“I’m not sure I remember it.”
“Well, it was in your basement. But … we found … something in the desk that we can’t explain.”
“What do you mean?” What sounded to be genuine curiosity colored his tone.
And brought a paralyzing thought: What if the worst was true, and Mom had been married but Dad didn’t know? That possibility hadn’t entered her mind until this moment. But it couldn’t be. Her parents had never kept secrets from each other. Or so they’d always boasted.
A memory came, something Phee hadn’t thought about in years. Freshman year in high school, she’d gotten in trouble for helping another girl cheat on a test. She’d had to get a note signed for the principal. She’d confessed to Mom and begged her not to tell Dad. And Mom’s response had been exactly what she expected. “You know better than to ever ask me to keep anything from your father, Phylicia. If you don’t want Dad to know something, then you best not tell me.”
That rang so true to who her mother was. No way could Mom have kept such a secret from him.
“Are you still there, Phee? You said you found something in a desk?” Dad’s voice pulled her back to the present.
“Yes. Some jewelry. A ring and a necklace. And a photograph.”
“A photograph?”
Did she detect hesitance in his tone? Or only mild curiosity?
“It was a picture of Mom in a wedding dress. With a man … that wasn’t you. A stranger. And it’s not her wedding dress from your wedding.”
“What?” If he was pretending to be surprised, he was doing a great job of it. “You found this in a desk from our house?”
“Yes. That one in the basement. The stuff was in a box glued to the underside of the desk, actually. Sort of like a …secret compartment. We never would have found it, except we decided to paint the desk. We found the stuff when we turned the desk upside down and took out the drawer.”
“That’s strange. I don’t know why that would have been there …” He let his voice trail off, sounding more cautious now.
“Dad? Was Mom … married before? To someone else?”
“Phee …” His sigh said everything.
“Was she, Dad?” Her heart raced.
“Phylicia, this isn’t a discussion … for over the phone. When I come home next time, we’ll talk then. Okay?”
He’d as good as answered her question. But it wasn’t okay. Nothing about it would ever be okay.
Chapter 16
Phee’s breath came in short gasps and she gripped her phone harder, pacing the short length of the kitchen. “She was, wasn’t she? Mom was married before. No …No, I can’t believe it.” But she did believe it. Dad’s reaction told her with certainty that it was true. “Why didn’t she tell us, Dad? How could she keep something like that a secret? What … happened to him?”
“Did your sisters see the photograph? The ring?”
“Britt did. She was with me when I found it tonight. We haven’t talked to Jo yet.” But she wondered if Britt had called Jo … was maybe even talking to her right now. “When were you going to tell us?”
“Phee, I don’t know that it was my place to tell you. Your mom didn’t want …”
“She didn’t want what? Didn’t want to be honest with her own flesh and blood?” She would have given anything to be able to see Dad’s face right now.
“It’s a long story, and it’s not really mine to tell. Let’s talk about this when—”
“You say it’s not your story to tell, but Mom can’t tell it. This is so unfair! What are we supposed to do with this?”
“You mean … what are you supposed to do with the photo? With the jewelry?” He sounded confused.
“No! What are we supposed to do with this information? That Mom had this secret life she never told us about?” Was he really that dense that he couldn’t see how hurtful this was to her and Britt? And would be to Joanna when she found out. Why would they have kept something like this a secret from their own daughters?
“Phee. You act as if your mother committed murder or something. This isn’t some monstrous thing she did. She was a victim. It happened a long time ago and it really has nothing to do with you girls. Your mom only knew the guy for a few weeks before they got married. It was a mistake. One that wasn’t even really her fault. She couldn’t have known this man wasn’t what he pretended to be. It … wasn’t a good situation. The man was abusive to her. He was a monster, frankly. Thankfully, she was granted an emergency divorce.”
“Wait … Mom was divorced?”
Dad actually laughed. “Well, she couldn’t very well have married me if she wasn’t. The first marriage only lasted a few months. Mom and I got married as soon as her divorce was final, and after that it was … almost as if it never happened.”
“Almost …” The word came out thick with sarcasm, and Phee’s mind swirled with confusion. “But then why would she have saved those things? The ring and the photo?”
“I can’t answer that, honey. I didn’t know she’d saved them. She probably just forgot they were there.”
“I just don’t understand why she didn’t say something. Why she never told us. All those years. And when she knew she … wouldn’t be around to answer our questions.”
“I can’t answer for your mother, but if I had to guess, I’d say she was … ashamed. No. That’s too strong. Embarrassed is more like it. We talked a few times about telling you girls. But Mom didn’t want you to know she’d made such a serious mistake. But don’t you see, Phee? It doesn’t matter now. Your mom never let her mistake drag her down or keep her from being the best wife and mother I’ve ever known. I don’t think you can deny that.”
“No. Of course not. I just … I don’t understand why you would keep this from us.”
“There’s really nothing to understand. It’s just something that happened. Before you were even born, and it doesn’t change one thing about how amazing your mother was.”
Her stomach churned. Dad was right. She’d judged Mom harshly. But this was a harsh pill to swallow.
