Falling for Home

by Jody Holford

  “It’s not. But you’re being a bit dramatic. Things get blurted out in fights. Except by guys, because we don’t blurt, we shout. Your mom is not a freak, and you did not say that. And your dad loves you. Go talk to him,” Alex replied, stroking her hair. When he did that, something uncurled inside of her chest and spread little waves of contentment through her. She sighed, angry at him for being right and rational and much calmer than she felt.

  “Is that what you’re going to do? Go talk to your dad?”

  “Trust me, sweetheart, if I could get my dad to talk to me, I would. I’ve threatened to charge him with obstruction, and he still won’t tell me where the damn paint came from.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m being all moody and emotional, and you have stuff going on, too,” she said, putting her arms around his waist. Furball brushed between them.

  “We need a date night. I need to take you out. How about tomorrow? We’ll go to a movie,” he suggested, kissing the crown of her head.

  “Ooh—”

  “Something funny. Without subtitles,” he added quickly.

  When Alex left for work, she realized she couldn’t stay in his house all day, staring out the window. She grabbed her things and headed back to her parents house. Both of them were in the kitchen when she walked in. The three of them stayed still, looking at each other, all of their words trapped in the silence.

  When Alex pulled up to his dad’s, he parked behind a work truck that read “Clay’s Concrete.” A couple of guys were smoothing out the cement. Finishing the driveway would spruce things up a lot and make parking easier. Sam had done a good job fixing up the shed. Alex walked over the lawn and up his dad’s front steps. He knocked twice then opened the front door and called out.

  “Back here,” Chuck answered.

  Alex made his way through the sparsely decorated, masculine living room. Wandering through the house he knew as well as his own, he found Chuck just where he’d thought he would—in his office, working on one of his maps. His dad had a lifelong fascination with cartography.

  A few Christmases ago, Alex had bought him a massive map of the world that took up one entire wall of the decently sized study. Chuck was at his desk, glasses perched on his nose, sketching on thin parchment paper. It was only in the last year or so that his dad had taken up drawing the maps. It was tedious work that would have driven Alex nuts, but it was interesting to look at. Chuck put his fine-tipped pencil down.

  “You’re becoming a regular,” Chuck said, stretching his neck to each side.

  “You phoned me. I’m stopping by like you asked. Driveway is going to look good,” Alex said. He wasn’t trying to be stiff and formal—he just couldn’t stop being irritated with his dad. Chuck stood and came around the wide-planked teak table that he used as a desk. The table would look good in Alex’s dining room.

  “You’re right, I did. Let’s get a drink. I’m thirsty,” Chuck replied, moving out of the room, leaving Alex to follow.

  “What are you mapping?”

  “An old route between England and Spain that wasn’t found until after a number of voyages had already failed.”

  Chuck grabbed two cans of soda from the fridge and tossed one to Alex. They both tapped the tops a couple of times and cracked them open. Alex took a long swallow and set his can on the counter. He had helped his dad do the backsplash in this kitchen and, looking around now, he realized they had done a pretty good job. It was a beautiful house and, overall, Alex had been happy growing up here. His dad was a stubborn son of a bitch, but he was fair and, usually honest. Which is part of what was bugging Alex so much right now.

  “So what’s up?” Alex asked.

  “Your mother phoned me.”

  Alex was glad he had put his drink down. If he’d been mid-swallow, he probably would have choked. If he’d been holding the can, he would have crushed it.

  “What the fuck?”

  “Watch your language, boy.”

  Alex smacked his hand against the countertop. “Okay. What the fucking hell?”

  Chuck shook his head and carried his pop to the living room. Jesus. Stay still. Talk already.

  “You know what sucks about having kids?” Chuck asked, settling into the corner of one of the leather couches.

  “When they want you to be honest?” Alex said. His thoughts flashed to Lucy, and he felt a pang of regret for what she was going through.

  “Smart-ass. No. What sucks is when they have certain traits that annoy the hell out of you and then you suddenly realize that they got them from you.”

  “At least you’re accepting the blame.”

