“I understand mood swings. I know what it’s like to feel out of control. But… I think her behavior was changing before she got pregnant. Don’t you?”
Mr. Downy shook his head resolutely. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Even before we got divorced… she had changed. I thought at the time that she had just decided she couldn’t deal with my issues anymore. You don’t really know how many problems a person has until you live with them for a while. But now I wonder…”
“Wonder what?” Mrs. Downy demanded. “I think it’s just like you said. She didn’t know how hard it was going to be until she’d been with you for a while. She knew in her head, but she hadn’t experienced it. She didn’t know how stressful it was going to be.”
“And she was so sick after that,” Mr. Downy said. “She was just so sick and weak with cancer and the treatments. She needed to live for herself. Not for someone else. If she hadn’t been focused on her own emotional health, she would never have survived it.”
“So you don’t think that anything has changed, over time. You think she’s still the same woman as she was before she and I met.”
“People do change,” Mrs. Downy pointed out. “They change because of their experiences.”
“I don’t think that’s it,” Zachary said slowly. “I’m worried that… she has Huntington’s Disease.”
33
Mr. and Mrs. Downy’s reactions were different. Mr. Downy looked angry, furious that Zachary would suggest such a thing. Mrs. Downy looked terrified. She alternated between looking at Zachary and at her husband, waiting for one of them to speak.
“There is no Huntington’s Disease in our family,” Mr. Downy finally said in a tight voice, his anger barely controlled.
“There are rare occasions where a child can have it even though the parents didn’t. Or there may have been cases in the family that only had a few symptoms, or didn’t occur until much later in life, so it was never diagnosed.” Zachary swallowed, looking into Mr. Downy’s cold, angry eyes. “There are cases where the parents didn’t have it,” he repeated. “Where it was a first-time mutation.”
“You are not a doctor.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You can’t make a diagnosis like that. And even if you were a doctor, you haven’t examined her. You haven’t run any tests. You can’t just know out of the blue that she had something like that.”
“No,” Zachary agreed. “But it isn’t out of the blue. Her babies have the gene for Huntington’s Disease.”
“So it is like you said, they have this mutation, she did not.”
“Both babies?”
“If they are identical twins, they would both have it, wouldn’t they?”
Zachary wasn’t sure. He considered, and nodded slowly. “Yes… maybe. But look at Bridget. Look at the changes over the past few years. Look at how she has become more moody and angry. Her personality has changed.”
Mr. Downy shook his head, but Mrs. Downy was not shaking hers. Her eyes were wide with fear, but she didn’t deny it like her husband.
“She has changed,” Zachary said to Mrs. Downy. “You can see that too, can’t you? She’s different than she was before we got married. And it isn’t just bitterness from the marriage. There’s been something else going on. Don’t you think so?”
Mrs. Downy looked at her husband as if she needed his permission to agree with Zachary, and when he didn’t give it to her, she looked down at her folded hands in her lap and didn’t agree or disagree with Zachary. He thought he detected a slight tremor in her cheek. She was trying to keep her emotions under control. Staying calm and collected in front of her daughter’s ex. Trying not to crack and show any weakness.
“I think it’s time for you to leave,” Mr. Downy said, rising to his feet.
“You haven’t had any concerns about her?” Zachary asked helplessly, sliding forward in his seat to get up. “If she’s diagnosed, they might be able to help her, to slow its progression. Give her a normal life for a few years longer…”
Mr. Downy glared down at him. But Zachary could see that his eyes were shiny with tears. He wasn’t quite as angry and confident as he pretended to be. Of course he was worried about his daughter. Maybe he had been raised not to show any un-manly emotions, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have feelings. If Zachary could see Bridget’s changed behavior as clearly as he did, Mr. Downy must be able to see it even more clearly. Unless it was one of those things that was harder to notice when you saw the person every day. Maybe he had been too close to her to notice the gradual progression.
But Zachary was sure that Mrs. Downy, at least, recognized the truth of what Zachary said.
He stayed sitting where he was, giving it a few more seconds to see if they were going to send him on his way or whether he could draw out the conversation and get them onside.
“I don’t want it to be true either,” Zachary said. “And if you really can’t see it, if you really haven’t seen any changes in her over the past couple of years and it is just me… then so be it. Maybe I’m just more sensitive to her moods after being away from her. But some of the things that she’s done in the last little while… have been very out of character.” He pushed himself to his feet. “That’s what I think, anyway.”
Mrs. Downy rose as well. She looked at her husband and put her hand on his arm. Finally, Mr. Downy nodded, giving in.
“Fine,” he said with a long sigh. “Maybe there have been changes. But people do change over time. They decide they’re not going to put up with being pushed around anymore. They act differently when they’re under stress, or when they’ve had a serious illness or a near-death experience. They even said that some of the cancer treatments could have an effect on her personality. Things can change; that doesn’t mean she has Huntington’s Disease.”
“No. But if she does, it’s better she gets diagnosed now, isn’t it? So they can treat it and help her.”
Mrs. Downy shook her head. “There isn’t anything they can do. It’s not something they can fix.”
