Do You Know the Monkey Man? (11 page)

“For the first couple of years, we just drove around the country. I told her you and your mom had died and we couldn’t go back to Iowa. That we were going to have a whole new life. She didn’t like it at first, but she got used to it. Grandma sent us money now and then and told us what was going on. As far as the police were concerned, the case was closed. Sarah was dead.

“After a while, when I was sure no one was looking for T. J., we settled down in a small town in southern California. I got a job. Your sister started kindergarten. She started a year late because of all the moving around we did before that.”

“That’s why she’s only going into eighth grade?”

“Yeah. We sort of skipped that first birthday, so when you guys turned five, she thought she was turning four.

“Then we moved to Oregon and South Dakota and finally Minnesota, because my mom had moved here. I found a guy who drew up some fake adoption papers a few years ago. He thought it was better to say T. J. was originally someone else’s kid rather than mine. That way no one could trace her to Sarah.

“So once I got the adoption papers, I told T. J. she was adopted. I told her her real family died in a fire. I told her her dad and I were real close. She didn’t even question it. She doesn’t remember much about her life in Clearwater.”

“She didn’t even remember me,” I said, picking at the tab on my can of Coke. “She said she once had a brother named Sam, but she doesn’t remember ever having a sister.”

“There was a boy in California she used to play with. His name was Sam, too. Somewhere along the way I think she confused the two of you, and I guess I thought that was okay.”

I closed my eyes. Maybe when I opened them I’d find out this whole thing was just a dream. A bad dream.

Unfortunately, it was all real.

“I never stopped thinking about you, Sam,” Joe said, his elbows on the table, leaning toward me. “I knew I could never go looking for you. But I always hoped you’d come looking for me. I just didn’t think you’d come looking so soon. And I never figured out what I’d do if you actually found me.”

“That’s why you didn’t call me back last week?”

“When I heard that message on the machine, I wanted to take T. J. and run again. But I couldn’t do that. My mom—your grandma—she’s pretty sick. She’s had a couple of strokes and she can’t take care of herself anymore. T. J. and me, we’re all she has left. She was always there for us, so now it’s our turn to be there for her.”

I didn’t know what to think of this grandmother who had not only abandoned me my whole life, but had helped my dad take T. J. away from us. This grandmother who was probably too sick to explain to me why she’d done it.

“So I had our number changed,” Joe went on. “Got it unlisted and hoped that would be enough. After all, it wasn’t Suzanne who’d found me, it was you. If you were the one looking for me instead of your mom, I thought maybe you’d just give up. But I bet you’re like your mom. You probably never give up.”

I couldn’t think of many people who would describe me like that.

“I’m nothing like my mom.” I always thought I was like him. Casual. Loose. A go-with-the-flow sort of person. But I was different than he was. Very different. I couldn’t imagine ever doing what he’d done.

“So, what do we do now?” Joe asked. He looked like an old man and a little kid at the same time.

“I-I don’t know.” We had to tell my mom. That’s what we had to do now.

He slapped his hand down on the kitchen table. “Well, to start with, I guess I should go and get T. J. When we get back, we’ll have some supper and then figure out what to do next, okay?”

I nodded. I didn’t have a clue what to say. My head was spinning.

Joe squeezed my shoulder and I felt an electric current go right through my skin. It was the first time in ten whole years my dad had touched me. But it was over almost as soon as it began.

“Don’t go anywhere,” he said as he yanked open the front door. “I’ll be back in just a minute.”

I
’m not sure how long I sat there at the kitchen table, trying to make sense of everything I’d just heard.

I was so confused. I knew I should probably hate my dad for what he’d done. Thinking about what he did, what he had stolen from Mom and Grandma and Grandpa Sperling and me…it made me feel sick. But for some reason, I didn’t hate him. I really didn’t. I wasn’t sure what I felt for him, but it wasn’t hatred.

Then I thought about my mom. What would she do when she found out? She’d have my dad thrown in jail. That much I knew for sure. What he did was a
crime
, right?

T. J. would come live with us and my dad would go to jail and that would be the end of it.

All of a sudden their dog let out a shrill
woof!
His tags jangled as he got up on his hind legs, paws on the front windowsill, tail wagging, and peered out the window.

