Finding Ashley

by Danielle Steel

  The third actress whose name she had gotten from Fiona was still working, very famous, currently making a film, and she had a daughter, also thirty-three years old. The fan website said she worked for an organization that provided legal and medical assistance for abused inner-city children, and had a degree as a social worker. Her husband was an entertainment lawyer with a well-known firm, and she had two children. There was no photograph of her, and the little Hattie read about her made her sound like a normal, well-educated woman with a good heart. The brief article about her said that she had graduated from the School of Social Work at Columbia University, where Melissa had gone to college. But neither the social worker nor the young actress were named Ashley, so they probably weren’t the right ones. But Hattie wanted to meet them anyway. They were the only leads she had.

  Hattie jotted down both phone numbers, still amazed by how easy it was to get the contact information for celebrities. They really had no privacy. She decided to call them in the morning. She wanted to try the actress first. She went back to her room then, lay down on the bed in her habit, fell asleep, and didn’t wake up until the sun was streaming into her room at nine o’clock the next day. She didn’t remember where she was for a minute, thought she was in Dublin, and then remembered that she was in L.A.

  Hattie went back to the coffee shop, in jeans and a T-shirt this time, had coffee and toast, and went back to her room to make the calls. She had thought about it that morning. She had told Mother Elizabeth that she wouldn’t try to meet the girls herself, but now that she was there, the temptation was just too great.

  The young actress’s name was Heather Jones. Hattie dialed her number, expecting to hear voicemail, or an assistant, and a young voice said hello. Hattie was shocked for a minute, and on the spur of the moment claimed to be a reporter wanting an interview.

  “From where?” The voice sounded blasé and not particularly interested, but she didn’t hang up, and Hattie thought frantically and said it was an Internet magazine for teens, and invented a name. She said it was new, and their readers were crazy about her. Heather Jones giggled then and sounded pleased. “Do you want to send me a Q and A?” she asked casually, and Hattie scrambled for what to say next.

  “I’d rather meet you in person. It won’t take long.” And much to her amazement, the girl trustingly agreed, and gave her an appointment at four o’clock that afternoon, at her home in Beverly Hills. It had been easier than Hattie had dreamed. She had no idea what to say to her, or how she’d bring up the subject of Melissa, but she was in it up to her neck now, and was determined to follow through.

  She tried to reach the second young woman then, whose number had been on the Internet. Her name wasn’t Ashley either. When she got voicemail, Hattie left a message.

  She took a cab to the house in Beverly Hills, and arrived on time, and felt as though she were living a movie. It reminded her of her brief stay in L.A. eighteen years before. Heather Jones’s famous rocker boyfriend was lounging at the pool, when a maid opened the door and led Hattie past the pool into the living room, where Heather was on the phone, waiting for her. She ended the call as soon as Hattie walked in, desperately afraid that they would ask her for credentials she didn’t have, but Heather Jones smiled at her and offered her a drink, which Hattie declined. The actress lay down on the couch, and invited Hattie to take a chair facing her.

  “You’ll be using existing art?” she asked her blithely. “We just did a PR shoot, my assistant can send you whatever shots you need.”

  “That’s perfect, thank you,” Hattie said, feeling dazed. It was all so Hollywood and everything she had run away from. She was a nun, not a reporter, but she reminded herself that she was doing it for her sister. She was trying to think of questions to ask her that teenagers might be interested in. She asked her about her early career, the movies she’d been in, which one meant the most to her, what her dreams were for the future, and what message she might want to send to her teenage fans. The actress loved talking about herself, and it wasn’t difficult to keep her engaged. Then finally, Hattie slipped a pertinent question into the mix at the end.

  “How do you think it affected you, knowing that you were adopted? Did you feel closer to your famous mother, or competitive with her?” The actress stared at her for a moment as though Hattie had spoken to her in Chinese.

