The Promise Girls

by Marie Bostwick

  “That’s about the time Joanie and I met and became friends, good friends,” he said, smiling at her. “I came over here on Saturdays to fix up her creaky old house, and she fed me really great meals. We’d talk for hours about all kinds of things. Pretty soon, this house started to feel like home to me. For a guy who had been rejected by his family, that was huge.

  “When I was twenty-two, my mom died of a cerebral aneurysm. She was only forty-five. Nobody expected it. My little brother, Noah, called and told me what happened. I drove to Spokane, but Dad wouldn’t let me in the house, and when I tried to go to the funeral, he blocked the door of the church,” Asher said, his voice becoming hoarse as he choked out the words. “He wouldn’t even let me say good-bye.”

  Meg, her eyes brimming with tears, reached out her hand and stroked her husband’s arm. Asher took a moment to compose himself, then went on with his story.

  “I drove back to Seattle and then straight to the liquor store. I’d never done much drinking, but that night I drank like a frat boy on spring break. I showed up on Joanie’s doorstep three sheets to the wind and carrying a case of beer. She let me in, let me drink, let me cry. I wanted to drive myself home, but Joanie took my keys and put me to bed in the guest room. But when she tried to leave, I started sobbing. Joanie sat down on the edge of the bed to comfort me and I . . . I just didn’t let go.”

  Asher put one elbow on the table and his forehead in his hand, his face pained, as if he couldn’t bring himself to look them in the eye, especially Walt, who had been listening intently, connecting the dots, filling in the details Asher was too ashamed to speak of.

  “So you’re my dad,” Walt said, his tone falling somewhere between a statement and a question, as if he understood intellectually, but hadn’t quite convinced himself to accept it. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Walt looked to his mother.

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “I should have, a long time ago. But, back then, I thought it would be better for everyone if I kept it a secret.”

  “Did you love him?”

  “I did,” Joanie said. “But the way you love a friend. When Asher said that he wouldn’t let go of me, that’s true. But I didn’t push him away either. There was nothing passionate about it, not in the romantic sense. My friend was suffering, in agony. I comforted him. I’m not saying it was right because it wasn’t. But that’s the way it was.

  “Asher had so much to drink. Until I talked to him, he didn’t realize how far things had gone. He remembered me helping him walk to the guest room, but nothing after that. I didn’t say anything the next day. I thought it would be awkward for both of us and, anyway, I was excited because Meg called that morning and said she was moving to Seattle.

  “A week later, Asher and Meg met for the first time.” Joanie flashed a smile in her sister and brother in-law’s direction. “And sparks flew. It was obvious where they were headed and I was thrilled. They were young, but I couldn’t have wished anyone better for my sister. I knew Asher was a good man who would do anything he could to make her happy. Which was a lot more than you could say about the guys I’d been dating.

  “A couple of weeks before the wedding, I realized I was pregnant with Asher’s baby. I didn’t know what to do and there was no one I could talk to, especially not Meg or Asher. The counselor I saw told me to think about having an abortion and I did. For about five seconds, probably less. When Meg and Asher got back from their honeymoon I told them I was pregnant and that one of the guys I’d been dating was the father. Since Asher didn’t remember what happened when he came home from Spokane, they had no reason not to believe me.

  “When I saw that counselor, you were barely the size of a walnut,” Joanie said, tilting her head and addressing her son with a tender smile. “But you were already my baby. And I wanted you. I’ve made so many mistakes and bad decisions—but having you wasn’t one of them. Being your mom is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

  Walt’s forehead creased as he tried to digest all that he’d just heard.

  “Wow.”

  “I know,” Joanie said. “It’s a lot to absorb. I’m sure you’re going to have a lot of questions after it all sinks in and that’s okay. You can ask me anything you want.”

  “Or me,” Asher added. “Anytime you want to talk, I’m here for you, buddy.”

  “I know,” Walt said. “You always have been, for as long as I can remember. When I was little and you’d take me and Trina to play in the park, or out for ice cream, I’d pretend you were my dad. And, in a way, this all kind of makes sense because that’s how I always thought of you.