Were they back?

I got up from the table and went to look outside. Joe and T. J. were sitting on the grass under the big tree. Joe had his arm around T. J. and she had her head resting on his shoulder. Their backs were to me, but because the windows were open I could hear every word they were saying.

“What are we going to do?” T. J. moaned.

“I don’t know, honey.”

“Will…her mom take me away from you?”

“She’ll sure want to try.”

T. J.’s shoulders quivered and Joe hugged her tighter to him. “But I want to stay with you,” she said. “Can’t we run away or something?”

I gasped. T. J. would rather run away with…Joe, who was a liar and a
criminal
, than come live with us?

“You know we can’t.”

“Because of Grandma, right?”

“Yes.”

“I wish she’d never come here!” T. J. cried. Each word she spoke was like a fist in my stomach.

“I wish—”

But I didn’t hang around to hear what else T. J. wished. I hustled back to T. J.’s bedroom, where I figured I’d find Angela waiting. We could sneak out the back door, cut across the yards, and be out of here before my dad and T. J. came back. I’d just suck this whole thing up inside me and pretend it never happened. I’d go back home and take whatever punishment my mom wanted to dole out for sneaking off to Minnesota without permission, for sneaking off to the Twin Cities without permission. I’d tell her I didn’t know what got into me. I just felt like doing something reckless.

But Angela wasn’t in the bedroom.

“Angela?” I called, looking all around.

“In here,” she called from a closed door behind me. The bathroom. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

I sighed, leaning my head against the wall. What was I thinking coming here?

I heard a toilet flush and the water come on. Finally Angela opened the door. “Hey,” she said softly. “How’d it go?”

“Fine,” I said, grabbing her arm. “But we’ve got to get out of here. Come on.”

“Wait.” Angela dug in her heels. “What’s the matter, Sam? What happened?”

“This was a mistake,” I said. “A huge mistake.” I told her a little bit about what my dad had told me and then I told her everything I’d overheard between my dad and T. J.

“I never realized what a mess of things I’d make by coming here,” I said. “If my mom finds out about this, my dad will go to jail. And then T. J. will have to come live with us and…she doesn’t want to.” My throat closed up and my eyes filled with tears. My bottom lip quivered. “Sh-she doesn’t even know us, but she doesn’t want to live with us.” I buried my face in my hands and just let the tears come.

Angela put her arms around me. “Shh,” she said, rubbing my back. “I know it hurts, but I have to tell you, Sam, I think I understand how she feels. What if some stranger came along and told you your mom had done something wrong and now you had to go live with him? How would you feel?”

I wiped my tears on the back of my arm and sniffed. “But I’m not just some stranger. I’m her
sister.
Her twin sister.”

“You’re still a stranger,” Angela said.

She was right, of course. And in that instant, I realized that Joe and T. J. were a family, but they weren’t
my
family. They were my blood relatives, but they were no more my family than Bob’s family was.

I sniffed again. “That’s why we have to leave. Now. Before they come back inside.”

“No, Sam! You can’t just pretend this whole thing never happened. What about your mom? Don’t you think she has a right to know the truth?”

Yes, she did. And T. J. and my dad had a right to…to what? I didn’t know. I had screwed things up by coming here, and now I didn’t know where my loyalties lay. All I knew was I didn’t want to be the one responsible for sending my dad to jail. And I didn’t want to be the one responsible for ruining everyone’s life.

“There’s something else you need to know, Sam,” Angela said. As if I hadn’t already found out enough.

“What?” I asked, slumping against the wall.

“I…talked to your mom—”

“What?”
I cried, panic rising in my throat.

Angela led me back to T. J.’s room and we sat back down on her bed. “When I called my dad’s house, Noreen answered the phone,” Angela explained. “She wanted to know where I was. And then she wanted to know whether you were with me. Your mom was there, Sam. She was at my dad’s house. Apparently she drove up to Hill Valley as soon as she got your message this morning.”

Oh no.
“What did you tell her?”

“I didn’t tell her anything,” Angela assured me. “Not about your dad or T. J. I just told her we were at the Mall of America. She wanted to talk to you, but I told her you were in the bathroom. In fact, I’ve told her that three times now because she keeps calling back. She probably thinks you’re sick or something. You’re supposed to call her.”

