The Girl of Sand & Fog (3 page)

There, I’ve said it. The very thing my mom has
forbidden me from talking me about to anyone. But fuck, Chrissie, I can’t keep
it bottled up inside me any longer.

My fingers tighten on the steering wheel.

Bobby searches my face. “No wonder you hate him.”

“I don’t understand.” Zoe is sweet, but a trifle
slow.

Bobby turns toward the backseat. “Christ, Zoe,
you can’t be that dumb.” Clearly it is beneath him to explain to her because he
turns his focus back on me. “My mom never said a word. Does Linda know about
the baby?”

I bite my lower lip.

I’ve already said too much.

Shit, I’m shaking my head anyway.

Why do I keep telling this guy my mom’s private
shit?

“I don’t understand how or when,” Bobby says
slowly, as if he can’t make sense of this. “Alan Manzone’s been on tour for a
year. Are they together again? Does he fly in during the breaks to see your
mom?”

I shake my head. “The night of Jesse Harris’s
funeral was the last time my mom saw Alan. Only time they’ve been together in
over a year. Makes it pretty clear what they did that night together.”

Bobby’s eyes widen.

God, it sounds even worse aloud than as a
suspicion in my head.

“That’s fucked up,” he says in a heavy way that
confirms he’s pieced this one together.

“Tell me something I don’t know,” I whisper,
feeling the tight lid on everything suddenly blown away. “Why do you think I’m
so messed up? It just never ends. It just always is, my mom and Alan Manzone,
and I can’t take it anymore. I mean, shit, couldn’t they think of a better time
to start fucking again than with my stepdad still warm in the grave? It made me
so angry when I saw Khloe and figured it out. She sent all us kids away the
night of Jesse’s burial and when I came home I just knew. And then, there was
Khloe nine months later. I just wanted to scream at her ‘how obvious is that,
Chrissie?’”

I start to breathe in a rapid, overly emotional
way. “Then, seeing Khloe, the truth about me became something I can’t pretend
away. It’s so obvious we are not half sisters. And now I can’t push it from my
head. Why does she lie to me? Or is it Alan? Does she lie to him and I just
have to live with it? And now I’m angry all the time. Angry at her. Angry at
Alan. Angry at the lying. Angry at the silence. I’m angry all the time. I
usually feel like I’m going to explode. But I can’t. I’m not even supposed to
tell people about Khloe.”

Bobby takes a moment to digest that thoughtfully.
“You mean no one knows about the baby? Not even him?”

I shake my head. “And I’d really appreciate it if
the two of you keep it that way. What I did to Mom back there, it wasn’t cool.
Not cool at all. I don’t know what’s going on. But she hasn’t spoken to Alan
since the funeral. I don’t want her hurt.”

I watch Bobby’s gaze shift to fix on my fingers
clutching the steering wheel and it is then I see they are trembling even
though they are curled around the wheel so tightly my knuckles are white. It is
one thing to behave badly. It is another thing to feel the aftermath of
something you’ve done to someone you love. I hurt Chrissie today and I did it
on purpose. I start to cry.

“I am such a bitch!”

“Pull into that driveway,” Bobby says.

“Why?”

“You’re shaking. You shouldn’t drive when you’re
upset. That’s where I live. We’ll hang here until you’re feeling better.”

I park the car and sit clutching the steering
wheel and breathing heavily.

“Do you feel like getting out?” he asks.

I shake my head.

“Fine. We can just sit here,” he murmurs
soothingly.

We sit in the car for what seems like ages
surrounded by my emotional heaviness. And then, no matter how I fight it, it
happens again. Truth bubbling upward and out of me.

I fix my eyes on Bobby. “Something is very wrong.
My mom won’t call Alan. They haven’t spoken in almost a year. That’s never
happened before. I hate him, but I don’t want him gone forever. I don’t want to
not see him anymore. He used to send me a present and a check every birthday
and Christmas. I got nothing on my birthday this year. Not even a call. That’s
never happened before. I don’t want him gone from my life for good.”

Bobby shakes his head. “Of course you don’t want
him gone. Alan Manzone is your dad.”

Anger surges upward inside me at being
misunderstood, because up to that point it seemed like Bobby was the one person
who got me.

“No,” I hiss, aggravated, but for some reason
explaining anyway. “I don’t want him gone until I know for certain he is my
dad. Understand? I want him to admit it, explain to me why they’ve lied about
it, apologize and then go away. Once I get the truth I won’t ever talk to him
again.”

“You don’t mean that,” Zoe exclaims.

Cracking silence surrounds me in the car.

“Oh no, she means it,” Bobby says.

That he gets that without any sort of judgment
reinstates his status with me.

I hear a cell phone beep, signaling a text, and watch
him fish his phone from his pocket. He reads it quickly and clicks off the
phone without responding. I don’t like the change of his expression.

“Your girlfriend?” I ask sharply, irritated by
the flash of unexpected jealousy. Fuck, where did that come from? I arch a brow
challengingly. “You can text her back if you want to.”

“Not my girlfriend,” he replies, annoyed.

“I don’t believe you. You look uncomfortable.
We’ve just met. You don’t need to lie to me. Why do all guys lie about
everything?”

I don’t know why I’m picking a fight with him,
and certainly not such a lame fight since, jeez, we only just met today and
even a crazy girl couldn’t think he owes her anything.

“I hate liars,” I repeat again argumentatively.

