The Family You Choose (13 page)

"Not exactly," Michael said with a sneer. "It
wasn’t a whole slew of women, it was just one." He smiled and she
didn’t know why, but she took a step back.

"Yeah, I guess that’s something Alex wouldn’t
mention. I’m sorry there was...such drama in your father’s last
days."

"You don’t get it, do you?" Michael stepped
forward. "It wasn’t two separate things—my father had an affair,
and then he died. It was all of a piece, and Alex wasn’t just
looking, he helped."

The thought of the younger Alex in a love
triangle with Stephen sickened Miranda, but she forced herself to
think about it. Because she didn’t want to think about the other
question which loomed so thickly between them that they didn’t need
to say it.

But he wasn’t going to let it go. "You know
you want to know."

"I don’t."

"Not even what she looked like?"

"You saw her?"

"I did." Another step closer. "The night he
died. A car accident."

Miranda bit the inside of her cheek. "What
did she look like?"

Michael stared at her. "She had a very nice
body. I thought so even then. Much like yours, although I’m pretty
sure you’re a few inches taller. She was blonde. Very pale. And
green eyes. Maybe the greenest eyes I’ve ever seen."

Miranda slapped Michael so hard he stumbled
back. He rubbed his cheek. "Didn’t you ever think," he continued,
"that it was such a sad coincidence that they both were killed in a
car accident? Didn’t you ever ask how she knew Alex, or at least,
how well?"

"You’re lying." She tried to keep her hands
shaking. "My mother wasn’t sleeping with either of them."

"Your mother was Alex’s whore," Michael spat.
"And my dad’s. And that’s why it’s so fitting that you’d be here
with Alex, after all these years. Why do you think he kept you
around, hmm? He probably thought that you could be useful
someday."

"No!" she said, and she couldn’t stop
trembling now, all over. "That’s the way you think. That isn’t the
way anyone else thinks."

"Go on; tell me that Alex loves you. Tell me
that Alex would never do that to you. Because Alex isn’t so
calculating, Alex isn’t so cold. Alex isn’t so ruthless, right?
You’ve never seen him step on people and treat them like
things."

"Not unless he was doing it for you!"

"And didn’t you wonder why? I know you did!
It never occurred to you that Alex might be the one who needed to
make something up to me?"

Miranda’s eyes welled up. "Pretend every
piece of garbage you’re spewing is true. That doesn’t make anything
you’ve done okay."

"Maybe. Maybe not. But you can understand
now, can’t you? He robbed my father of his life over some piece of
trash."

"You just stop!" She took a deep, slow
breath. "Why—why do you keep insisting it’s Alex’s fault?"

"Because I heard them." He was right up in
her face right now, so close that she could smell the martini. "He
told my mother. And then my father left and that was the last time
I saw him. He and your tramp of a mother got into his car, but they
never got out."

Miranda sniffled and tried to smile to keep
her lips from trembling. "Why should I believe you?"

"I wouldn’t expect you to take my word for
it." His nose was touching hers. "Go ahead, check it out. Look him
up, look her up, look my dad up. Ask Keith, I bet he remembers her.
Ask Richard, maybe Lucy said something to him. Or don’t. Just go
back to your perfect little bubble world. I’ll get what I want
anyway."

"What do you want?"

Michael smiled. Before she could move, he
kissed her and grabbed her hands behind her so she couldn’t stop
him. She thought she was going to choke. She wriggled her arms free
and punched his chest. He grabbed her hands and shoved his tongue
down her throat, pushing her up against the wall.

Finally, he came up for air. "Did Alex ever
kiss you like that?"

Miranda kicked his shins and punched him
again. "Get out!" she screamed. He blew her a kiss before he turned
and left.

Miranda rocked back and forth on the couch,
hugging her knees to her chest. Keith came in a moment later. "Is
everything alright?"

She blinked. "Keith, do you remember my
mother?"

He opened his mouth as if he were going to
say something, then stopped. That was enough.

Miranda ran out of the room, grabbed her coat
and ran out of the house to the library. She’d loved going there so
much when she was younger but now, even as she ran there, she
dreaded it in the pit of her stomach.

The layout had changed since she was younger.
She asked at the Information Desk in order to find the Reference
Room. "Please, I need to find something."

