Spirit Level

by Sarah N. Harvey

  “Why not?” she asks. “Are you ashamed of me or something?”

  “Ashamed? Of course not. I just haven’t told her about looking for my sibs. I was planning on telling her.”

  “When?”

  I shrug. “Soon, I guess.”

  “You always this secretive?” Lucy licks her finger and picks up muffin crumbs from her plate.

  I shrug again. “Not really. I’ve never really had anything to be secretive about. Mom’s big on communication, as long as she’s not the one doing it. She’s always saying, You can tell me anything. Usually I do. Just not this time.”

  “Angela’s like that too, but Nori says that sometimes I overshare. Do you think that’s true?”

  I think about some of the other stuff Lucy has told me. For example, Nori grew up in San Diego and married her high school sweetheart, a guy named Howard, who developed a serious Internet porn addiction. She divorced him and ended up living on a collective farm in northern California, where she met Angela. They fell in love and moved to Seattle, where Angela trained to be a midwife and Nori became a garden designer. Angela actually delivered Lucy, at home, while Adam watched. Adam and Angela don’t get along, which is why he moved away to go to college, where he is studying business. Maybe he never got over the trauma of watching his little sister’s birth.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I mean, we just met. It’s hard to know what to say, what to leave out.”

  She frowns again. “Why is that so hard? We’re sisters. We should tell each other everything, right?”

  She sounds so much like a bossy ten-year-old that I have to laugh. After all, what do I know about being a sister? Maybe she’s right. It’s just that my “everything” is so much duller than hers.

  “Maybe not everything,” I say.

  “But you will tell your mom?”

  “Yeah. Soon.”

  I get up to grab some hot water for my tea, and when I come back to the table, she’s having an intense FaceTime conversation with someone.

  “She’s right here,” Lucy says to whoever’s on the phone. “Hang on a sec.” She holds the phone out to me. “It’s Ben. In Australia. Wanna say hi?”

  I don’t see how I can say no, although I want to. I hate having things sprung on me—Verna calls it being “wrong-footed”—but Lucy doesn’t know that yet. I take the phone and smile at it and say, “Hi, Ben.” Ben smiles back. He doesn’t look at all like me or Lucy. He’s got short blond hair and bright blue eyes. He looks like a surf bum.

  “Hi, Harriet.” He yawns, and I can almost see his tonsils. He has no fillings. Neither do I. Good genes, I guess. “Nice to meet you.”

  “What time is it there?” I ask.

  “Early. Lucy never gets the time difference right.”

  “I do so,” Lucy yelps. “You’re just lazy. It’s morning there.”

  “And I worked until two,” he says.

  “Oops!” Lucy giggles. “Sorry, Ben.”

  “What do you do?” I ask.

  “Bartender. While I’m in school.” Ben yawns again. “Trying to keep the debt load down.”

  “He’s gonna be a famous architect,” Lucy says.

  “Cool,” I say. My conversational skills, such as they are, seem to have vanished. He must think I’m an idiot. “Look, I should run,” I say. “Late for work myself. Bye, Ben.” I hand the phone to Lucy, but not before I see the look of surprise on Ben’s face. I’m disappointing everyone today. Lucy says goodbye to Ben and puts her phone away.

  “That was rude, Harry,” she says. “Super rude. Ben’s a good guy. And he’s your brother. I’m going to class.” She grabs her messenger bag and flounces out of the café. Really, that’s the only word for it. I consider going after her, but I don’t have the energy. So far, I’m not very good at the sister thing.

  I don’t hear from Lucy for a few days, and I’m about to text her and apologize when I get an email from another half-sister.

  My name is Meredith Leatherby, and I found you on DSR. I guess we’re sisters. Half-sisters. I’m from Montana originally. Moved to Seattle a while ago. Since our donor used a Seattle facility, I was hoping to find some of my siblings here. Are you available for coffee sometime?

  No “Dear Harriet,” no “Cheers.” Not even a “Yours truly.” It’s not the warmest email I’ve ever received, and I wonder if she’s found Lucy through DSR too. Instead of writing back to Meredith, I pick up my phone and text Lucy.

