. I came across it when I was doing research for a paper. Sarah still has the llama. That’s how I recognized us.”
I smiled and fought off my tears. “Thank you, Sundae. Your grandmother gave her that. Nanda. Do you remember her? She passed away a few years ago.”
He shook his head. “I really don’t remember anything. When I saw t
hat article, I was in total shock. My dad told us the house burned down and you died. He didn’t talk about you much. He said it made him too sad, which I think was true. He never got married again.”
It was difficult not to show my anger. Over the years, there were moments when I honestly believed I could douse Matt with gasoline and never think twice about lighting the match.
I said, “You got this article from the library?”
“Yes, over Thanksgiving break. Then I found your number in the phone book. I didn’t know what to do. Sarah was in France, studying. When I got home and showed her the newspaper article, she said we should forget about it. She wanted me to pretend I’d never seen it. She’s afraid you’ll tell the police and they’ll send our father to prison. But I just couldn’t…I wanted to meet you.”
“Thank you.”
He nodded but said nothing more.
“You said in your message your dad said it was okay for you to come here?”
“He could see it was something I needed to do. He said he raised me and Sarah to think for ourselves.”
“Well, I’m glad he did. Your father and I, uh…there was a lot of bitterness between us. I don’t know what he told you. I’m not sure I want to know. But, please, believe me, I’m not going to contact the police or try to punish him. The only thing that matters to me now is having a relationship with you and Sarah again.” Relief showed in his eyes. “Would you like more coffee?”
“No, thank you…” He still didn’t know what to call me.
“What’s Sarah studying in college?”
“Art history. She’s doing her thesis on Cézanne.”
“Really? How wonderful. What about you? Do you know what you want to major in?”
“Music. I play oboe, also flute and cor anglais.”
“Classical music?”
“Sometimes. But mostly jazz.”
“I don’t know much about jazz. Do you write your own music?”
“A lot of it. I’m in a band at school. The day I found that article in the newspaper I came home and stuff just started flowing. It was kind of crazy, learning you were still alive, and I used to have a different name and all. It felt like the whole world was turned upside down. I was trying to make sense out of what my dad had done. I guess music helps me deal with things. As upsetting as it was finding that article—I know this probably sounds strange—it also felt kind of cool. Sort of like an adventure. Like I was still me but somebody completely different.”
“You must spend a lot of time alone with your music.”
“Yeah, I do.”
“I spend a lot of time alone too. How does it work? The music? Do you hear a melody in your head and just start playing it on your oboe?”
“Yeah, pretty much. I use a tape recorder. Sometimes it’s almost like I can’t keep up with myself. Things start pouring out of me, and I have no idea where the piece is going. I’m just trying to get it all down. It’s kind of like being in a field of butterflies and you’re trying to catch as many as you can, but some of the best ones keep getting away. After I’ve been playing for a while, I go back and listen to the tape and I’m surprised by half the stuff that’s there. It’s almost like somebody else came into my room and put a bunch of music on my tape recorder. Of course, a lot of it is pure crap.” He laughed. “That’s when the hard part starts, trying to figure out what to keep and what to get rid of. Anyway, it’s pretty strange. A couple of hours before, none of that music existed. And now it does. I made it up, but I have no idea where it came from.”
“That’s how I feel about you at the moment. Like you fell out of the sky. Did you finish that piece? The one you started the day you found the article in the newspaper?”
“Sort of. I turned it in for my composition final. My teacher liked it, but he said I need to keep working on it.”
“Did you bring your oboe with you? I’d love to hear it.”
He went to the foyer and got his book bag and took out the instrument case. When the oboe was fitted together, he wet the reed with his lips and played a burst of warm-up notes.
“Well, here goes.” The look on his face was eager and uncertain.
“What do you call it?”
“‘Lost and Found.’”
He closed his eyes and began to play a slow, melancholy song. I sat on the edge of the sofa watching him, drinking him in. The oboe looked tiny in his long-fingered hands. I thought of all the things I had missed—first day of school, first lost tooth, first home run, first oboe recital, first crush. Matt took all that for himself. I wondered if I could ever forgive him. It was hard to imagine ever wanting to, but I would have to try. It might be the only way I could keep Nathan and find my way back to Sarah. I’d been broken for so long that I wondered what it would be like to feel whole again. A sudden trill of the oboe startled me. The tempo was quicker now, the melody sweet and airy; my son had found his way home. I had never felt so happy, or so afraid.