“They might be able to slow down its progress. And they say that a cure isn’t far away. Maybe not soon enough for Bridget…” He tried to swallow the painful lump that swelled up in his throat. “But what about the babies? There could be a cure in time for them.”
“She won’t keep them,” Mrs. Downy said. “If she thinks there’s something wrong with them, she won’t risk it.”
“Maybe if she knows there will be a cure… or at least that there’s a good chance…”
“She won’t,” Mrs. Downy repeated with certainty. “I know she won’t. I’m surprised she hasn’t had an abortion already.” She sniffled and touched her hand to the end of her nose as if trying to stifle a sneeze. But Zachary knew there was far more behind the gesture than the tickle of a sneeze.
“Sit down,” Mr. Downy said, and they all sat again. Zachary rubbed his palms on his knees, thinking.
“She needs to be tested. She needs to go to the doctor and be tested.”
“I’d like to see you talk her into that,” Mr. Downy said with a sharp bark of laughter.
“I’m probably not the best person to talk to her. But you…”
Mr. Downy shook his head. “Him, then. Gordon.”
Zachary nodded. “He’s a lot better at managing her than I ever was.”
“He’s nothing like you,” Mrs. Downy agreed. She gave a little shake of her head. “I wish that things had worked out between the two of you.”
Zachary was surprised. He’d never felt like he had the approval of either of them. Bridget kept trying to mold him into something that would be more acceptable to her family, but hadn’t been able to change him like she wanted to. So he’d always known that he didn’t fit in with them. That they probably wished every time they saw him that Bridget had picked someone else.
Someone more like them. Someone more like Gordon.
“Gordon is very successful,” he said to Mrs. Downy,
unable to understand why she would say such a thing. “He’s patient and persuasive and wealthy. And handsome. All the things that I am not.”
“And you are many things that he is not,” she pointed out. “And could never be.”
Zachary could think of a lot of his traits that Gordon would never have. Nor would he ever want to have them.
“I can’t understand Bridget not wanting to have children,” Mrs. Downy said, smoothing wrinkles from her pants as if it were a job that required her close attention. “The pull of motherhood is very strong. It’s a woman’s natural inclination. I can’t understand her attitude about not wanting to have children. She says she doesn’t want to ruin her body with pregnancy, but it isn’t that. It’s much more than that.” She shook her head thoughtfully. “I always wanted children. When we got married, I was so excited to become a mother. Every month, I waited for the signs that I was with child. Every time I wasn’t, an ache grew in my heart. It became unbearable.”
Zachary nodded. That was a feeling he could understand. He longed for children himself, and most women seemed to have an even stronger instinct for nurturing.
“There weren’t clinics like this when I was a young woman,” Mrs. Downy went on. “All of this technology is new. IVF… it was so new; it wasn’t something that you could go to the doctor for. It was brand new.”
“That must have been difficult for you.”
Mrs. Downy nodded. She continued to look down. The conversation lagged. Zachary looked for a way to carry it forward.
“And it has been scary for you, seeing the changes in Bridget, wondering what was going on. Huntington’s Disease is a terrifying prospect. I don’t know if you know anything about it…”
She didn’t move or answer.
Zachary looked at Mr. Downy. He was staring at a thick book in the bookcase closest to him. Zachary had seen books like that before. He remembered Burton’s foster mother pulling a thick volume off of the shelf and leafing through the pages of pictures of all of their foster children.
He had seen pictures of Bridget with her parents. Pregnancy shots of Mrs. Downy. Bridget as a newborn, cuddled in her mother’s arms, Mrs. Downy looking at the camera with sparkling eyes and a contented smile.
At their wedding reception, there had been a long picture montage of Bridget growing up, going through all of the different ages and stages, from infancy up through to adulthood, growing lovelier all the time. Her parents were always doting on her. It was the kind of life that Zachary could only imagine. A life where there was plenty to go around, parents who cared for her physically and emotionally, one consistent home from the time she was a baby until she was grown. Even now, as a grown woman, her parents were still there for her, fighting her battles and standing by her side.
Zachary got up and retrieved the photo album. Neither of them stopped him. He paged through it, looking at Bridget’s life in reverse, starting at the back and working his way toward the front. There were no ultrasound pictures, but there was that first picture of Mrs. Downy, looking down and her baby bump, two hands wrapped around it as she thought about the baby kicking inside of her.
“We didn’t have all of those options they have today,” Mrs. Downy said. “Every month that went by…”
Zachary looked at her, blinking. He looked down at the photo album in his lap. Mrs. Downy was there, holding her pregnant tummy. Anticipating the birth. Clearly, something had worked. He looked back up at her. What was it she was afraid to tell him? Had they used a sperm donor? Maybe Mr. Downy hadn’t been able to produce children himself, and she had been forced to go through other channels, seeking out someone who was willing to father her child. Maybe that was where the Huntington’s Disease had come from.
34
What happened?” he asked her softly. “You eventually managed to get pregnant.”
She shook her head slowly.
“But you did,” Zachary repeated, indicating the picture. “You were pregnant here.”