  “Adopted? What are you talking about? I wasn’t adopted. Is that on the Internet?” She looked shocked. “I was born in Italy when my mother took six months off between movies to have me.” And then had obviously come home with a baby, claiming she’d given birth to it abroad, while taking a break in Italy where no one had seen her. She was one of the children who had never been told she was adopted. “I don’t know where you heard that. Everyone says I look like my mother, but we were always very different. As you know, my mother had a terrible substance abuse problem. It made me determined not to be like her. I wanted to have her talent, but not her problems. She died when I was seventeen. She OD’d in our swimming pool. I found her. I’ve never done drugs and I don’t drink because of it. And as you know, Billy Zee, my first husband, had a problem with heroin addiction, which is why I left him. In fact, I’d like to remind your readers never, ever to mess with drugs. I want you to put that in the article. That’s the most important thing I have to say.” She was so earnest that Hattie was touched. She wasn’t a very interesting subject, but she had a poignant naïve quality, despite her striking good looks and the skin-tight white jumpsuit she was wearing.

  “Of course, I’ll put that in, in bold type,” Hattie assured her. “I want to thank you for your time, and your message to our young readers,” Hattie said, trying to sound sincere, and feeling slightly guilty.

  “When will it run?” Heather asked, standing up.

  “I’m not sure. Probably in the next month.” Hattie felt like a supreme liar, and she had stared at Heather Jones throughout the interview. Her birth year was right, and even the month, but Hattie was almost sure that she was no relation to Melissa. She had probably been born at Saint Blaise’s, but to someone else, and never knew she’d been adopted, and never would, with no records now to prove it, and her adopted mother long gone.

  Her boyfriend strolled into the room then, put an arm around Heather, pulled her close, and kissed her, as a maid appeared to escort Hattie out. Heather waved with a sensual smile as Hattie made her exit. The maid called a taxi for her and it came within minutes as Hattie waited on the street outside Heather’s house. She felt as though she had gone over Niagara Falls in a barrel, but she didn’t think she’d found Ashley. Nothing about her felt right.

  She went back to her hotel and fell asleep again. She awoke to the phone ringing in her room. It was the other young woman she had called earlier, the social worker, who said she had just gotten the message when she got home from work. Hattie was half asleep, still jetlagged, and decided to try the interview ploy again, since it had worked so well the first time. This woman’s name was Michaela Foster, not Ashley. She was the daughter of the famous actress Marla Moore, whom even Hattie knew by name. She told her she was calling for an interview about her humanitarian work with inner-city children.

  “I think there’s some mistake,” Michaela Foster said politely. “I don’t do interviews, I’m a social worker. You were probably looking for my mother, Marla Moore. She’s working on a film right now. If you call her PR people at ICM, they’ll set it up when she gets back if she’s interested. She’s on location in Quebec.” She was about to hang up when Hattie stopped her.

  “No, we really wanted you. What you do is very interesting. I’m writing an article about the children of famous women and the careers they choose. Were you ever drawn to acting?” Hattie tried to keep her talking, and snag her interest.

  “Never. I know what hard work it is. And I’ve never wanted to be in the limelight. My mother and I are very different, and I’m adopted,” she said in
a cheerful, matter-of-fact tone, clearly comfortable with who she was, and well aware of her origins.

  “I’d really like to meet you,” Hattie persisted, feeling like a stalker.

  “If you’re interested in the work we do, you should really speak to my boss or my team, not just to me.” Michaela hesitated for a moment and then sounded startled and a little confused, but she went on. “Why don’t you come to my office tomorrow afternoon. It’s important to make the public aware of the needs of inner-city kids. There are people living well below the national poverty level right here in L.A.” She sounded intelligent and dedicated to her work. There was something about how direct she was that reminded Hattie of Melissa, but she told herself it was wishful thinking.