Chapter 32
Adam
The night Elliot left to go to Lucy’s, I drove him to the airport to catch the red-eye to Boston. Both of us were quiet, but there wasn’t any tension between us. He put on a jazz tape and fiddled with the snaps on the parka he’d draped across his knees. I assumed he was thinking about his mother, wondering what would happen when he knocked on her door. He’d said he thought she was still living in our old house in Jamaica Plain. I remembered what a cool place it was, with the marble hearths and the dentil crown molding. The way the light shone through the stained-glass windows by the front door. But Lucy ruined everything about it for me. To this day I could still see her coming down the hall in that kimono, looking like a hooker carrying a wineglass and beer bottle. It was hard to imagine her still rattling around in that big old house alone.
I wondered if she and Griffin had gotten married and had more children. That seemed unlikely. He wasn’t the marrying kind, and she wasn’t cut out to be a mother. But maybe the two of them had gotten caught up in the charade they’d been playing and decided to start a family of their own. The more I thought about that possibility, the more I hoped it wasn’t so. I had a strong feeling that Elliot was going to develop a relationship with Lucy. Maybe, eventually, Sara would too. Discovering a younger half-brother or half-sister would only draw them closer to her. It made me wonder how our lives would have changed if I had gotten married again myself. Elliot might not have felt so different growing up. He probably wouldn’t have gone looking for information about Lucy if he’d had another mother. Sadly, that hadn’t been something I could give him. I’d met some fine women along the way, even came close to falling in love a few times. But marriages are built on honesty and trust, and I could never risk telling my secret to anyone.
Elliot and I got out of the truck at the airport and gave each other a hug. As I stood on the curb watching him walk into the terminal, he lifted his hand to wave goodbye without looking back. It was just past eleven when I got home. Sara was back from her date, warming a piece of apple cobbler in the kitchen.
“Where’s El?” she said.
I hung my keys on the hook by the door. “Gone back to Boston. I just dropped him off at the airport.”
“That’s insane, Daddy! Why did you let him go?”
“What was I going to do? Lock him in his room? He’s going to have to figure this out for himself. You will too, honey.” That last line seemed to catch her off guard. She wanted me to tell her to hate her mother and never have anything to do with her. “I meant it when I said I taught you guys to think for yourselves.”
“What if she tries to get you sent to prison?”
“I don’t think she’ll do that. It’s not a pretty story. She’s not going to want to air all the gory details for you and El to hear. But if she does…I’ll just get up on the stand and tell my side to a jury.” I set my jaw in defiance. “I’m proud of what I did, Sara. The only
thing I’m guilty of is trying to protect you and your brother. Nobody’s going to send me to jail for that.”
She didn’t look convinced. For all my bravado, I wasn’t entirely convinced myself.
She said, “When is he coming back?”
“Saturday around noon. We’ll have Christmas dinner and open presents together.”
“Terrific,” she said sarcastically. She tried to take the cobbler out of the toaster oven and muttered, “Shit,” as she snatched her fingers away from the heat. “I can’t believe he couldn’t wait till after the holidays.”
“Don’t be too hard on him, Sara. This was something he needed to do. He’s been carrying it around for over a month. I’m just glad he came home and talked it over with you and me before going to see her.” I poured a cup of cold coffee and put it in the microwave. “Where’d you go tonight?”
“Out with Ajit. I didn’t tell him what’s going on.”
“I suppose you’ll have to, sooner or later.” I hadn’t begun to process how this whole thing would play out beyond the three of us. It wasn’t something we could keep secret for long. “What’s up with you and Ajit?”
“We’re okay, I guess.” The look on her face said something different. “He just found out he won a two-year fellowship to Oxford.”
“Wow, that’s fantastic.”
“It is. But I’m tired of us always being apart.” She’d been accepted into a prestigious apprenticeship program at the Getty Museum in L.A. starting in the fall.
“Ah, don’t worry. You guys’ll work it out.” Or not. I wanted to be supportive, but I’d never seen two people in love who could make each other so unhappy.
She sat down at the kitchen table with the apple cobbler and a glass of milk. “What would you say if I went to England with him?”
“And gave up the job at the Getty?”
She shrugged. “I could take some grad courses. Try to get something at one of the museums over there.”
“I’m not sure what to tell you, hon. It’s your life. I could make a good case one way or the other.” I retrieved my coffee from the microwave and sat down with her at the table.
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