“A contract signed under duress is not a valid contract,” Carol said, chewing the inside of her cheek as she often did when she was suppressing her indignation.
This might come as a shock, but that’s because for many, many years I forced myself to pretend Julia didn’t exist—as my mother insisted.
My mother was a good person, but she was other things as well, above all, fervently Roman Catholic. I lived in fear of getting pregnant, which was probably why I didn’t go to the doctor until I was four months along. The father of my baby was not in the picture. He was slightly older than I and “passing through” my hometown of Calais, PA. (Sounds way more exotic than it was—a mining town about 40 min. northeast of Pittsburgh.) I was a teenager in the hicks, itching to get out of Dodge and he, I mistakenly believed, was my ticket out. It’s an old story, the stuff of TV movies. When I found out I was pregnant, he had already left and I never felt more alone or scared. There was no one to turn to but Mom.
That’s why I agreed to her “solution.” She arranged for a private adoption through a local lawyer whose name I never knew. Then she sent me to live with my aunt Therese Zahm clear across state in Mahoken so people back home wouldn’t find out I was pregnant. (As if!) Julia was born on December 3, the winter after I graduated from high school. The lawyer, I was told, came to the hospital along with a professional nurse. They brought the legal papers that I signed and I could hear my baby girl crying down the hall as I slipped into a drugged sleep. Despite years of cancer and cancer treatments that left me nauseous, aching, and blistered, that night remains the worst of my life. I dream of it to this day.
My mother said it would be for the best, that I would thank her years later.
She was wrong.
“And I used to think
my
mother was a piece of work when I was a teenager,” Beth said. “Elsie seems like Carol Brady in comparison. To force a girl to give up her baby on the spot. . .”
Mom’s plan was for me to return home that Christmas. She told everyone that I’d been at a junior college in the Poconos and, for a while, I played along. But then I started crying for no reason and wandering around at night, restless. On one of those nights, in the spring after Julia was born, I managed to get down to Pittsburgh with a plan to hop a bus to Boston where my best friend from high school went to college. I made it to Scranton, but from there could only afford to go as far as Waterbury, Connecticut. Luckily, I found a job waitressing and a few months later met Sean at the diner where I worked and, well, you know the rest.
You also know Sean and how conservative he is and what a blow it would be for him to find out that the woman he loved kept a huge secret throughout his marriage, that she lied to him and to his sons, not only about their half sister, but also about their grandmother whom they were raised to believe died when I was a teenager. Which, in a way, she did.
Carol put a hand over Mary Kay’s. “That means Lynne’s mom doesn’t know her daughter is dead.”
“Or that she was even sick, I expect.” Mary Kay turned to Beth. “Did she ever say anything to you about her mother?”
Beth, more confused than either of them, could barely whisper. “No.”
After I got sick—or maybe it was when Kevin and Kyle were no longer children—I started thinking about Julia more and more. I became obsessed with finding out what happened to her, if she landed in a nice family, if she was loved, if she had red hair! So I made a few calls, first to the hospital in Mahoken to no avail. The hospital’s records were sealed—even though I’m the biological mother! I checked with Northampton County Orphans Court and found the same thing. The clerk told me in all likelihood the birth certificate had been changed to remove my name and replace it with the names of the adopting parents. So there’s no record tying me to Julia whatsoever.
Mary Kay put down the letter. “Dear lord!”
I guess by now you know where this is going. I am asking you the huge favor of picking up where I left off in my search for Julia. Believe me, I do not make this request lightly. I’m fully aware that it is a tremendous burden and interruption in your otherwise hectic lives. All I can say is that I trust no one else but you. We have been through so much—marital problems, job changes, cancer . . . teenagers! I know you guys will take this letter seriously and fulfill my last request. That alone gives me tremendous peace as I pass from this existence to (hopefully) another.