  “See,” Chuck said, gesturing toward Alex with his can. “That’s what I’m talking about. No one can talk to you about something when you’ve made your mind up. Your mother wants to talk to you, Alex. If I can give the woman a chance, so can you.”

  Alex’s heart fell to his stomach and twisted inside out.

  “What do you mean ‘give her a chance’? What kind of chance are you giving her?” Alex demanded, glad he hadn’t sat down. His fists clenched at his sides and his breath froze, making his chest tight.

  “Shit, Alex! Not that kind of chance. She’s called a few times over the years. I’m not mad at her anymore. I think you should work on that,” Chuck said.

  “Oh, yeah. Why should I do that?”

  “Sit down, Alex,” Chuck said in a tone that demanded he did. Alex sat on the edge of the couch, feeling fifteen again. Like he’d been caught sneaking out and Chuck was going to give him a talk that would make him wish he hadn’t been so stupid.

  “I don’t want to do this. She didn’t want me sixteen years ago, I don’t need her now,” Alex said.

  “Maybe not. But one day, she’ll be gone, and all you’ll have is your stubborn, bruised heart,” Chuck said gruffly.

  “My heart is just fine, thanks.”

  “No, it’s not. Not that piece of it, anyway. She wrecked a piece of yours the way she did mine. We can either hang on to that and let it fester, or we can let it go. There’s a hell of a lot of relief in letting it go, son.”

  “There’s nothing to let go, dad. I’m fine. I don’t need to reconnect with my mother.”

  “She’s got cancer, Alex.”

  And just like that, his heart twisted again and pushed its way upward to lodge in his throat, painfully. Alex said nothing. He looked at his father, trying not to let it matter. Three seconds ago, she hadn’t mattered.

  “Her prognosis is good. She’s already had surgery. She’s not calling to say good-bye or anything morbid like that. I think she realizes that we only get one shot at this. She messed up a good portion of it. You can’t go back, but you can move forward. She just wants to move forward.”

  Alex still said nothing. How could he when his heart was stuck in his trachea? He stood and walked to the window. He could see the guys pouring concrete. The thick, heavy liquid dispensed slowly. Someone smoothed it out, and then they left it to move to the next section. If anything got caught in that concrete, it would stay there, essentially, forever. Unless someone made a conscious effort to change what had been imprinted in the cement.

  “What kind?” Alex asked.

  “Breast cancer. She’s doing well. They caught it early. She was a shitty mother. A shitty wife. But she’s a good person, Alex. She’s your mom.”

  Alex shook his head. He didn’t have the words. He didn’t know what he felt or what he wanted. Obviously, he didn’t want her to have cancer. He hadn’t thought he’d care about anything connected to her, but he knew, in this moment, he didn’t want her to have cancer, he didn’t want her to die, and—son of a bitch—he didn’t want her to die without him ever having a chance to talk to her again.

  “Do you want some tea? I have some chamomile. It’s calming,” Julie said, puttering and fidgeting with the kettle, the tea bags, and taking out cups. Mark stayed where he had been sitting when Lucy had walked in.

  “No, thank you,” Lucy answered, unsure where to look.<
br />
  “How did you find out?” Mark asked, surprising Lucy. She looked up at him. Her heart seized. She loved him so much. She didn’t have his nose or his height or his blood, but he was her dad. A cup clattered onto the counter. Julie picked it up and put it away.

  Lucy thought back to that night so long ago. She had vague memories, snippets, of her younger sister being sick off and on, but as a kid, she only knew what her parents told her. “You were having an argument one night. Char was at a sleepover, and Kate came to sleep with me. She was stealing all of the covers, and when I went to shove her out of the bed, I realized that she was burning up. I came to get one of you.”

  Julie gave a small, strangled sound that was half gasp, half whimper. Lucy sat down at the table across from her dad. Julie turned to face them but stayed with her back to the counter.

  “We didn’t keep it from you because we didn’t want you to know. We didn’t want you to feel what you feel now,” Julie said quietly.

  “What’s that?”