  “But in another way . . . Wow,” he repeated, in a slightly dazed voice, looking from Joanie to Asher. “This is just really weird. You’re my mother. And you’re my father.”

  “And you’re my brother?” Trina asked, sounding nearly as stunned as Walt and looking at him with an expression that fell midway between horror and disbelief.

  Walt pivoted his head sharply to the right, gazing at Trina with an almost identical expression. The two former cousins regarded each other for a long, long moment and then, at exactly the same time, burst into laughter, breaking the tension for everyone.

  “It is so weird,” Trina said emphatically, wrinkling her nose, calmer but still laughing.

  “Yeah,” Walt confirmed, “I mean, sure, I finally have a father and, lucky for me he’s a great guy. But, still... look at the downside. It wasn’t bad enough to be taking my cousin to the prom, now I’m taking my sister. How sad is that?”

  Walt grinned and Trina bopped him on the shoulder with her fist. “Jerk.”

  Joanie felt her shoulders unknot, relieved of the burden of secrecy she had carried for so long, grateful that revealing the truth had not been as awful as she had feared and that she hadn’t had to do it alone. She looked across the table at her brother-in-law and sister, mouthed the words, “Thank you,” and received looks of love and absolution in return.

  “Man!” Avery exclaimed. “And here I thought I was going to win the prize for most dramatic story of the weekend, rescuing a drowning child. But, no. Here I finally do something cool and Joanie has to come along and upstage me. Thanks a lot,” she said to her sister in a teasingly sarcastic tone. “I guess you win.”

  Minerva, the only member of the family who wasn’t laughing by this time, took a sip from her water glass and then set it down on the table.

  “Just a minute, Avery. Before we hand out any prizes and as long as we’re making confessions, there’s something I have to say. To all of you.”

  Chapter 44

  Minerva pushed her chair back from the dining table and rose to her feet. As if she were making a speech, Joanie thought to herself.

  As it turned out, she was.

  “This is a complicated story and not an easy one to tell, so I’m going to ask you not to interrupt me or ask any questions until I’m finished.

  “I told the three of you,” she said, looking at her daughters, “and the world, that you were ‘test tube babies,’ as they used to be called. I said that I had you all by choice, choosing three sperm donors who were highly accomplished in their respective fields—music, art, and literature—because I wanted my daughters to lead remarkable lives, and fulfill the artistic promise that was your birthright.

  “I did have you all by choice. Your births were all wanted, at least by me, and planned. And I did want you to lead remarkable lives. But everything else was a lie.

  “You were conceived in the usual way and you all had the same father: Karl Gregory Altendorf.”

  Meg and Asher exchanged a look as Minerva made the announcement and Asher put his arm around her shoulders. Avery’s face was frozen into an expression that was almost comical, as if she was sure this all had to be a joke and was just waiting for the punchline. Joanie was shocked, too, partly because that name—Karl Gregory Altendorf—sounded so familiar. She’d heard of this man, she was certain. But when and why? The answer
was on the tip of her tongue, but Minerva said it first.

  “He was the conductor of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. He was also married and a father of five. And from the time I was sixteen until he died, a year after Avery was born, I was his mistress.”

  From the moment Minerva rose to her feet and began to speak, her voice had been calm, measured, her demeanor and expression resolute, almost haughty, as if she had decided beforehand that her listeners would despise her and was daring them to do it. Now Joanie could see doubt in her eyes, a crack in that steadfast veneer.

  Minerva reached for her water glass and took a drink. Her hands were shaking.

  “I’m sure you want to know the what, why, and how of all this. There’s much more to it than I can tell in one night, so I’ll just try to give you the highlights,” she said wryly.

  “I was born and raised in a small town in south Georgia. My mother was unmarried and I was a bastard. And everyone in town knew it.

  “Momma was a waitress, but we couldn’t survive on what she made in tips alone, so she supplemented her income with gifts from gentlemen callers, as she referred to them. None of them were gentlemen. All of them were married. Momma had her pride, though. She didn’t go in for one-night stands and she wouldn’t accept money. That would have been low class,” Minerva said with a mirthless little laugh.