  Sorry I was rude to Ben. I’d like to call him to apologize. I just got an email from a girl called Meredith. Another sister. She wants to meet. You up for that? If so, when? I miss you.

  I send the text before I can delete the last sentence, then reread Meredith’s email. It still sounds cold. Or maybe she’s just really reserved. Compared to Lucy, everyone seems reserved. And dull. Including me.

  I start working on another transcript for Mom while I wait to hear from Lucy. Unlike most of the girls Mom interviews, Sonia comes from a middle-class family that she calls totally white bread. My parents are rich and boring as fuck. My dad’s a lawyer, my mom’s a doctor. How cliché is that? She is their only child, raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan; she first ran away when she was thirteen. Why? She wasn’t abused—in fact, she was well loved. She admits that. But she was bored. Or, as she puts it, supremely, mind-numbingly, soul-destroyingly bored. Every time she got caught, she’d wait a while and then run again. Over and over and over. Thousands of dollars wasted on therapists, none of whom believed that she was simply bored out of her mind, even though she never stopped telling them. Special schools, acting classes, an expensive guitar, a trip to Paris. None of it interested her. The family cat (Pushkin) bored her. Food (especially pasta, for some reason) bored her. Music bored her. Her friends bored her. School really bored her. When her parents told her they would no longer search for her if she ran again—some tough-love bullshit, she calls it—she left them a note that said, It’s not your fault and took off. Now she lives in Seattle, couch surfing and panhandling and meeting people she calls fascinatingly weird. She’s been beaten up a couple of times (all that orthodontic work shot to shit), and she has a chronic cough that she treats with stolen cough syrup. But she’s not bored. Not at all. She calls home (collect) on Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, her birthday and Christmas. I’m not trying to hurt them, she says. I just don’t want their life. Seems like a pretty extreme way to deal with boredom, but then, I’m not a risk taker. I can’t imagine running away from Mom and Verna. It makes me sick just to think about it. Sonia sounds really selfish. Maybe there’s something she’s not telling Mom, something horrific that would explain her behavior, but all I can do is transcribe what I hear.

  I close Sonia’s file and reread Meredith’s email. Maybe brusque is the right word for it, as if she has no emotional stake in seeing me. My phone pings—Lucy’s text says, I got an email from her too. So yeah, let’s go together. Not our café though. Downtown? I miss you too, sis.

  Our café. I smile and text back: Monday @ Starbucks in PP Mkt? 2 pm. As an afterthought, I add, She doesn’t sound very friendly.

  Maybe she’s shy. But I’m curious. You?

  Curious enough to meet her. I’ll email her and get back to you.

  I shoot Meredith an email and get a three-word response: See you then.

  The rest of the week is predictable: hair salon and dog walking in the mornings, transcribing in the afternoons, dinner with Mom, watching movies or reading in the evenings, hanging out with the ladies on Sunday. This week’s playlist: old musicals. We did a rousing chorus of “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Outta My Hair,” which seemed deeply appropriate.

  Shanti is there for a shampoo, and I ask her about Brad, the guy Annabeth thinks might be a pimp.

  She shakes her head. “Not someone I know,” she says, �
��but I’ll ask around. In the meantime, tell her to be careful. Lots of weirdos out there. And lots of them look perfectly normal.”

  I nod as if I know what she’s talking about.

  Ben has accepted my emailed apology—his exact words were No worries, mate, and we’re going to Skype soon, when we can figure out a good time. One night when Mom and I are sitting on the couch—Mom’s reading and I’m watching old episodes of Veronica Mars on my computer—my phone pings. When I pick it up and read a text from Lucy that makes me laugh, Mom asks if I’m back in touch with Byron.

  I shake my head. “Nope,” I say.

  She looks up from the gigantic tome she’s reading and raises an eyebrow at me. “It’s not like you to be so mysterious, Harry.”

  “Just a friend,” I mumble, pulling my feet off her lap and standing up.

  She nods and goes back to her book. In a way, I wish she would pry a bit, worm it out of me. Make me talk. At this point, I’m not even sure why I’m keeping it a secret. Maybe I’ll tell her after I meet Meredith.