The librarian smiled uncomfortably. "Of
course. What are we looking for?"

She shook her head. "Who, actually, and a
bunch of them. I need everything you have on Stephen Abbot,
Alexander Sheldon, and Tatiana Hamilton."

It took an hour and a half, but they
collected microfiche newspaper articles, Boston Magazine mentions,
birth records and obituaries. "It looks like you’ll have to go to
Magnolia to get Ms. Hamilton’s birth record, but we have Mr.
Sheldon and Mr. Abbot’s right here." Then Miranda sat at the desk,
poring over the details of everyone else’s past.

Stephen Abbot. Son of Michael Abbot and
Regina Snyder. Alexander Sheldon. Son of Bryce Sheldon and Linda
Stiles. Bryce Sheldon, deceased. Linda Stiles, deceased. Regina
Snyder, deceased. Stephen Abbot, married to Annabelle Hendrickson.
Michael Abbot, deceased. Alexander Sheldon, Black Monday Survivor.
Stephen Abbot, father of Michael Abbot the second. Alex Sheldon,
boy wonder renowned for business acumen. Alex Sheldon, the most
eligible bachelor in Boston. Stephen Abbot, deceased. Stephen Abbot
and Tatiana Hamilton Harel of Magnolia, killed in an accident on
the Massachusetts Turnpike. Annabelle Hendrickson Abbot, widow of
Stephen Abbot, deceased.

Miranda’s hand shook. She thought she had
them all in chronological order, but something was missing. Where
was it? There—the Boston Magazine blurb. "Alex Sheldon, Boston’s
most eligible bachelor, accompanying Stephen Abbot, his wife
Annabelle Abbot and an unknown female companion, to the AIDS
Awareness Ball." She looked at the picture. "Can I get this blown
up and in color?" Fifteen minutes later, she held it in her hand.
There was dark-haired Annabelle, smiling for the cameras, while
Stephen all but scowled at Alex kissing the forehead of his unknown
female companion, who had her eyes closed. His blonde, pale, female
companion. Wearing the same black dress she wore every time she
appeared in Miranda’s dream.

Trembling, crying, Miranda couldn’t move for
ten minutes. The librarian came over. "Is everything alright?"
Miranda wiped her tears and tried to tidy up all of the materials.
"Don’t worry—we’ll take care of that," the librarian said gently.
"And these copies are yours to keep."

"No, I don’t think so."

Miranda walked home, looking straight ahead.
She dried her tears before she walked into the front door. She went
into the study and tried to open Alex’s desk. Keith came in as she
was using a letter opener to try and pry open the drawers. "Do you
have the key?"

"I don’t think Alex wants you in there," he
said sternly.

"And Alex gets what he wants, doesn’t he? No
matter what."

Keith left, and two minutes later Miranda’s
phone rang. "Just like clockwork," she said in answer.

"Miranda, what are you doing?" Was that panic
she heard in Alex’s voice?

"Just trying to see what other goodies about
my mother I can find," she said.

She heard him inhale. "What are you talking
about?"

"The library has only so much." She smiled;
she was sure he could see that through the phone line. "You were
never going to tell me, were you?" She hung up the phone, and
pushed his monitor off the table. She threw his container of brandy
at the fireplace. Keith came in, white-faced. Miranda calmly stood
up. "I don’t care if you call him again," she said as she walked
out.

She got into her car and programmed Magnolia,
Massachusetts into her GPS. She hadn’t been there in so long; she’d
even forgotten that it was part of Gloucester. Her phone rang. It
was Alex. She ignored it. Again. And again. It rang again, and it
was Richard. "Miranda, where are you? Alex is frantic."

"He can screw himself, Richard. Even more so
because he called you." She got off the exit. "Is Jessie okay? Are
you okay? Is Zainab okay?"

"Jessie is doing much better, but we can talk
about that later. What is going on?"

"Richard, what do you remember about my
mother?"

"Your mother? I’m sorry. I never met
her."

She could still love Richard. "What about
Michael? What about Lucy? What did they say?"

"Nothing worth repeating, or remembering, for
that matter. What is going on with you?"

"Just remember that I love you and Jessie and
Zainab, okay? Now don’t worry about anything."