  “She took on lovers one at a time, sometimes for a few weeks, sometimes for a few months, until they tired of her. They showed their devotion with tangible goods—clothes, food, sometimes even with gas for our car. One man, a grocer from another county, gave her an eighteen-pound Virginia ham. We lived on it for weeks. I’ve never eaten ham since,” she said, and took another sip of water, as if to wash the taste from her mouth.

  “My mother never stood a chance in that town, nobody did. I had more to work with than Momma—more brains, more ambition. I was prettier too. When she died, I got out of there.

  “Momma said that when the doctor slapped my behind I opened my mouth and started wailing an aria. That was a funny thing about Momma. She loved opera. One of her first gentlemen callers gave her a record player. For some God-knows-what reason, Momma got herself a record of Maria Callas singing Puccini.

  “I swear,” Minerva said with a nostalgic smile, unconsciously slipping into the accent of her youth, “she just about wore through the vinyl playing that thing. I grew up listening to it and singing along. I had a good voice. Untrained, but good. Momma thought music might be my ticket to a better life. So did I.

  “Some of the bigger towns—Columbus and Albany—had concert associations. Whenever she could afford it, Momma and I would go to the classical concerts. That’s how we met Karl. He was only an associate conductor at the symphony back then and would make extra money by guest conducting at regional concerts throughout the South. The first time we saw him, as luck would have it, he was conducting a small-scale production of La Bohème. Of course, we knew the music. Momma sat listening with tears rolling down her face the whole time. When it was over she grabbed my hand, dragged me down two flights of stairs from the upper balcony, and all but ambushed poor Karl. He was awfully sweet about it. After everyone left he played the piano accompaniment while I sang for him. ‘O Mio Babbino Caro.’ I was nervous and not in the best voice, plus I was only thirteen. But he was encouraging, said I had promise, told me to work hard in school and keep singing. I’m sure he was just being kind, but Momma took his words to mean I had a great future in music. And I have to say, at the time, I thought so too.

  “Momma and I saw him conduct three more times after that. I didn’t sing for him again, but he remembered us and was always kind, asking how my studies were coming along. It was all very innocent. He was a sort of a grandfatherly figure to me.

  “When Momma died of heart failure, I was put into a foster home and it was terrible, terrible. Of all the things that have happened to me, the worst was seeing the three of you taken from me and put in the same situation. I never wanted that for you.”

  Minerva’s placid, almost flat expression turned stormy. Joanie felt that familiar pang of guilt that always came when she thought about their family being torn apart and how she had been the catalyst for all of it.

  Had it been her turn to speak, Joanie would have echoed her mother’s words. But if there was anything she had learned in the last weeks, it was that the past was indelible. No amount of wishful thinking could change it. A lifetime of guilt and regret would not alter it in the least degree. You could, possibly, confess it, learn from it, and thereby alter the future, make it better for everyone. This was her hope. Perhaps it was Minerva’s as well.

  “There was to be another concert that summer with Karl as conductor,” Minerva continued. “I slipped out the bedroom window of my foster home and caught a Greyhound bus to Columbus. At the end of the concert, when Karl greeted me and asked where my mother was, I started to sob. He took me backstage, comforted me, said he’d drive me home. Before we got into the car, I threw my arms around him and kissed him. He kissed me back.

  “That’s how it began. I was sixteen. He was nearly sixty.

  “He set me up in an apartment in midtown Atlanta so he could see me before or after rehearsals. He wouldn’t let me go to concerts in case someone should find out about us—that was always his great fear. He discouraged me from making friends or working too. He did arrange for me to take voice lessons with Cornelia Armstedt, but she was old and very ill so that didn’t last long. It was a very lonely life and at times I was very depressed, thinking that I had turned out exactly like Momma, a thing I had sworn would never happen. I could have left anytime, but I didn’t. I was in love with him.