  I don’t know why I suggested the Pike Place Starbucks. It’s crowded and noisy and full of tourists. I find Lucy at a table in a corner, and she asks how we’re going to recognize Meredith. “No idea,” I say. “Her emails weren’t exactly chatty. I told her to look for a tiny Asian girl with long hair and a tall girl wearing a red Pearl Jam T-shirt.”

  Lucy and I sit and watch the crowd. Two o’clock comes and goes, and I’m beginning to think we’ve been stood up when a girl and a guy come in and start looking around instead of ordering coffee. The girl, who is shorter than me but not as short as Lucy, is very pale and thin. She’s wearing a black-and-white-striped boat-neck top with black capris and black ballet flats. Très chic. A small black leather pack is slung over one shoulder. Everything about her is sharp: her nose, her chin, the bones of her wrists, her shoulder blades. Her hair is black and aggressively short, shorter than a pixie cut. Her eyebrows are heavy—Audrey Hepburn heavy, not unibrow heavy.

  The guy she’s with is about my height and slim, almost skinny, with a haircut like hers—as if they went to a salon and had their heads shaved at the same time, and now it’s growing back. His hair is blond and curly, though, which makes it look as if he has a halo.

  They spot us, and I wave as they walk over to our table. I stand up and say, “Meredith?”

  She nods and smiles with her lips closed, as if she’s afraid she has poppy seeds stuck between her teeth. “I’m so pleased to meet you,” she says. “Hope you don’t mind—I brought my friend, Alex.”

  “Hi, Alex,” Lucy and I chorus. Alex shakes our hands. His palm is cool and dry, his grip firm. He’s wearing a wrinkled pale-blue button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, gray plaid shorts and checkered Vans. No socks.

  Meredith turns to him and says, “I’d love an iced soy chai tea latte.”

  “Coming right up,” Alex says. “You guys good?” he asks Lucy and me. When he smiles, I can see that his front teeth are crooked. Not snaggletooth crooked but noticeable.

  Lucy and I nod and hold up our drinks. Meredith grabs a chair, pulls it over to our table and sits down. After she stares at us for a few moments, she says, “You’d never know, would you? That we were related.”

  “It’s the Japanese thing,” Lucy says. “But Harry looks a lot like my brother Adam. Same donor, different moms.”

  Meredith’s gaze darts back and forth between Lucy and me. Her eyes are a very pale blue—like acid-washed denim. “So your moms are gay?”

  “Mine are,” Lucy says.

  “Mine’s not,” I say. “She’s a single mom by choice. What about yours?”

  “Standard-issue suburban parents. I don’t talk to them anymore.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say.

  “Don’t be,” Meredith replies. “I’m here now, meeting my sisters. That’s what’s important.” She smiles. Her lips are thin, and it looks as if she never lost her baby teeth or, if she did, her adult teeth came in very small. I can understand if she doesn’t smile a lot.

  Alex comes back to the table with Meredith’s drink and a lemonade for himself. He sits down between me and Meredith, who thanks him for the drink and gives him a kiss on the cheek.

  “So, how many sibs have you found so far?” she asks. “Other than Adam.”

  “One more that I know of,” Lucy says. “Ben, in Australia. He’s awesome.”

  “And some Mormon guy—James something-or-other,” I add.

  “You didn’t tell me about him.” Lucy frowns at me.

  “Mormons are so strange,” Meredith says. “All those wives.”

  I stop myself before I launch into Mom’s not all Mormons are polygamists speech. “He seems nice enough,” I say instead, even though I never replied to his email and he hasn’t tried to contact me again. For some reason, I feel like defending him. “Anyway, he lives in Florida somewhere. He just came back from Argentina.”

  “Probably trying to convert the heathen,” Meredith says with a breathy laugh.

  Alex says, “I lived next door to a Mormon family when I was little. Super nice people. Generous, kind. I spent a lot of time at their house.”

  A look passes between Alex and Meredith that I can’t quite decipher. I think maybe he’s telling her to back off about Mormons, but I could be wrong.

  “Was that in Montana?” Lucy asks.