  “Thank you,” Hattie said, feeling breathless, and like a liar again. The young woman on the phone sounded lovely, like a real person. She knew she was adopted, which would make things easier for Hattie, if she decided to tell her about Melissa. She wanted to make a clean breast of it soon, and not string this woman along with a false interview, as she had Heather, who had lapped it up, and wasn’t nearly as bright. Heather’s ego was in evidence at all times.

  Hattie lay awake all night, thinking about what she would say, and how to do it. By morning, she was exhausted, and by that afternoon, she was a nervous wreck. She went to the address Michaela Foster had given her. Her office was in a bright modern building in a renovated area that had been a slum only a few years before, but was being gentrified. Hattie gave her name to a young receptionist, and a few minutes later Michaela came out to greet her. She had a warm, gentle smile, and Hattie was shocked for a minute. Michaela looked strikingly like Hattie and Melissa’s mother, although in a much friendlier, more upbeat, younger version. She exuded charm and humility and was clearly very intelligent, with natural beauty. Hattie sat staring at her, and didn’t know what to say.

  “I’ve asked my team to be available, if you’d like to chat with them,” she said easily, making Hattie feel welcome, and guilty for her lies to get to her. And the promise to Mother Elizabeth she was about to break. Hattie wanted to seize the opportunity she had while she was there.

  “That won’t be necessary,” Hattie said in a low voice. “Mrs. Foster, Michaela, I have a story to tell you. It may sound crazy, but it isn’t. If you’re who I hope you are, I’ve been looking for you, and my sister has been searching for you for years. We thought your name was Ashley,” Hattie said, feeling foolish, and Michaela Foster looked surprised.

  “That’s my middle name. My mother wanted to name me Ashley, but my father preferred Michaela, so they compromised, and Ashley is my middle name. Where have you been looking for me, and why?” She looked puzzled.

  “Mainly in Ireland. I came from there two days ago.”

  “I was born in Ireland,” she said, looking intrigued. “My parents adopted me there, and brought me home. I think foreign adoptions were easier then. It’s more complicated today.”

  Hattie jumped in without waiting any longer. “My sister, Melissa, gave birth to a baby girl there, she was unwed and just sixteen. My parents sent her to Ireland to spend the pregnancy in a convent, and give the baby up, which she did. She always regretted it. Sixteen years later, she married and had a son. He died of a brain tumor at ten, six years ago. They divorced, and she’s alone now. Her husband knew about the baby she had at sixteen. She reached out to the convent to find out where the baby was, who had adopted her, and where she grew up, in the hope of meeting her one day. The nuns told her that all the records had been burned and destroyed, and there was no way to trace any of the babies, birth mothers, or adopting parents.”

  Michaela was staring at Hattie too, as though she’d seen a ghost. “I called them too. Saint Blaise’s. My mother was always very open with me about the fact that I was adopted. I always knew, she never hid it from me. She and my father were older parents. She was forty, and he was sixty-two when I was born. He died when I was three. He was a famous producer and I never knew him. I don’t remember him at all. My mother is a wonderful person, an honest, incredibly talented woman. She was always very candid about the fact that she realized that the adoption had been a mistake. She thought she’d be more maternal, but she wasn’t. And she felt she was too old for motherhood by the time they got me. And then my father died suddenly. She has a huge career and she’s busy. Even now, at seventy-three, she makes about two movies a year, more if she can. The adoption was my father’s idea, and she blames herself for not being around more when I was young. She says she’s not maternal, but she’s better at it than she gives herself credit for. I love her very much and she loves me. She’s been a wonderful mother.

  “I’ve wanted to know more about my birth mother from the time I was in my teens. My mother encouraged me to find out. She knew that my birth mother was American, and from a good family in New York. But that was all she knew. When I was eighteen, I called Saint Blaise’s, and they told me about all the records being destroyed. There was nothing I could do after that, so I gave up, and figured I’d never know who she was or anything about her.”

