I ask Julia to summarize the letter that comes with the kit, explaining that the siblingship testing can often be frustrating and inconclusive. “Unlike paternity testing,” she paraphrases, “there are no genes that siblings must share. So any combination is possible. Therefore, a DNA sibling test cannot provide absolute answers. Theoretically, if two people are full siblings, then half of the tested genes should be identical. If they are half siblings, only a quarter should be identical. In practice, genes from the two parents combine randomly. So these are averages rather than exact numbers.” She turns the paper over and scans the back. “Rush orders cost extra. Tests with no parental DNA cost extra. A lot extra.”
Ray holds his chin in his knuckles and says, “Tell me again how this will this help us find our birth parents?”
“It won’t, Ray,” I say. “I see it as piece of the bigger puzzle.”
He shakes his head, “Well, Taina just blew a hole in the sibling ideology, whether we like it or not. Is it still worth doing?”
“I was going to keep it a secret,” Taina says, first looking apologetically at Holly then accusatorially at me. “It just kind of popped out.”
“It’s still worth doing,” I insist. Doug tested Taina against Adrian and me. I want to repeat that test to confirm, then test against the rest of you.”
Holly leaned forward and said, “Is it what you really want, David?”
I make my final sales pitch: “Yes. Absolutely.” I turn to Ray. “Being open to the truth about our history doesn’t dishonor the people we love. In fact, it does the opposite; it demonstrates a certain level of emotional—” I struggle with the word until they help me arrive at stability. “To do this,” I continue, “we have to have a confidence in who we are and what we believe. And I believe in us, and in our commitment to each other as a family.”
Holly exhales with force, which makes her bangs flutter. “Hell. Doesn’t marriage contain the same kind of magic? If the ‘two become one’ by pact of law or religion, then why would siblingship be so farfetched? Our tattoos don’t symbolize DNA; they’re more like symbols of commitment. Like wedding rings.”
“I’m in,” Ray says, touching his tattoo and looking up at our sisters, then at me. “Maybe we can get the results before we leave.”
“Are you sure about this?” Taina asks, putting her hand over Ray’s.
“No,” he says, eyes wide. “But hiding from the truth doesn’t seem right either. We’re getting too old to stick our heads in the sand.”
As I wait to fall asleep before my afternoon nap, I think about what had happened that afternoon. The knowledge that Taina isn’t my blood sister doesn’t bother me at all. The bonds formed from love and shared experiences are so much more powerful than shared genes. After all, we all know the world is full of blood relatives who can’t stand each other. I firmly believe that we are bound first and foremost by a deep understanding of each other. It’s all going to melt into one great alloy, then fuse into a whole that’s stronger than its divisive parts. I have seven more days to gather consensus and then smooth out Adrian’s ruffled feathers. I’m thinking like a salesman: I have one week to close the deal.
I took a seven-hour nap so there’s no way I can go to bed when the first crew goes to bed that night. I heat up a glass of milk and figure that I’ll just have to join the vampires. I hear them talking through a window out on the porch and smell the smoke of Taina’s cigarettes wafting into the hall. I look through the window. Taina is straddling the porch rail, holding up a cigarette, which glows orange against the dark backdrop of the water. Adrian is standing, leaning against the same rail, arms crossed over his chest. They look tense but not combative. He glances at her sideways now and then as he kicks at something with a bare foot. Adrian and I have never talked about Taina’s crush, so I don’t know if he knows. She and I have never discussed it either, but Holly-big-mouth confirmed it when I asked. The whole idea of it makes me feel dirty, and I know that Adrian would be appalled.
Adrian is talking about Ray, and I catch bits of the conversation. He squeezes the tips of his fingers together when he says, “. . . If it turns out that he has no genetic relatives.”
Taina replies, “Ray was seventeen when ‘it’ happened.”
Adrian half-whispers, “Once you’re capable of drinking yourself to death, you’re always capable.”
Taina points her cigarette at him. “You told me once that you had friends in gangs.” She blows a huge cloud of smoke into the breeze. “Did you do something bad, Adrian? Is that why you’re afraid to give your DNA? Because not even Ray believes that your resistance to this is about Ray.”