They felt deflated, flattened by the loss Lynne had been mourning for so many years while they had gone on with their routines, drinking martinis and bitching about their petty problems that couldn’t compare to being forced to hand over a baby, to running away from home and being cut off from family. Beth rested her head on Carol’s shoulder as Mary Kay finished the letter.
The first step in your search is definitely to contact my aunt Therese, who continues to live on Notch Road in Mahoken—by Allentown—and my mother, Eunice, something I haven’t been able to bring myself to do since I took that bus to Waterbury. I kept meaning to call her when I was in remission, but to do so would have meant welcoming her into my new life and introducing her to Sean and the boys, thereby raising all sorts of questions. Frankly, that would have been more toxic than the chemo.
My father was Carl Swann. He died in 1976, but Mom lives in the Beckwood Landing Assisted Living Center outside Calais. (A quarter mile off Route 66. I’m sure Carol will figure it out, what with her map skills.) You’ll find, enclosed, a letter I’ve written to her in a sealed envelope marked “To Mom.” Please tell her I love her very much and that I left this earth with no hard feelings, only loving memories. She might know, better than anyone, what happened to my daughter. If she hasn’t slammed the door on your faces, ask her if she remembers the name of the lawyer.
If you locate Julia, please give her the other envelope, my grandmother’s gold earrings (they’re in a box on my bureau), my wedding dress, and a hug, a mother’s hug from deep down. Please tell her I love her so, so much and that while I could not watch over her in life, I will do my best to watch over her in death. Our physical beings might pass away, but our love never does.
Needless to say, time is of the essence. Neither my aunt nor my mother was aware of my illness. . .
Mary Kay tapped the paper. “So that answers our question.”
. . . which means you will have to tell them of that, and of my passing before they find out some other way.
Beth let out a groan. “I’m not very good at that. It was hard enough calling you, Carol, with the news Lynne had died. I can’t imagine notifying total strangers.”
“It’ll be OK. I’ll be there and Mary Kay, too,” Carol said, foretelling the next line in Lynne’s letter.
This is why I hope the three of you can clear your schedules and do this as a group. It’ll definitely be more tolerable, might even be fun!
Right now, I’m sitting here, picturing you guys taking a road trip across Pennsylvania, crowded in Beth’s new Highlander, no husbands, no jobs, no kids, cranking the tunes, talking and laughing and winding down the day with martinis. And martinis are a must. I insist on a different one every night! After all, this is what we’re all about, right ladies? Don’t forget our mission statement to preserve and protect the endangered cocktail. If we don’t make the sacrifice, who will?
So, while I won’t be with you physically, trust that I’ll be there in spirit as you drink your spirits. Have one on me and good luck.
To paraphrase the Boss, everything dies, but maybe everything that dies comes back. And the Boss never lies.
Until then,
Love,
Lynne
“Can I see that?” Beth, her body aching in a strange new way, took the letter, biting a nail as she reread it word by word.
Mary Kay finished her martini and set the glass down declaratively. “Man, am I ever gonna miss her. That letter was so Lynne, so bursting with her kick-ass attitude.”
Carol was silent, analyzing this assignment that would be no small feat indeed. It would require nerves of steel, breaking the news to Lynne’s aunt and, especially, Lynne’s mother. Then there was the challenge of locating Julia—a virtual impossibility, considering the legal obstacles—not to mention the exhaustion from driving hundreds of miles.
She would have to cancel her date with Scott so she could go back to her own apartment and pack, make arrangements for work. Carol realized she should have been disappointed by this—actually, she
had
been looking forward to their night together on the drive to Connecticut that morning—but now, after being home, after sitting through that wrenching service and finding this letter, the absolute last thing on her mind was sex. Sleeping with another man besides Jeff would be emotional enough without thoughts of death and lost babies rolling around in her head. No, tonight was not the night. It would be unfair to Scott. “I think we should leave tomorrow bright and early,” she said.
Beth lifted her head from the letter. “Tomorrow? Can’t we hold off until Monday?”