  “Like you’re not mine. How the hell can you think that you aren’t mine?” Mark asked, sitting up and banging his fist on the table. Lucy jumped and wondered if she had gotten it wrong all those years ago. Words were failing her as her breathing quickened.

  “What? Are you … do you mean … are you my dad?” she asked, hating the tears in her voice.

  “It depends on what you call a dad,” Mark said. His eyes were heated—the way they were when he gave a lecture that he felt passionate about. “Biologically, no. I am not. But that doesn’t change one damn thing, Lucy. I’m surprised at you.”

  He shook his head and Lucy felt like hers was spinning. How could he be mad or surprised at her? She stood, suddenly wanting a drink and needing something in her hands. She went to the fridge to grab some apple juice.

  “Mark. Don’t be like that. She’s shocked. Honey. What your dad means—”

  “What I mean,” Mark interrupted, “is your first word was Santa. You pronounced it Sa-Sa. You were eleven months old when you took your first step. You fell headfirst into the coffee table, and I just about had a heart attack. I taught you how to ride a bike. I told you the truth about Santa Claus and the tooth fairy, and I held you when you cried over the first idiot boy who broke your heart.”

  Lucy shut the fridge with nothing in her hands. Her dad stood, all but vibrating with his energy and passion and all of the conviction that made him, him. He moved around the table, glancing at Julie, who smiled encouragingly at him. The sweetness of the exchange just about broke the fragile grip Lucy had on her emotions.

  “I helped you study for your Spanish test in eleventh grade. I hated Spanish in high school, but I learned it again for you. Sometimes, I still conjugate verbs and it irritates the hell out of me. I told your mother to let you go, that it was the only way you’d ever come back, every single time you had to travel abroad. You do not have my blood. But you do have my name, my love, and my heart. You tell me if that’s enough. Tell me if that makes me your dad.”

  He was breathing heavily when he finished, and Lucy’s control shattered when a single tear rolled down his cheek. She launched herself at him, so utterly overwhelmed that she couldn’t speak. His arms came around her immediately, as they always had. Steady, sure, safe.

  “You are my little girl. Nothing can change that,” he whispered in her ear. She nodded against him, her own tears streaming down her face. He hugged her harder.

  They took a break. Her mother made all of them tea, and they took it into the living room. They sipped their tea and didn’t rush. Lucy dried her tears and excused herself to wash up. When she returned, her parents were sitting side by side on the couch. Lucy sat across from them on the loveseat. She pulled her knees up and hugged them to her chest, feeling like she’d need the anchor. The silence and secrets crept back, and Lucy was afraid to learn too much. Did she have the same capacity to forgive as her dad?

  “I made one mistake. One night. I jeopardized everything that I had, and I don’t even have a good reason. That’s the worst of it, I think. That I didn’t even have a reason to throw it all away. As soon as it happened, I was sick. I told your father immediately,” Julie said in one long swell of words. Mark put his hand on Julie’s, covering it like a shield. She glanced at him before continuing.

  “At first, I didn’t want him to forgive me. I hated myself so much. I told him to take Char, to leave me. That he deserved so much better,” Julie said, her voice cracking.

  “I considered it. I left for a couple of weeks. I came to pick up Char, but I couldn’t talk to your mom. I couldn’t look at her. When Char told me that mommy cried all the time, I came back. I wasn’t coming back to her, but for your sister,” Mark said.

  Lucy had to force herself to breathe as she watched the pain slowly etch itself over their features, pulling them back to that time.

  “I thought I was truly heartsick. And I was. Your father was the only boyfriend I had ever had. He is and will always be the only man I have ever loved. But after three weeks of throwing up constantly, I went to the doctor.”

  “You were pregnant with me,” Lucy whispered, not even meaning to. Her mom nodded. Lucy’s stomach tilted, causing a wave of dizziness even though she was sitting.

  “Everything we do is a choice. Sometimes one choice defines us—shows us who we are or who we aren’t. Your mother is not a cheater, Lucy. She made a mistake. I had to make a choice, too. Move on without her or punish both of us for good. Every good thing in my life has come from being with your mom. Even the pain she caused me brought you,” Mark said.