Adrian stiffens. “Sure I hung around bad people, but I don’t trust the law, either. I have too many friends who’ve ended up in jail for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Cops think they have X-ray vision into our dirty little Latino souls. I don’t want anyone to have my DNA, and I’m pissed at your husband, by the way. I want him to get rid of it. I’m the watch dog in the family, Taina. I’m the one with proof of past abuse. I’m the only one who grew up poor. I’ve seen things.”
I step onto the porch, let the screen door bang to announce my presence. “What’s up?” I say.
Adrian’s voice is flat. “What are you doing up?”
“Can’t sleep.”
A short distance out in the water, something big makes a splash, and we turn, but see nothing but an expanding ring on the surface of the water. I look at Taina. “I want you to paint me. And you—” I look at Adrian. “How ’bout you compose a song for my funeral?”
“Jesus, David. Stop being so morbid.”
“C’mon, you so-called artists. Where’s the guitar? The sketchbook? The tackle box full of fancy art gear? Come on inside. I don’t have forever, you know.”
Stirring my siblings’ creative juices is easy—just lounge on the couch, listen to Adrian play around with his guitar and watch Taina sketch. To lighten the mood, I open a trunk in the hall and exchange my baseball hat for a tall black leather grenadier hat with a brass eagle on the front.
“Que guapo,” says Adrian. “Don’t you think, Tai?”
I run a finger across the brim of the hat and begin to dance around, singing, “I’m too sexy for my hat . . .”
Taina’s face melts into the first smile I’ve seen from her in days.
“It’s a great hat,” Adrian says, and tries to play “Too Sexy” while I dance around.
“Don’t move,” Taina orders, holding out her hands. She tapes a fresh sheet of paper to her easel. She begins to sketch me. I sit. I don’t move.
After a half-hour, I get up and look at the picture. It looks exactly like one of her Caribbean Lagoon designs that have become a cash cow for her former employer. She even sketched a palm tree behind my head. Gone is the hat that I’m so obviously wearing. Instead, I have a full head of thick, dark hair. It’s ridiculous. She smiles at me hopefully, expecting praise.
I pull at the edges of the paper and rip it off. I ball it up and throw it across the room so it lands in the empty fireplace.
“You can do better,” I say. “You’re blocked.”
Her mouth hangs open for a moment, and then she says, “Go to hell.” Her eyes actually fill with tears.
Sure, I feel bad. But I press on, emboldened by the soldier who once wore this hat: Lieutenant August Bradley the Fourth, a Griswold by marriage. If he could stand up to the Confederates, then surely I can stand up to my sister. So I say, “You gave up on yourself and your talent. I want to help you get it back.”
I can tell she’s really pissed, because her lower lip is trembling. “I’m not painting you, asshole. Forget it.”
“Stay in the present moment,” I say, doing my best Buddhist monk imitation. “Just draw like you did before fear moved in.” I tap at the hat. “Honor your gift.” I grab her hand and point to the starfish tattoo that Adrian said looks like a frozen crab. “Let’s defrost that little bugger.”
Adrian throws his h
ead and laughs. “Can’t say no one listens to you, Tai.”
So Taina marches over to where Adrian’s sitting and starts tearing out the pages of his notebook, crumpling them up and throwing them across the room. “See how you like it,” she mumbles, frowning. She looks like a little girl, suddenly, a sister being teased by two older brothers who might be throwing her favorite doll back and forth between them. Adrian lunges at her and tries to get his papers back. “Hey! Hey!”
“Lame.” She holds up a sheet. “This one sounds like a . . .” she screws up her face, “like a hemorrhoid commercial.”
I hold my Zenlike calm. “Taina,” I say, taking the paper away from her and putting my hands on her shoulders. “You just said it yourself—you weren’t made for commercial work, at least, not forever. You told me that, and I’m never going to let you forget it.”
She shakes her head. “Are you saying my work is mediocre? Speak for yourself. You’re the most mediocre person I ever met, David.”