“I’m concerned about her mother and aunt finding out. With the Internet these days, news travels in a flash. What’s to prevent someone in Lynne’s hometown from coming across Lynne’s obituary online and contacting her mother?”
“I hadn’t thought of that.”
“Makes sense to me,” Mary Kay said. “All I have to do is convince my supervisor that this is a personal crisis and with my saved vacation days, I’ll get the week off. How about you, Beth?”
“The library? They won’t care. George can take over.”
Mary Kay turned to Carol. “I bet for you it’s a big deal, what with that fancy law job.”
“Another lawyer will cover my clients. Besides, I happen to have an in with the firm’s founding partner,” she said, smiling to herself. “Not like I don’t have some pull.”
“Yeah, I wanna hear more about that pull,” Mary Kay said. “You can fill us in on the
loooong
drive across Pennsylvania.”
So they hammered out logistics. Carol would rush back to New York, pack a bag, call her clients, and work with the firm to rearrange her caseload. The next morning, she’d hop the MetroNorth to Danbury, where Beth and Mary Kay would pick her up in Beth’s car, as Lynne suggested. If all went according to Beth’s scheduling, they could be in Pennsylvania by noon on Saturday.
It was done. By the same time the next day, they would be on the road, searching for Lynne’s long-lost daughter.
Chapter Six
D
awn broke through the high windows in Mary Kay’s bedroom as she quietly slid out of bed, leaving Drake peacefully asleep on her Egyptian cotton sheets, his broad back rising and falling softly. She kissed his shoulder and snuck into the shower, mentally ticking through a list of last minute errands.
She was running late. The plan was to meet Carol at the train station around eight and already it was almost six thirty. Thankfully, she’d packed the night before, tucking away flatware and tablecloths into the cooler that held various mysterious bottles for their journey, along with her antique silver shaker and bright Capri hand-painted martini glasses.
Just because they’d be on the road was no reason to settle for plastic cups. But that was Mary Kay. Why settle for less when you can have more?
After her shower, she toweled off, applied her makeup, and opened the peach-colored packet of birth-control pills, turning the dial to the next dose, pushing it through the foil and promptly dropping it into the sink.
Turning on the faucet, she sighed and watched the little green pill swirl down the drain. She remembered an article she’d read about the groundwater being contaminated with estrogen and other hormones that had been flushed away. Could it be that she was but one of a legion of women who secretly wasted their birth control?
“Why do I even bother
pretending
to take them?” she asked herself, knowing full well the answer.
Because she wanted Drake to think she could get pregnant—even if she couldn’t.
The ruse had started quite by accident. When they first started sleeping together, Drake came across an old packet of her birth-control pills and made a comment about how interesting it was that she still needed them at her age. Mary Kay had been slightly taken aback because she didn’t think of herself as being
that
old.
OK, so she had crossed the big 4-0 and was a full five (pushing six) years older than Drake. But as a nurse midwife she’d helped plenty of women her age deliver their babies. It was funny that Drake didn’t know this.
What was more striking, however, was how pleased, almost animated, he became after stumbling across those pills, as if he were seeing her in a whole new light. Overnight, their relationship bloomed from casual to serious. They started spending weekends together, going for long walks and hikes. While Drake taught her how to belay down a rock face and build cairns, they hashed out those dealbreaking commitment issues like religion and money and whether it was ethically wrong to have more than two kids.
Turned out, Drake loved children. Not only did he work with them in his profession as a child psychologist, but in his spare time he helped abused kids regain their self-esteem by leading them on wilderness adventures. Mary Kay had never met someone so giving, so eager to make the world a better place.
She was literally head over heels and before she knew it, the prospect of losing him filled her with panic. By then she didn’t have the heart to tell Drake the real reason she used to take birth control wasn’t to prevent a child—but to spare her life. After being diagnosed with scarred fallopian tubes and, therefore, at a high risk of ectopic pregnancy, Mary Kay was prescribed the Pill, which she used to take religiously until she figured that, after forty, it was doing more harm than good. Now she just washed them down the drain.