  “Karl was a remarkable man. Remarkable,” she said again, her voice dropping to a reverent hush. “He should have been conducting in New York or London, not Atlanta. But it was a matter of timing. And politics. The musical world is far more political than people realize. But I adored Karl. I would have done anything for him.

  “Of course, I wanted him to marry me and he said he would after the last of his children were grown. He was deeply devoted to his children. That was part of the reason I started pressuring him to give me a baby. Karl was resistant at first, but eventually warmed up to the idea. I’m not sure that would have been the case had he known that only two months after Joanie was born, he would be promoted to Music Director and Principal Conductor of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra.

  “The experience of going from associate conductor to the principal is akin to a one-term congressman from a small state suddenly being appointed president. Karl was on the fringes before, but overnight he became the center of everything. Everyone knew him. He was interviewed in the press, recognized on the street. It should have been a wonderful time in his life, but it wasn’t. He was more afraid than ever that someone would find out about me, about us,” she said, looking to Joanie, “and that it would all be taken away from him.

  “In addition to more money and more prestige, his new position gave him friends in high places, men of discretion who had the power to do all kinds of things, alter birth certificates, erase identities, create new ones. I was moved across the country and told to pick a new name. For my first name I chose Minerva, goddess of wisdom and the arts. For the last, Promise, because that’s what Karl said he saw in me when we first met and because I hoped he would see the same thing in you,” she said, looking at Joanie, then at the other girls. “In all of you.

  “I liked Los Angeles. I wasn’t able to see Karl as frequently, but for the first time in years, I had a purpose, a happiness that wasn’t centered on Karl, a baby to love, then two. Until Joanie was about three and a half and started to call him Papa, he would come to the house. After that, he thought it was too risky, so we met in hotels.

  “He was very involved in your education. Avery, when you were born, he sent an entire library worth of storybooks. Meg, when you took my lipsticks and drew on the wall, I wanted to spank you, but Karl just laughed. The next day, he sent a set o
f finger paints and five huge pads of butcher paper. From then on, you were never without paints, brushes, canvases, or art books.

  “Joanie, he bought your piano and gave you your very first lessons. Later, he called his old friend Gerhardt Boehm and asked him to give you an audition. Boehm would never have taken you if you didn’t have the talent, but it was your father who brought you to his notice. And that picture over there,” she said, pointing to the photograph that had formerly hung on the wall of Boehm’s studio, “do you see me, far, far in the background? The man I am talking to is your father. He stood in the wings to listen to you play. I tried to convince him to stay, and to let me introduce you. But he left. I was very upset. I convinced myself that had you won a gold medal instead of bronze, it might have been different and he might have acknowledged you at last. It was a lie. But when you tell so many lies to so many people, even yourself, you start to believe them.

  “Joanie . . .” she said tenderly. “A bronze in your first major competition—what an accomplishment! It should have been a wonderful day for you, a triumphant day, but I spoiled it for you because I bought my life with lies and made you pay the price. I am truly sorry.”

  Minerva looked at Joanie in a way that was so raw that Joanie felt like she was seeing her mother for the first time. She felt something loosen inside her, loosen and release.

  “I encouraged your talent,” Minerva went on, widening her gaze to encompass all three of her daughters, “and often I pushed you, too hard, because your creativity pleased him so much. I hoped he would become so attached to you that he would finally make us a real family. But that wasn’t the only reason I pushed. I wanted you to have the opportunities I couldn’t. It was the same wish my mother had for me. The difference was, you had the talent to make it come true.

  “Keeping your paternity a secret was still tricky,” she said, “especially as you were getting older. The first test tube baby was born in England in 1978 and the first American baby in 1981. Before long, it was quite a common procedure, so I came up with the idea of telling people that you were conceived using in vitro. It was a little complicated to pull off. For one thing we had to alter Joanie’s birthday—I’m sorry, sweetheart, but you’re thirty-nine, not thirty-eight. We altered my age as well, so if anyone ever did find out about Karl and me, at least he wouldn’t have had a mistress who was underage. But that makes the news better for me—I’m actually fifty-eight, not sixty-three. We also had to invent an intricate story about me going to England to have the first two babies.