“Exactly!” I say. “That’s my point. You’re extraordinary, and I’m not. My job therefore, is to repeat to you what you told me ten years ago—that you would consider your life a failure if you never saw your work hanging in a gallery. I’m here telling you it’s time to start that journey. Now.”
I guess I hit a bee’s nest because not even my monkish charm can calm her. “You don’t get to be a dick just because you have a brain tumor,” she yells. “And the whole ‘what I’ve learned from the Griswolds thing’ is getting old. Screw the Griswolds.”
I trace an imaginary rainbow between us. “This is great. Let it out.”
“Great job, man,” Adrian pipes in. “Creativity’s just oozing out her ears.”
I take a deep breath. I try a more direct approach. “Look. I know that was harsh, Tai. But you didn’t waste your time. Once you know what isn’t working, you’re free to discover what does.”
Adrian looked up from his guitar. “He’s got a point. That’s how I work.”
Then I did something I rarely do. I hugged her. I held her head to my neck and said, “I am mediocre, always have been. And that’s why I’m trying so hard not to be. I have so little time left to make my mark, to be extraordinary at something.” I pull her back and look into her eyes. “Even if it’s only at being a brother.”
Chapter 28
In the late morning, on the fourth day, Julia came running out of the house and breathlessly announced that David was missing. They were all out on the lawn, waiting for him to get up and join them. Adrian and Ray, already in their swim trunks, were in the process of setting up a volleyball net. Holly was kickboxing a tire swing underneath the old cedar. Taina was sunning herself in a macramé bikini out on the seawall and had recently caused a passing sailboat to run aground. The guys had helped an embarrassed pair of brothers push their boat back out, and the incident had served as after-breakfast entertainment.
“Missing? Not too many places to hide on a one-acre island,” Ray told Julia. “Did you check the bathrooms?”
“He must have left before we got up. The blue kayak is gone,” Julia said. “He does this.” She shook her head. “He craves solitude.”
“But he shouldn’t be alone,” Ray said, squinting and shading his face in the sun. “What if he has a seizure or something?”
Julia said, “Exactly.”
“A thousand bucks says he’s in one of the nature preserves, being bitten by ticks as we speak. Let’s go check it out,” Adrian said, looking out to the water. “When we spot him, we leave him alone.”
“I have a first-aid kit, a Swiss Army knife, a cell phone, some snacks, water bottles . . .” said Ray, patting at his chest and pants pockets, as if he were looking for his car keys.
“Hang on there, Eagle Scout,” Adrian said. “Two is enough.”
“Cool. You and me, man.”
Adrian shook his head. “Julia knows the islands better than anyone. I’ll go with her.”
Ray saw the guilty look pass over Julia’s face, but she didn’t say anything, she just folded her arms and looked away. They wanted to be alone with each other, Ray understood suddenly, so he nodded and backed away. He got back to work untangling the volleyball net. When Julia and Adrian disappeared from sight in the motorboat, he followed the stone path to the back of the house. He walked around Uncle Jim’s grave, calling out “Morning, sir!” A gentle breeze animated the beach towels and ladies’ cover-ups hanging on the clothesline, and they parted for him as he passed through. He stood before the rock tub full of beverages, the captain’s punch bowl. He put his hand into the icy water in search of something to drink. He sucked in air at the sight of the vodka bottle, a tall, Scandinavian beauty with its seal still unbroken. He ran his fingers along the bottle’s neck, then picked it up out of the water. By the time he reached for the plastic bottle of Canadian spring water, his fingers were blue and completely numb. It took everything he had to put the vodka back.
The sky was dull with a thin cover of clouds, but the breeze sweeping over the Thimble Islands was fragrant with the scent of charcoal and grilled meat of early lunches. As Julia and Adrian wove their way through the channel, each Thimble showed activity of some kind, whether it was children diving off rocks into the water or someone lounging with a newspaper on a porch. Only the nature preserves and bird sanctuaries were quiet.
“Wow. This is a great spot for a hotel and casino,” Adrian joked. “Why waste it on birds?”