  “My sister decided the same thing. She admitted to me recently that giving you up was the worst thing she ever did, and in some ways it ruined her life. Her parents forced her to do it, and she never forgave them for it. I think she called the convent a couple of times, and got the same answer. It was a dead end. I want to help her, so I went there myself a few days ago. It’s an abysmal place. The worst part of it is that they destroyed the records intentionally, and thought they were doing the right thing, to protect everyone’s privacy, and themselves.

  “The only reason I got your name is because I came across a woman who was a nun and a midwife there. She left the Church since then, but she remembered that your mother adopted a baby the year that my sister’s baby was born. It was a wild long shot, but I decided to come here to try and find you, and hope we got lucky. It’s a miracle if you’re really my niece. My sister doesn’t know I’m here, she doesn’t know I went to Dublin to go to Saint Blaise’s in person. She told me details recently that she’d never told me before, and I realized that the greatest gift I could give her was to find her daughter. You, hopefully. So here I am. You look remarkably like my mother, and I hope you’re the baby we’ve been looking for.” There were tears in Hattie’s eyes when she said it, and in Michaela’s as she listened to the story. It didn’t come as a shock to her, it came as a relief, and she suddenly had the feeling that she was complete. “And by the way,” Hattie added with a wry grin, “as a further surprise, I’m not a reporter, I’m a nun.”

  “You’re a nun?” Michaela looked shocked at first and then she laughed. “You don’t look like a nun, or act like one.”

  “But I am. I left my habit at the hotel. My order doesn’t require me to wear it in daily life. And I couldn’t pose as a journalist, and show up in the habit.”

  “I guess not.” Michaela grinned.

  “Would you be willing to take a DNA test?” Hattie asked her and she nodded, thinking.

  “My mother is very open-minded and always encouraged me to find my birth mother if I wanted to. But I don’t want to tell her about this though until we’re sure. I think in some way, it will be a shock to her if what she calls my ‘real’ mother turns up. She’s my real mother and has been all my life. But there’s room in my life for the woman who gave birth to me. I can only imagine the trauma it must have been for a sixteen-year-old girl to have a baby and give it up.”

  “I don’t think she ever recovered from it. There’s a sharp side to her. And losing her son nearly finished her off.”

  “Where does she live? In New York?” Hattie had said that she lived in New York, so Michaela thought her birth mother might too. “She lives in the Berkshires, in Massachusetts. She has become a recluse since she moved there four years ago, two years after her son’s death. And she’s divorced.”

  “What
does she do?”

  “She’s a very talented writer, she wrote under the name Melissa Stevens. She gave it up when her son got sick, and hasn’t written since, and says she won’t.”

  Michaela looked shocked again. “I’ve read her books. They’re brilliant, but very dark and depressing.”

  “She’s been through a lot. I’m not going to tell her until we’re sure. I can help provide a sample for the DNA test, if that’s helpful. I think we should keep it between us, until we know. I don’t want to get her hopes up and disappoint her.”

  “I want to meet her,” Michaela said, looking earnestly at Hattie, “and for my kids to meet her. I gave up on finding her years ago. It seemed hopeless after they told me about the fire. Why did they want to hide the records? Just to protect everyone’s privacy? My mother never made a secret of adopting me.”

  “Others did.” Hattie thought of Heather Jones. She took a deep breath then. “The Church made a lot of money on the adoptions, which they don’t want people to know. They had a booming business with it for a long time. The girls who had their babies there came from families who could afford to send them away, and all of the adopting parents were rich and could pay anything for the babies they adopted. There are plenty of convents who took care of poor girls having babies out of wedlock. But there were a handful of convents in Ireland that turned it into a high-priced, very lucrative business, which some people frown on. It was for the benefit of the Church. My sister and parents, and your adoptive parents, were part of it, and others like them. The nuns were particularly proud of the movie stars who came to them for babies, which is how I learned about your mother, and about you. If she wasn’t a movie star, the ex-nun I talked to wouldn’t have remembered her and I would never have found you, so I guess we’re both lucky. Do you think she’ll be upset?”