“Was there anything else, honey?” Dad’s voice was gentle. He sounded more like himself than he had in a very long time. But she could tell he was about to cut her off, to hang up before she was ready to say goodbye. Like he’d done so often since … Karleen.
“Just … please come home soon. We miss you. We all miss you, Dad.” Her voice cracked.
“I’ll try. And when you tell your sisters—about Mom—be kind, okay? She would have hated you finding out this way.”
“I will. I promise.” She swallowed back the lump in her throat. She didn’t want to hang up with this conflict between them. “Thanks, Dad. For being honest.”
“We’ll talk more next time I’m in Cape.” The way he said it felt as if he didn’t want to own her label of “honest.”
“When will that be? When are you coming back?”
“I don’t really know. But I’ll be in touch.”
“Okay. I love you.”
“Love you too, honey.” The phone went silent on his end.
She laid her phone on the kitchen counter, still trying to absorb news she would never in a thousand lifetimes have suspected. She needed to tell her sisters what Dad had confirmed. But she didn’t want Britt to be by herself when she heard that what they’d suspected was true.
Over and over, she replayed her conversation with Dad in her mind, trying to think of how she could tell her sisters in a way that didn’t shock them as much as she’d been shocked. Dad had said to be kind. That Mom had made a mistake. It’s just something that happened. Before you were even born …
What did that have to do with it? Dad had laughed a little when Phee expressed shock that Mom had been divorced. Well, she couldn’t very well have married me if she wasn’t divorced.
How soon after Mom divorced this guy had she and Dad gotten married? She didn’t think Dad had said.
Their conversation meandered through her brain, circling back on itse
lf, getting all mixed up. Something was strange about the way Dad had worded things. But now she couldn’t remember exactly what he’d said. What order he’d said things in. And she sensed that was important.
Something that happened. Before you were even born.
Why had he said it that way? Why hadn’t he said, “Before I ever met your mom”? Maybe he hadn’t meant anything by it, but he’d clearly been guarding his words. Why had he connected it to her birth?
She had pictures in tiny frames on her nightstand. Herself as a newborn in Mom’s arms in the hospital, with Dad beside the bed, looking like the quintessential proud new father. Phee had done the math, the way all teenagers did when they realized their parents might not have been pure as the driven snow on their wedding day. Two of her friends had been eight-pound preemies, supposedly born weeks too early. She’d once overheard her parents joke with friends that they’d gotten pregnant on their honeymoon, and she’d felt relieved and a little smug when everything added up as it should. She’d been born May 15, 1987. Mom and Dad’s anniversary was August 1, 1986. Close, but not too close.
But now she wondered. She wracked her brain to remember if she’d ever actually seen her parents’ marriage certificate. Or her father’s name on her birth certificate, for that matter. She thought she would have noticed if anything was amiss. But then it wasn’t as if she studied her birth certificate every day. In fact, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d looked at it.
She went to the small desk in the corner of her living room and opened the drawer where she kept important papers. She riffled through the folder and found her birth certificate. Dad’s name was there, just below her date of birth and Mom’s maiden name. Clayton, the same as Phee’s grandparents. It all looked official.
She started to file the document away, then remembered an envelope of old photos she’d scanned and copied from family albums several years ago, intending to make a collage to frame. She’d never finished the project, and now she located the envelope at the back of a drawer, spilled the contents onto the desk, and spread them out. Faded family photos taken through the years and black-and-white photos of the grandparents she barely remembered. Finally, she unearthed the picture she was looking for. Mom and Dad’s wedding portrait, presumably taken by someone at the office of the justice of the peace who’d married them.
The faded image was overexposed, causing light from a nearby window to form a halo of light behind Mom. But she was smiling up at Dad with utter adoration, an expression Phee had seen on Mom’s face a thousand times.
Her throat swelled, and she ached with longing to see Mom again, to hear her voice one more time.
The photo proved that Phee had remembered correctly. Mom’s off-white dress had a high collar, and she wore her hair long and straight, with no veil.
Phee started to tuck the photo in her purse to show her sisters, but something made her study it again. Her parents stood in front of a lectern, Mom clutching a simple bouquet of cream-colored roses in both hands, Dad’s arm around her shoulders.
But what made Phee catch her breath was the view outside the bank of windows to their left. The photo was faded and the trees in the image were out of focus, but Phee didn’t think either of those things accounted for the appearance of the leaves—unmistakably orange and red and gold.
How could that be … in August? Could the photo have faded in such a way to give the appearance of autumn outside the windows? She opened her desk drawer and took out a magnifying glass. Behind Mom and Dad in the photo, what looked like a calendar hung on the wall. The photo on the calendar also bore an image of autumn-colored trees and she could just make out the letters ber below the calendar photo. September? October? Not August. Had they lied about their anniversary too?
Dad said he and Mom got married as soon as her divorce was final. Soon was a relative term, but if they hadn’t married until the fall before she was born, Mom had to have already been pregnant.
Had her parents had an affair while Mom was still married? And lied about it to cover up the pregnancy?
Or— The thought that came next siphoned the air from Phee’s lungs. What if Mom had already been pregnant by her first husband? But that would mean— Could it be that Dad wasn’t even her real father?