Julia gasped. “Watch it. You’re in Connecticut, boy. We executed eleven people for practicing witchcraft. These days it’s for proposing land development. To us, it’s the same thing.”
Even though she had given her guests a tour of the islands already, she hit some of the points she may have failed to mention, such as the names of the aboriginal inhabitants, the Mattabesek, also known as the Quinnipiac. “Only twenty-five or so of the islands are inhabited,” Julia explained. “There are just under a hundred ‘homes’ of varying sizes.” She pointed to Roger’s Island, upon which stood a twenty-room English Tudor mansion, and then pointed behind them, at Cedar Island, which was nothing but a pile of rocks with a gazebo on top. Adrian asked how many islands there were in total. “It’s hard to say, because some of the islands are just rock piles that disappear at high tide. At some point, everyone just agreed on three-hundred-and-sixty-five islands, one for each day of the year.” As she spoke, she swept the landscape for signs of a blue kayak, and seeing none, continued weaving between the islands. Julia explained the history behind quirky names like Cut-in-Two Island, Mother-in-Law Island, and Dogfish Island. The infamous pirate Captain Kidd supposedly buried treasure on Money Island, she told him. She pointed to her favorite, Pot Rock Island, the site of the Thimble’s first hotel, built in 1846. “They had clambakes there every weekend. At the turn of the century, yachts from New York stopped there to picnic,” she said. “And locals from the city of Branford came too. You could take a midnight sail to the islands that had bands and dancing. This area became the Newport of Connecticut. The golden era was from 1890 to the early 1930s. The Great Depression put the kibosh on all the fun. The cottages emptied and the big yachts stopped coming. And then came the Great New England Hurricane, which crushed most of the houses and killed seven people here.” Suddenly, Julia stood and pointed to a Crayola-blue kayak on the shore of Outer Island. There was also a speedboat off shore. Julia raised the binoculars and saw that David was talking to a woman wearing a pink baseball hat while standing on a huge boulder. “She must be someone from the university,” Julia said. “Or from the forestry social circuit.”
“Forestry social circuit? There is such a thing?”
“It’s an oxymoron, I know.” She stood up and began waving, then shouted, “David!” It was too far for him to hear, he was just a small figure. They saw him and the woman turn and walk deeper into the heart of the island.
“Let’s leave him alone,” Adrian said. “He’s fine.”
Julia turned to look at Adrian. “He shou
ldn’t be standing on that rock. His balance is off.”
“He’s not alone,” Adrian said.
Julia took her cell phone out of the pocket of her shorts. She hit one key and listened. Adrian could hear the slap of water underneath the boat as he waited. “Dammit,” Julia said, “this is still part of the dead zone. How are we supposed to keep him safe?”
Adrian drew his eyebrows together. “Are you . . . jealous?”
Julia chuckled dryly. “First of all, I’d bet a million dollars he’s annoyed that she’s intruding upon his solitude. And second, if there’s any monkey business going on up there, I’m happy for him.”
“Then why are we spying on him?”
She pulled the bill of her Gap canvas bucket hat a bit lower, half-shielding her eyes. “I’m not spying,” she said, putting her hand on her chest. “I feel responsible—” She stopped. “The whole point of this gathering was for me to begin to detach.”
“And how’s that working out?”
She sighed. “So take over, dammit. Give me some proof that that tattoo means something.”
They sat on the boat in silence, letting the water rock them up and down, just listening to the distant sound of children splashing and laughing.
“What do you want me to do that I’m not already doing?” He leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees.
“You can start by giving up your DNA,” she said. “Please, Adrian. It’s the right thing to do at this point.”
He looked up at her. “You want my DNA?”
“Yeah, I want your DNA,” she echoed, realizing too late, how it sounded. He half-closed his eyes and rocked his head back and forth. “Well, well.” Then he threw his head back and laughed.
“You’re not going to rattle me into forgetting about it,” she said. She yanked the cord of the boat’s engine. “I’m asking you to return to me the trust that I have placed in you.” The motor trembled and roared to life. Not waiting for him to respond, she shouted, “Hey, how’d you like to go sailing?”
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