Chương 10
My name is Daniel Reed. I was born in Ohio in 1991. My biological mother is Eleanor Hayes. She told me you may be my biological father. I am not asking for money or trying to disrupt your family. I am trying to verify information about my birth. If you are willing to speak, please reply.
Michael replied nine hours later.
I think you have the wrong person.
Daniel showed Eleanor.
She read it.
“That’s him.”
“How can you tell?”
“He still lies in complete sentences.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You got that from one sentence?”
“No. I got it from two years.”
Daniel replied with Eleanor’s full name and the city where they met.
Michael did not answer.
A week passed.
Then Daniel received an email from a woman named Megan Trent.
She was forty-two.
Michael’s older daughter.
I saw your email on my father’s tablet. He has not told me anything. I need to know what you are claiming.
Daniel closed the laptop.
He walked outside.
Rachel followed after a minute.
“This is what Mom was afraid of,” he said.
“What?”
“One truth blowing up somebody else’s family.”
Rachel sat beside him on the deck.
“Yes.”
“If I answer her, I do that.”
“Maybe.”
“If I don’t, I become them.”
Rachel considered that.
“No.”
He looked at her.
“Silence isn’t always the same. Motive matters.”
“That sounds convenient.”
“It is convenient. It can also be true.”
Daniel stared across the dry yard.
“What would you do?”
“I’d answer carefully.”
So he did.
He did not accuse Michael.
He stated the facts he could support.
Eleanor’s account.
The year.
The city.
The possibility of biological relationship.
He told Megan he was willing to use a commercial DNA service or a private lab if she wanted clarity.
Megan replied two days later.
I have a sister. I need to talk to her first.
Daniel waited.
Waiting became a new form of life.
He went to work.
He argued with a tile supplier.
He replaced a garbage disposal at home because it began leaking at exactly the wrong time.
Eleanor stayed with them for another week, then insisted on returning to Louisville.
Claire called every few days.
Daniel sometimes answered.
Sometimes he did not.
Their conversations were awkward and short.
“Did you eat?”
“Yes.”
“How’s work?”
Fine.
“How’s Eleanor?”
Tired.
Neither knew how to speak about anything else.
Then one evening Claire said, “I’m going to sell the house.”
Daniel frowned.
“Why?”
“It’s too much for me.”
“You’ve said that for five years.”
“I mean it now.”
“Don’t make some giant decision because of this.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m sixty-one, Daniel. The gutters need replacing, the basement gets water, and I have three bedrooms I use to store things I should throw away.”
He smiled despite himself.
“You’ll never throw anything away.”
“That’s probably true.”
Then she said, “I found your dinosaur.”
Daniel stopped.
“What dinosaur?”
“The green one.”
He knew immediately.
A plastic brontosaurus he had carried everywhere at four.
“I thought that disappeared.”
“You left it in the garden.”
“I blamed Dad.”
“I know.”
“You let me blame him.”
“He found it funny.”
Daniel sat at the kitchen table.
Claire said, “I washed it.”
“Why?”
“It was dirty.”
“Mom, it’s been thirty years.”
“It was very dirty.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
For a few minutes they talked about the dinosaur.
It was the first conversation since the doorway that did not feel like evidence.
When they hung up, Daniel cried.
Not dramatically.
He sat at the kitchen table with one hand over his eyes while Rachel loaded the dishwasher.
She did not stop.
She did not come over and turn the moment into something ceremonial.
After a while she slid a box of tissues across the table.
He used one.
Then another.
A month after the slap, Megan Trent agreed to a DNA test.
Her sister refused.
Michael sent Daniel a message.
Leave my daughters out of this.
Daniel read it several times.
Then he called.
Michael answered.
Neither spoke at first.
Daniel heard television in the background.
Finally Michael said, “You shouldn’t have contacted them.”
Daniel’s hand tightened around the phone.
“You could’ve answered me.”
“I told you you had the wrong person.”
“No. You lied.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Then take a DNA test.”
Silence.
Daniel heard Michael breathe.
He imagined an old man in a comfortable house, perhaps sitting in a recliner, perhaps staring at a television.
“I was married,” Michael said.
“I know.”
“You don’t understand.”
Daniel nearly laughed.
That sentence again.
The family anthem.
“Then explain.”
Michael was quiet.
“I made a mistake.”
Daniel looked at the wall.
“A mistake?”
“Yes.”
“How long was the mistake?”
Michael exhaled.
“I’m not doing this.”
“You already did it.”
“You’re trying to destroy my family.”
“No.”
“You contacted my daughter.”
“Because you lied.”
Michael’s voice sharpened.
“What do you want?”
Daniel almost answered immediately.
Money?
An apology?
Recognition?
A father?
He discovered that he wanted none of those cleanly enough to name them.
“I want you to tell the truth.”
“To who?”
“To yourself would be a start.”
Michael hung up.
Daniel stood in the kitchen holding the phone.
He had imagined feeling triumphant.
Instead he felt tired.
The DNA result came twelve days later.
Megan was his half sister.
She called that evening.
Her voice shook.
“So.”
“So.”
“My father admitted it.”
Daniel sat down.
“What did he say?”
“That he had an affair. That your mother was unstable. That he gave her money.”
Daniel looked toward the window.
“Some of that is true.”
“Which part?”
“All of it, probably. Depending on how he said it.”
Megan laughed once, without humor.
“I hate this.”
“Me too.”
She began crying.
Daniel stared at the table.
He had not considered her grief enough.
May you like
Michael Trent had been her father for forty-two years.
Whatever kind of man he had been to Eleanor, whatever cowardice he had shown toward Daniel, he had also attended Megan’s school plays, taught her to drive, walked her down the aisle.