“No!” I hurled myself back against the wall. I couldn’t talk to my mom. Not yet. What would I say?

“Sam, you have to! She knows something’s up, but she doesn’t know what. And she and my dad are both on their way to the Mall of America to get us.” She checked her watch. “We’re supposed to meet them in front of Bloomingdale’s in an hour.”

“An hour?” I screeched.

Angela nodded miserably. “You’ve got to call her and tell her where we are.”

Or we could just sneak out, run through the backyards, and then cut over to Penn Avenue and catch a bus to the Mall of America. We might even get there before my mom and Angela’s dad. Either way, all we’d have to tell them was we felt like sneaking off for a day of fun at the Mall of America. We’re teenagers. Teenagers do stuff like that.

No. Angela was right. I had to call my mom and tell her the truth.

I dragged myself to my feet, then tottered over to the window. My dad and T. J. were still out there. I couldn’t hear them as well here as I could in the living room, but I didn’t want to take any chances on them hearing me. So I took my cell phone into the bathroom and turned on the shower to drown out my voice.

“You’re doing the right thing,” Angela called over the noise of the water.

I hoped she was right.

I sat down on the toilet seat. Then I opened my purse and took out my cell phone. My whole body was shaking. But one by one I punched in each digit of my mom’s cell phone number.

What was I going to say?

Mom picked up on the first ring. “Hello? Sam?”

I gulped. It was so good to hear her voice. “Uh huh.”

“Oh, thank God! Do you have any idea, any idea at all, what I’ve been going through the past twenty-four hours?”

Probably nothing in comparison to what she was about to go through.

“I tell you, Sam, I don’t know what goes through your head anymore. I specifically told you to get on that bus this morning and come home, and what do you do? You hop on another bus and take off for the Mall of America? Do you have any idea how dangerous that is?”

“Well—” I began.

“No, you probably don’t,” Mom went on, her voice rising. If I wasn’t careful, I was going to start crying again. “Because you’re thirteen and you think you know it all! You think you can do whatever you want. Well, let me tell you something, Sam, there are going to be some changes around here when we get back to Clearwater. Some big changes.”

“I’ll say,” I muttered.

“Are you being fresh with me, young lady?”

“No!” I said right away. Because I really wasn’t being fresh. Not this time.

I took a deep breath. “I’ve got something to tell you, Mom.”

“What? What do you have to tell me?”

I glanced over at the stream of water pouring out of the faucet and swirling down the drain.

This was so hard.

“Well,” I said weakly. “First I think you’d better pull over. I don’t think you should be driving when I say what I have to say—”

“Do you really think I’m driving right now, Samantha?”
Mom yelled.
“I am way too upset to be driving!”

“Oh. Good,” I said, relieved. “I mean, good that you’re not driving.” This was going to come as a huge shock and I didn’t want her to drive off the road or anything.

Mom sighed. “What is it, Sam?”

I swallowed again. I wished I could be a little kid again and have her put her arms around me and tell me everything was going to be okay.

“Sam?” Mom said, more worried this time.

There was no easy way to say it. So I just opened my mouth and blurted everything out, “I found my dad and I’m at his house and T. J., I mean Sarah, is here, too. She’s alive, just like I thought. And…she’s living with him, and …” And I had to stop there because I was out of breath.

But I’d said it.

There was a long pause. Then, “W-what did you say?” Mom asked in a voice barely louder than a whisper.

I closed my eyes and leaned back against the toilet. Did I really have to say it all over again?

“I said, ‘I found my dad and—’”

“Sarah’s…alive?” Mom interrupted.

“Yes!”

“She’s there with you?”

“Well, not right here. She’s outside. With him. She didn’t know anything about you and me. She thought—well, never mind right now. They’re out there talking and then—”

“Where are you right now?” Mom wanted to know.

“I told you, I’m at…my dad’s house.”

“Yes, but where is that? What’s the address?”

I told her.

“You stay put,” Mom demanded. “I’m calling the police. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Wait, Mom! Don’t call the police,” I begged. What would my dad and T. J. think when the police pulled up in their driveway?

But it was too late. Mom had already hung up.