  Alex shakes his head. “Texas. Montana came later, when I was six. That’s where I met Meredith—in first grade.”

  “He puked Cream of Wheat all over the teacher’s shoes on the first day of class. Miss Oakley, remember?”

  Alex grimaces. “You never let me forget. I was so nervous. New city. New school. Meredith rescued me. Took me to the nurse’s office. We’ve been friends ever since.”

  “Best friends,” Meredith says, as if one of us has challenged her.

  “So how’d you end up in Seattle?” I ask.

  “We both needed to get out of Missoula, and I wanted to find my dad, so we headed west and ended up here.”

  “Wasn’t your dad in Missoula?” Lucy says.

  “I’m talking about my real dad. You know, our father. I’m eighteen now. I can look for him legally. Don’t you want to meet him?”

  I shake my head. So does Lucy.

  “You sure?” Meredith says. “I mean, he’s our father.” Her eyebrows draw together.

  “No he isn’t,” Lucy says. “He’s our donor. There’s a difference.”

  Meredith shrugs. “Suit yourself. But I’m sure he’s around here somewhere. I’ve even got a picture. Wanna see it?” She starts to reach into her bag, and I put my hand on her arm to stop her. She flinches as if I have hurt her, which I’m sure I haven’t.

  “I’m sorry, Meredith,” I say as she rubs her arm. “I’m just not ready.”

  “Me either,” Lucy says. “I don’t think my moms ever saw a picture. Did yours?” she asks me.

  “I don’t think so,” I say. “If she did, she hasn’t shown me. Seeing a picture changes things, don’t you think? Makes it so much more personal, when really, it wasn’t personal at all.”

  “I have to disagree,” Meredith says. “It’s deeply personal. When did you guys find out you were donor kids?”

  “I don’t remember,” I say. “I’ve always known. So I must have been really little.”

  “Angela and Nori told me they started talking about my donor the minute I was born,” Lucy adds. “Not that I understood until I was older, but it was never, like, announced. It was just part of who I was.”

  “I didn’t find out until I was twelve,” Meredith says. “I grew up believing a lie.”

  “Whoa,” Lucy says. “That’s rough.”

  “But you loved your dad—the man wh
o raised you—didn’t you?” I ask.

  Meredith glares at me. “That’s not the point. He betrayed me. My mom betrayed me. When they told me, all I could think about was finding my real dad. And now I can. I was hoping you’d want to share my journey. It would mean so much to me. To do this with my sisters.”

  Tears form in her pale eyes and hang on her thick black lashes. She grabs Lucy’s hand in both of hers as a single tear makes its way down one pale cheek. “I feel like we’ve known each other forever.” She turns to me. “And you too, Harry.”

  I don’t know what to say. I don’t feel that way at all. She’s a stranger. A stranger with some of my DNA.

  “I’m sorry,” Lucy says. “It’s just such a new idea. But maybe you’re right. Can I think about it? Talk to my moms?”

  “Of course,” Meredith says, letting go of Lucy’s hand. “It’s an important decision. I’ve been thinking about it for a couple of years. I guess I should give you more than a couple of minutes to decide!” She laughs. “Alex says I’m like a steamroller once I get going, don’t you, sweetie?” She reaches over and pats his cheek. Am I imagining it, or does he look a bit uncomfortable?

  “How long have you been in Seattle?” I ask. It’s a lame segue, I know, but I don’t want to talk any more about finding our donor.

  “Almost a year,” Alex says. “You?”

  “Born and raised. Lucy too.”

  “Lucky you,” he says. “Noticeably short on rednecks out here. Compared to Texas and Montana. You don’t see a lot of pickup trucks with gun racks outside the Whole Foods market.”

  “More like Smart cars with Things Go Better With Kale bumper stickers,” I say.

  Lucy giggles and Alex smiles—a wide, genuine, eye-crinkling smile—and I notice that his eyes are a very deep, dark blue, the color of the lapis lazuli stone in my favorite ring.

  “Funny,” he says to me, and I’m sure I blush.

  “We should go, Alex.” Meredith gets up from the table. “I need to get to work.”