No. It seemed impossible. But then, before today, it seemed impossible that Mom could have had a secret life they knew nothing about.
She pulled several photographs of herself and her sisters from the envelope and stared at their faces, one by one. Joanna and Britt had often been mistaken for twins when they were little. Even now, they shared very similar features. Thin faces, thin lips, high cheekbones.
Absently, she touched her fingers to her own lips. They were full, her smile wide enough that she sometimes cringed at photos of herself grinning like Lewis Carroll’s Cheshire cat. Phee had a higher forehead than her sisters, and rounder cheeks. Their matching blue eyes and brown hair had always flagged the three of them as sisters, but looking at these photos now, she saw the differences more clearly.
She riffled through the photos, looking for the ones of her grandparents. She saw hints of Mom and Dad in their parents, but she didn’t see herself, not even in Mom’s side of the family. But no one ever really saw themselves in another person, did they? One’s own face became too familiar.
She slipped the photographs back into the envelope, her mind churning with possibilities—all of them devastating.
Trembling, she stepped into her boots, threw on a coat, and walked out to the carport. She unlocked the car and slipped behind the wheel. But before heading to her parents’ house, she texted Joanna.
Have you talked to Britt? Can you meet me in Langhorne in a few minutes? Sorry so late, but this is important.
She was halfway to Langhorne when her phone pinged Jo’s reply. Keeping one eye on the road, she sneaked a peek.
No. What’s going on? Everything ok?
She opted to ignore the questions. Apparently, Britt hadn’t said anything. Jo would surely come. She might be late, but she’d come.
As she drove on, Phee realized that Britt thought the two of them would be revealing Mom’s shocking secret to Jo. But in fact, Phee now had a secret from both of her sisters. She sent up a desperate prayer that her suspicions were unfounded. That there was somehow a logical explanation for everything she was beginning to fear.
The front porch light wasn’t on, but a lamp glowed in the dining room window. Britt must still be up. Phee frowned at the real estate sign planted squarely in the front yard as she pulled onto the driveway. If the house sold, they’d need to get beds—and everything else—moved out to the cottage so Britt would have a place to stay. Once they moved everything out, there’d be no reason for Jo and Phee not to move too. It would be nice to get out from under their rent, though she might have trouble getting out of her lease early.
Phee considered waiting in the car until Jo arrived, but if Britt saw her car in the driveway, she’d wonder why she wasn’t coming inside. God, please give me the words to say this right.
She started to ring the doorbell, then smiled to herself and texted Britt first. Hey, I’m about to ring your doorbell. Don’t call the cops on me.
Britt opened the door, phone in hand, already rolling her eyes. “Haha. Very funny. Why are you here so late? Is everything okay?”
“Yes … and no. I … um … talked to Dad. About the stuff we found in the desk.”
“Seriously?” Britt’s eyes went wide. She gestured Phee inside. “So, what’s the scoop? Have you already called Jo?”
As Phee stepped through the door, it occurred to her that she should have brought the envelope to show Jo. But she’d put it back in the wooden box and left it on top of the desk.
Phee glanced back toward the driveway. “Jo’s on her way over. Let’s wait till she gets here so I don’t have to say everything twice.”
“So … is it bad?”
“I don’t know for sure. I guess it … depends.”
&
nbsp; “On?”
“Britt, just be patient. I’ll tell you everything once Jo gets here.”
“Knowing her, that could be hours.”
“Exaggerate much?”
Britt threw her a smirk, which quickly turned into a genuine smile. “Do you want some tea?”
Phee nodded. “That would be good.”
She followed Britt to the kitchen and put the kettle on to boil while Britt retrieved three cups and matching saucers from Mom’s cupboard. For a moment, it dragged her back to the days when Mom had been hovering at death’s door and they’d shared a thousand cups of tea while they waited. With Dad.
Melvin sauntered into the kitchen and made a beeline for Phee.
“Hey, buddy.” She bent to scratch him under the chin. “You haven’t had any run-ins with the police lately, have you, buddy?”
“Very funny,” Britt singsonged, placing spoons on each saucer.
The teakettle started its high-pitched whistle just as the doorbell rang.
“I’ve got it.” Phee ran to the entryway and let Joanna in.
“What’s going on?”
“Come have some tea, and I’ll tell you.”
Joanna stripped off her scarf and unbuttoned her coat to reveal pajama bottoms and a fuzzy sweatshirt. She tucked her scarf into the sleeve of her coat and hung it on the hall tree. “This better be good, sister.”
“I never claimed it was good.”
Her face must have given her away, because Jo looked stricken. “What happened? Is Dad okay?”
“He’s okay. In fact, I actually had a good talk with him tonight.”
“Then what’s up?” Jo preceded Phee into the kitchen, and Melvin greeted her with the same figure-eight dance he’d done around Phee’s feet.
“I made tea.” Britt held out the kettle. “You want some?”
“Sure. Thanks.” She eyed Britt. “Do you know what this is all about?”
“Some of it. I think …”
They doctored their tea—Jo and Britt with sugar, Phee with a little milk—and carried their cups and saucers to the table on the other side of the island.
Reason to Breathe Page 13