Hummingbird Heart (8 page)

“Back when I was a teenager.” He cleared his throat and looked down at the table. “Back when Sheri wasn't much older than Dylan is now.”

“Same age,” Mom said. Her voice sounded tight.

Karma just nodded. “Uh-huh. I know Amanda and Mom were best friends in school.”

I leaned forward. “So, were you guys all in the same class?”

He shook his head. “I wasn't at school with them. I met your mom a few weeks after I graduated.”

I'd always assumed they'd met at school. Actually, I was pretty sure Mom had said so. “So where'd you meet then?”

Mark laughed. “At a party, actually. Someone's backyard.” He looked at me, head cocked to one side. “Summer nights, patios, too much beer flowing. You know the scene.”

Mom interrupted, her voice hard-edged. “Jesus Christ, Mark. Didn't we agree there was no need to drag up the past?”

So that was why she'd rushed out of my room with the phone—to make Mark promise to adhere to her stupid code of secrecy. I wondered if the photographs weren't the only thing she'd been lying to me about. “I guess Mark is free to talk about whatever he wants,” I said coldly.

Mom stared at Mark like she was just daring him to say another word. He shrugged. “Relax, Mandy.”

“Amanda.” She was silent for a long minute. Then she shook her head. “Sorry. It's fine. So we met at a party. Whatever.” She cleared her throat. “All ancient history. So, Mark, do you and Lisa have kids?”

Changing the subject. Like that wasn't totally obvious. I wondered what she was hiding. I mean, I already knew she'd been a total pothead and got pregnant at sixteen from a one-night stand. It wasn't as if she had some perfect straight-A student, moral leader and virgin-till-marriage image to maintain.

“A daughter.” Mark pulled out his phone. “Her name's Casey. She's almost four.” He looked at the image on the screen for a long moment, his mouth twisted into a crooked smile. I thought he was going to hand the phone to Mom, but he handed it to me instead. “Your half sister,” he said.

I took the phone from him and stared at the photo. My half sister. A round-faced girl, smiling, with short dark hair and big eyes. Cute kid, I guess. My stomach was full of something much squirmier than butterflies and my throat was getting all tight. As quickly as I could without being rude, I passed the phone to Mom.

“Must be hard to be away from her,” Mom said.

“It is,” Mark said. His voice sounded funny, like he really meant it. Like he could hardly stand to be away from his precious little girl.

I sucked on my bottom lip. He'd been away from me, his other daughter, for my whole life and he hadn't cared at all. Hadn't even cared enough to stay in touch with Mom to find out how I was doing.

Mark was fiddling with his napkin, folding it into a small square and unfolding it again.

“How come you got in touch?” I blurted out. “I mean, you never wanted to see me before, so how come you wanted to meet me now?”

He squeezed the bridge of his nose and then rubbed his hands over his cheeks. I could see a faint bluish shadow, like he hadn't shaved that day. He cleared his throat. “It's a complicated situation.”

I wondered if his wife knew about me, and I felt a flush of shame, as if I'd done something wrong. “You were embarrassed? Ashamed of me?”

He made a small noise of protest. “Of course not.”

Across the table, Karma was wide-eyed, her mouth hanging open slightly.

He picked up his napkin, shook out the wrinkles and folded it neatly in half. “Maybe you should talk to your mother about this.”

I raised my eyebrows. “She can't tell me why you never wanted to be involved, can she? So I'm asking you.”

There was a long uncomfortable silence. Mark looked at my mother and made a helpless gesture. She just shook her head, lips clamped together tightly. I looked down at the white tablecloth. I wished my mother wasn't sitting there listening, but I had to ask. “Didn't you ever even wonder about me?”

Mark looked at me. “I'm here, now. I know it must seem odd, but can we just move forward? Get to know each other?”

“Kind of hard to get to know you if you can't even answer a simple question,” I said.

Mark rubbed his hands over his face again and said nothing. The server arrived and began placing plates of food on the table, all beautifully arranged and decorated with curly bits of finely sliced vegetables. When the server was gone, Mom looked at Mark. “Why are you doing this?” she asked. “We don't need you interfering in our family.”

He picked up his napkin, twisted it into a tight ball and let it drop onto the table beside his plate. “Long story,” he said. “Let's just enjoy our dinner and get to know each other. Then perhaps the girls could take a little walk and you and I could have a few minutes alone together. There's something I'd like to discuss with you.”

My heart fluttered. He was going to ask me to come and visit, maybe even stay for a while. That had to be it. What else could it be?

T
en

Dinner was painful. I just wanted to know what Mark was doing here, and I guess Mom did too. I wished he'd get on with it. I poked at my salad, sliding tomato and cucumber slices to one side and twirling shredded carrots with my fork.

“Beautiful city,” Mark said.

It was at least the third time we'd covered that particular topic.

Mom nodded. “Yes.”

Long silence. I chewed on a piece of lettuce that tasted like nothing at all and waited for Mark to say how nice the hotel was.

“It's a lovely hotel,” Mark said.

Mom shrugged. “I wouldn't know.”

Another long silence.

“So, did Lisa come with you?” Mom asked at last.

Mark shook his head. “She stayed with our daughter.” His eyes flickered toward me and back to Mom. “With Casey.”

“Of course. So. Is she working, or…”

“Not right now. She's a full-time parent.”