  “It’s not as cut and dried as that, honey. We went to therapy. I went to therapy. We fought. We cried and we healed,” Julie added.

  “But how did you get past the fact that she was pregnant with another man’s child?” Lucy asked. She unfolded her legs and stretched them out, feeling pins and needles skitter along her skin.

  “We didn’t know who the father was. Until that fight. We had no idea you heard us,” Julie told her. She picked up her tea, sipped at it, and placed it back down. Lucy wished she had something stronger than tea. Lucy remembered her parents worrying about Kate, taking her to the doctor, and Kate’s frequent fevers. Had any of the three of them realized the stress her parents had been under at the time? Probably not.

  “Kate was really sick. They thought, briefly, while running tests, that she might need a liver transplant. It was suggested that we have you and Char tested to see if you were a match. Just in case. It turned out not to be her liver, but it also gave us results we hadn’t anticipated. We were so caught up in her being sick that we weren’t thinking what else would come from the blood tests and screening,” Mark said, his eyes cloudy like he was looking at that time in his life.

  Lucy stood and stretched her legs by pacing the living room. If she had known all of the reasons—if she had never found out at all—would she have spent the last ten years losing herself? Escaping from the sting of not belonging? If she’d never found out, would they have ever told her?

  “It’s never changed for one second how I feel about you, Lucy,” Mark said, drawing her attention back to the two of them sitting stoically on the couch.

  “I am…” Julie’s voice trailed off, and Lucy stopped pacing. “I am so sorry that you thought, for even one second, that having you home would bring me, us, anything but joy. I’m so sorry.”

  Lucy wanted to say it wasn’t her fault, but that wasn’t entirely true. She felt anger toward her mother, but not as much as she’d expected.

  She took a deep breath. “How did you forgive her? How do you look at her the way you do and not see what she did? How do you look at me and not see it?” Lucy whispered. Her dad stood and came to her. He tilted her chin up and brushed her hair back from her face like he had when he coached her Little League games. He’d taken her chin between his thumb and forefinger and told her to keep her eye on the ball and her heart in the game.

  “When I look at you, I see your moth
er’s eyes. I hear your mother’s laugh, and see her amazing capacity to give in all of the things you do. I love her. It’s too much to live without her. To me, that’s harder than forgiveness. All I see when I look at you is my daughter,” he said quietly. Lucy wasn’t even sure if her mother could hear him. And regardless of what she knew, all she saw when she looked at him was her dad. It was the only truth she needed.

  He pulled her in for a hug and whispered, “Don’t be mad at her. She’s punished herself enough.” He kissed her forehead, lingering for a moment. Then he picked up his teacup and Julie’s and took them to the kitchen, leaving her alone with her mom. Lucy felt awkward standing there, so she went to sit where her dad had been.

  “I ask myself every day why he forgave me,” Julie said, looking down at her hands clasped in her lap. “Then I push the thought away and focus on being grateful he did. Your father is the best person I know. He makes me better, and he is part of you, regardless of DNA.”

  Lucy nodded. She finally felt like this was enough.

  “You need help, Mom,” Lucy said quietly. Might as well herd all of the elephants at once. This time, Julie nodded and took Lucy’s hand.

  “I know.”

  Alex had finally caught a break. One of the security cameras they had installed had caught the back of a kid’s head. It wasn’t definitive, but it told them more than they had known. Their tagger was approximately five-feet-nine, right-handed, and blond. He had been wearing a non-descript nylon jacket that Alex hoped to inspect closer when he blew up some of the photos.

  He poured cat food into a bowl like a zombie, wanting nothing more than to shower and sleep for ten hours. He felt like he’d aged a decade today. As usual, the best part of his day was curled up in his bed, snoring softly. She was on her side, her face so peaceful. Watching her made him physically ache for her. Will this intensity ever lessen? He didn’t want to think about his dad, his mother, or a punk-ass tagger. Not when he could fall into bed and into Lucy. He was grabbing some boxers to change into after his shower when her phone rang on his dresser. Casting a quick glance, not wanting the noise to wake her, he pressed accept and walked out of his bedroom into the hall.