“No. I wasn’t.”
He stared at the picture, not understanding.
“It was a prop,” Mr. Downy said gruffly. “Back then… that’s what some people did. Pretended. Then one day… came back from the hospital with a baby.” He ducked his head. “But… it wasn’t what it looked like. There were private adoptions. It was shameful not to be able to have children of your own. So you did what you had to to convince everyone that you did. That the little blond-haired baby you brought home one day really was your own.”
Zachary let his breath out in a whoosh. He stared at Mr. and Mrs. Downy in disbelief. “Bridget is adopted?”
“Things were different back then. They were changing, but… there were still circles… people who would look down their noses if they thought that you had done something like that instead of being able to conceive a child of your own.”
“So this whole conversation…” Zachary made a circular gesture to indicate what they had just finished talking about. “About your medical history… none of that matters. Because Bridget isn’t your biological child. She doesn’t carry your genes.”
Mrs. Downy nodded, looking shamefaced. “She doesn’t know.”
“Bridget doesn’t know she’s adopted?”
“No.”
Zachary took several deep breaths, feeling like he couldn’t get enough oxygen. Not a panic attack. He was just so shocked he couldn’t seem to work his diaphragm properly anymore. Breathing didn’t feel natural.
“Bridget doesn’t know that you adopted her. She thinks she is your biological child.”
They both nodded this time. Mr. Downy looked studiously out the window. Mrs. Downy was staring at the photo album still in Zachary’s lap.
“So Bridget didn’t lie about it. She has no idea.”
“We have meant to tell her…” Mrs. Downy started, “but it has never worked out. The time has never been right. Just when we get ready to tell her… something will happen. And it doesn’t feel right. Now that she’s older… it feels like the time has passed. And to tell her while she’s pregnant… and struggling with this pregnancy… I just can’t do that to her now.”
“She needs to know now. She needs to understand the DNA results she got back on the babies and to know what it means for her. And to know that she could have Huntington’s Disease herself.” Zachary shook his head in disbelief. “Why wouldn’t you tell her that when she was going in for her IVF? Explain to her that you don’t know her genetic heritage. She could have had counseling and testing before she got pregnant.”
“I didn’t see what good that would do.”
“And when Gordon asked about predispositions to diseases that run in your family? You never thought that maybe it was important for him to know the truth instead of the lies you had been telling all these years?” Zachary knew his words were harsh, but he couldn’t understand how they could have gone for decades without ever revealing what they knew about Bridget’s heritage. “Why did you lie to him? Why didn’t you tell him then?”
“We couldn’t tell him and not her. It’s our responsibility to tell Bridget…”
“But you didn’t. You never told either of them that there was more to it.”
“We’ve tried,” Mrs. Downy said.
“You don’t know how hard it is,” Mr. Downy chimed in. It was strangely incongruous to have this man who Zachary had always seen as a confident, competent man, complain that it was too hard to tell his daughter where she had come from. His protest was strangely childlike.
“I’ve never had to do it,” Zachary agreed. “I can’t judge you. I don’t know how I would have handled it in the same situation. But you have to tell her now! You have to explain to her that she’s the one carrying the Huntington’s gene, and she needs to be tested herself.”
Neither of them jumped up and volunteered to be the one to break the news to Bridget. Zachary sat, looking at them and looking at the little girl in the pictures.
He had told her about his own tragedies, how he had lo
st his biological parents and been raised in foster care. And she’d had no idea that their lives were parallels. She thought her life was the complete opposite, having been born as Mr. and Mrs. Downy’s natural child and raised by them from birth.
In the end, they agreed to call Gordon. Not Bridget. They couldn’t yet find a way to break the news to her. But they would talk to Gordon, explain that they had lied to him. Gordon needed to hear that and to know that it wasn’t any wrongdoing on the part of the clinic that had led to the two babies carrying the Huntington’s gene. He needed to know that it wasn’t Forest McLachlan.
Nor had his wife cheated on him. Instead… a fraud had been perpetrated on all of them. They had been lied to by Bridget’s parents right from the start. And then, they would discuss how to best approach Bridget with the revelation.
Bridget was not going to like it.
Zachary was glad that it wasn’t going to be up to him to break the news to his ex-wife. If he told her something like that, he would deserve the wrath she poured out upon him. She needed to hear it from the people she loved, not from her ex-husband. He didn’t need to be her target anymore.
And after they told her that she was adopted, they needed to tell her the rest.
35
Gordon sat on the Downys’ couch like a statue, his face as gray as stone. He could have been a sculpture sitting there. He didn’t move. Zachary couldn’t even see him breathing. It was like he had been frozen in time.
Zachary couldn’t imagine what was going through his head. He had believed that there had been a switch made at the clinic. To hear now that his wife was not only adopted, but that she might have Huntington’s Disease must have been devastating.
Not only his babies, but his wife too.
And if she was already having symptoms, then they didn’t get to wait until she was seventy years old. They didn’t have the luxury of waiting for a cure to the dreadful disease. If she had it now, her days were already numbered.
She Was at Risk Page 19