“And you have a full-time income. Must be nice,” Mom said.

Mark just shook his head and didn't say anything.

I didn't see why she had to be bitchy about it. It wasn't Mark's fault that no one wanted to buy her weird photographs. Maybe she was pissed off to find out he was so wealthy. After all, he'd never paid a penny of child support. I wondered if that would change now, since he'd finally decided to meet me.

Still, I couldn't help noticing that Mark wasn't asking me anything. If he was here because he wanted to get to know me, you'd think he'd show some interest. I pushed my plate away. “I'm not really hungry. Um, Karma?”

She stuck another French fry into her mouth. “What?”

“Ready to go for a walk?”

She looked at her plate. “No.”

“Come on…” I kicked her gently under the table.

She looked up at me.

I mouthed, “Please?”

Karma sighed, casting a final regretful look at her unfinished hamburger. “Okay. Okay.”

Karma wandered around, but I stayed close to the restaurant entrance, hidden behind a giant potted palm tree, watching Mom and Mark. I wished I could hear their conversation, but they were a good thirty or forty feet away with several tables of chattering people between us.

Mom was leaning toward him. I could imagine what she was saying. She'd be telling him to get on with it, spit it out, say why he was here.

Mark put his elbows on the table and rested his chin on his knuckles.

Mom folded her hands in her lap.

He was talking. Talking. Talking.

Then Mom suddenly tensed. She raised her voice, but I couldn't hear the words. She started to stand, and Mark grabbed her arm.

Mom sank back into her seat and he let go of her wrist, leaning toward her.

I couldn't imagine what they could be talking about. Maybe he wanted me to visit and Mom was saying no. Or…

Stone
, I told myself.
Be as hard as stone. Be ice. Don't let
yourself care.
I swallowed hard and my throat was so tight it felt like I was swallowing marbles. Even if Mark wanted me to visit, I wasn't sure I would. He hadn't ever wanted to meet me before. Why should he get what he wanted now?

A man at the table closest to the entrance stood up, blocking my view. Karma sidled up to me.

“What's going on?”

“I don't know. It looked like they were fighting, but I couldn't hear anything.” I leaned to one side, trying to see them without being obvious. A waitress standing just inside the entrance gave me an odd look. I ignored her. The man sat back down, but I couldn't even see Mom's and Mark's faces—just their heads bent low over the table in conversation.

“What do you think of him?” Karma asked. “Do you like him?”

I shrugged.

“He looks like you, don't you think?”

“I guess. Sort of. I mean, for a middle-aged man.”

“I think he looks like a movie star,” Karma said.

I snorted. “He looks like a middle-aged lawyer, which is what he is.”

She shook her head impatiently. “Like that guy, what's his name? In that movie where the girl gets kidnapped and—”

“Shut up a minute,” I told her. Mom had just pushed her chair back from the table and stood up. “I wonder what they're talking about.”

“Old times, I bet,” Karma said. “I wonder if he was ever
my
mom's boyfriend. Then he'd sort of be like my dad too.”

“Oh, Karma…” I looked at her, wondering what to say. Most of the time she was such a tough, scrappy little kid and then she'd come out with something like this, and I'd feel so sad for her. I'd remember that she was really an orphan, just like in all the old-fashioned kids' books I used to read—Mary in the
Secret Garden,
Anne in
Anne
of Green Gables
, Sara Crewe in
The Little Princess
. Though of course in the end Sara turned out not to be an orphan after all. I opened my mouth to say something lame about how it was okay just being the three of us, her and me and Mom—but next thing I knew, Mom came flying out of the restaurant. She grabbed both me and Karma. “Let's go.”

She hustled us across the lobby, and out through the automatic doors. I pulled free. “Mom! What's wrong?”

She didn't answer. A soft rain was falling. I started to cry. “Stop it, Mom. You can't do this. Just tell me what happened, okay?”

Mom just pressed her lips tightly together and shook her head. She kept walking, down the hill and into the underground parking lot. “Not now, Dylan. Get in the car.”

“Mom!”

“Don't argue, Dylan.” She was almost shouting. I didn't think I'd ever seen her so upset. “You too, Karma.”

Karma got in the car, her eyes wide and scared. I hesitated. “Please…can't I just run back and say goodbye?”

Mom banged the palms of her hands against the car roof. “Get in the goddamn car, Dylan.”

I got in and slammed the door behind me so hard the jolt made my whole arm ache. Mom reversed out of the parking spot, swore as she almost hit the back of a pickup truck and drove quickly out of the parking garage. I stared out the car window, twisting around to watch the hotel disappear behind us.

What the hell was her problem? It didn't make sense. I couldn't even imagine what Mark could have said or done to make Mom walk out like that. She'd already practically agreed that I could go to Ontario to visit. I opened my mouth to beg for an explanation, but something—some fear—stopped me. What if it was something really bad? For all I knew, Mark could've spent the last ten years in jail for child molestation or murder or something. Maybe he had just told my mother something horrible. Something I would rather not know.

I pushed my knuckles against the sharp edge of my teeth and closed my eyes so tightly it hurt. I could feel hot tears squeezing out anyway. Karma's small warm hand touched mine. A tentative touch, a firmer grasp, a long squeeze. I squeezed back gratefully, but after a minute, I pulled away. Karma knew how it felt to lose a real parent. What had I lost? Nothing.