She drove until she arrived at the tiny beach
village. It was winter now and the town looked almost deserted. She
parked at the beach and walked onto the sand. The way the cold sea
air clung to her cheeks—it was a memory so old she didn’t remember
the first time, it just felt like home. Her mother must have taken
her on this beach, many times, maybe even during the winter.

She stared at the grey, choppy water. She
reached out her hand, as if she could touch the sky and water and
everything as it had been at some point when she was a small child.
She held her hand in front of her and looked at it, trying hard to
remember. Then she turned around and looked at the houses across
the street. Her house, the house she’d lived in until she was five,
must be one of those behind her. Her mother had been there, her
grandmother too. They’d been a family, a real family. Maybe her
father had been in that house as well...

Her phone rang again. It was Alex. Alex was
once again coming to take her away from this place with the grey
water, sky and truth. Once again trying to lure her and tell her
how much he loved her and that he was going to make it okay. Rage
overcame her, and she hurled her phone into the ocean. Then she sat
on the beach, staring into the dark water for over an hour before
it finally got so cold that she had to go to her car to keep
warm.

She started her car and programmed the
address into the GPS without asking herself why. She didn’t think
anything the whole time she drove, only about the road and the
cold.

She parked the car and walked up to the door.
She rang the doorbell. No answer. She rang again. She knocked. It
was past eleven. She didn’t care.

The door finally opened. Michael stood there
with a glass of wine in his hand, his shirt pulled out of his
pants. Miranda looked at him for a moment, remembering his cruelty
just a few hours before. "Let’s go," she said before he could say
anything.

She walked inside and took off her coat and
threw it on his couch. She walked to his bedroom door and kicked
off her boots. "What are you doing?" Michael asked. Miranda walked
into the bedroom, pulling her sweater over her head.

"How drunk are you?"

She stripped naked while Michael stood in
silence. She faced him full on. He looked her up and down, his
mouth half-open, and then stared at her face. "Really, Michael,"
she said, moving to his bed. "Going once, going twice-"

"Sold," he said, closing the door and putting
down his glass. He stripped just as quickly. She lay back on the
bed. He put his hands on her breasts. She forced herself not to
flinch. Then he brought his lips to hers. She put her hand on his
mouth. "Just one thing… don’t kiss me."

She lay in bed staring at the ceiling. She
thought about Emily’s dress on the night of her reception. She
thought about how pretty Emily looked, like an all grown up big
little girl; which was such a joke because of course she was all
grown up, and not a little girl at all, out of college and married.
Miranda was a different kind of joke. She was a little girl who
never grew up.

They’ll never forgive me, she thought, trying
hard not to let on how painful this was. She turned her head to the
side so she wouldn’t have to look at Michael’s face. He was...this
wasn’t how she’d ever pictured it, and she’d never pictured it with
him. She’d shuddered as his hands and mouth had worked over her
body. She thought she should be grateful, somewhat, that he hadn’t
lingered on her but had gotten to the point pretty quickly. She
wished she’d turned the light off. It killed her to be there, but
that was why she was there.

Michael groaned at last, and then seemed to
fall on top of her. "Does that mean you’re finally done?" she said
with a mixture of exasperation and relief. He didn’t answer, but
Miranda pushed him off of her anyway. She stood up and grabbed her
clothes, her back to him. She was in pain, but she wasn’t going to
let on.

Michael turned over and she could feel him
watching her as she put her underwear on. "So...huh. Wow. What was
that?"

"I’m not much of a judge," Miranda said as
she notched up her bra, "but I’d say that was pretty
disgusting."

It sounded like he stopped breathing. "What
is your problem?"

She zipped up her jeans and then put on her
socks. She turned around and threw his pants at him, almost hitting
him in the face. She didn’t want to look at his nakedness and the
condom didn't cover enough. She already felt like she might be
sick.

"Don’t act so hurt," she said as she put on
her sweater. "How did you think this was going to work? ‘Oh,
Michael, it’s you, it’s always been you, I was such a fool.’ Or
whatever. I guess that would be sweet and I’d feel bad, except that
we both know you never wanted me for me. You wanted me for Alex."
She laughed. "Which is sort of sick, if you think about it."