For the first time I see a flash of anger on his
face. “All guys don’t lie. I don’t lie. Not ever, Kaley.”

He retrieves the phone, clicks to the text and
tosses it at me. Pouty and feigning indifference, I glance at the screen.

Linda:
Whose car is that? Who are those girls? What’s up, Brat? Afraid to introduce
them to your crazy mom?

I toss the phone into his lap and start to laugh.
“I thought Chrissie was bad. Your mom sends you texts from the house when
you’re home?”

Zoe laughs. “Linda is so funny.”

“Yeah, but she is a pain in the ass,” Bobby says,
opening his door and setting one leg out. “Do you want to come in?”

As emotionally unsteady as I’m feeling, I debate
the wisdom of following Bobby into the house and coming face-to-face with more
shit that might rattle me. There isn’t a person on this planet more connected
to Alan Manzone than Len Rowan is, unless one tosses into the mix Chrissie who
somehow exists in total connectivity with the man without having been his
significant other in over ten years.

It often seems as if everyone in my world
revolves around Alan, even me, for as long as I can remember. And what is most
infuriating about that is that he seems to hold us all emotionally hostage
without effort, awareness or want.

It takes me a minute to decide, and Bobby just
sits there waiting for me. With an aggravated sigh, I unbuckle and climb from
the driver’s seat. Whatever there is in there, it can’t be worse than any of
the other shit I deal with on a daily basis, and a part of me is curious about
the Rowans since Bobby is such a difficult-to-read sort of guy.

Difficult.

Intriguing.

Definitely hot body.

I don’t need to complicate my messed-up life with
him.

What the fuck am I doing here?

CHAPTER 3

My
mouth drops.

I stand inside the main foyer and stare in
disbelief. Fuck, I don’t know what I expected to find here, but it wasn’t this.

The inside of the house stirs instant reaction,
like what you’d have if too much sensory simulation is forced on you all at
once. I’ve grown up in modest affluence, and though I do know that our family
has money, that we are privileged, somehow Jesse and Chrissie always made a
point to live conservatively that way.

Chrissie believes in not ruining children with
money, a philosophy that started the last generation with Grandpa Jack and his
earthy, very humbly chic existence in Santa Barbara.

I’ve certainly watched enough episodes of
Real
Housewives of Orange County
that I shouldn’t be surprised by anything found
in an affluent Southern California neighborhood. But this house demands
reaction.

I’ve never seen anything like this.

I shift my gaze to look out through the line of
tall windows at the back of the house with its stunning view of the Pacific
Ocean, and can’t help but think that as breathtaking as the location is, the house
is just plain obscene. There is something absolutely creepy about the
incredible amount of memorabilia strategically scattered across the walls from
floor to ceiling. Pictures, gold and platinum albums, guitars in cases: they
are everywhere. It’s like the fucking Rock ’n’ Roll Hall of Fame in here.

But with only one inductee: Alan Manzone and the
members of Blackpoll.

“Ridiculous, isn’t it?” Bobby says. “Linda
considers herself the official biographer of the band, keeper of the history,
and takes that role too seriously.”

I stare at my left hand. Somehow Bobby caught it
in his without my realizing it. He looks uncomfortable. Embarrassed. And
something else I’m not sure of. I decide to skip over his remarks and be
generous about this.

I smile. “Your mom loves your dad. I think it’s
all kind of sweet.”

He rolls his eyes. “Bullshit. It’s vulgar and you
know it.” 

I shake my head. “Impressive, but not vulgar. And
definitely sweet.”

I start to study the pictures on the walls. There
are almost as many of Alan here as there are of the Rowans. Well, they do have
a long history with him, just like Chrissie does, evidenced on the walls with
the number of personal moments caught on film here.

Most of the pictures I’ve never seen before. They
are private photos. Family photos. I don’t know how I know that. I just do.

I am halfway through the entryway when a series
of pictures nearly drops me to the floor. Tucked in between the Rowans’
personal moments are personal moments of
me
that I have never seen
before.

Christ, there are pictures of me as a small
child, me
with
Alan, tucked into the history here. I stare at one of us
on the beach—I couldn’t be more than four—and the side-by-side still of our
faces is an undeniable visual confirmation of what I know to be true: that he
is my real dad.

I start to hyperventilate and frantically
continue searching the pictures.

“Kaley, what’s wrong?” Bobby asks.

I can’t stop shaking. “I’ve not seen any of this
before. Not ever. Even my mom doesn’t have these photos.”

I jerk free of Bobby’s hand.

“What?” says Zoe, concerned and clueless.

I shove my face into hers. “There are photos of
me all over these walls. Look. That little girl is me. There are photos of me
I’ve never seen before. Me with Alan Manzone. They are everywhere!”

“So?” Zoe asks.

I’m breathing hard and furious now. “Do you know
what it’s like to see pieces of your life you know nothing about in a
stranger’s house?”

“We’re hardly strangers, Kaley. I was in the room
the day you were born,” I hear someone say from behind me. “I consider us
family, which is why you and your mother are on my walls there.”

I whirl to see Linda Rowan standing in a doorway,
watching me.

“I was wondering how long it would be before you
turned up here,” Linda says. “I’m glad to see that my kid isn’t a complete jerk
and invited you over. I’ve been trying to catch Chrissie since she moved here
in September. What’s up with your mom? Why is she avoiding me?”

I have to count to ten not to scream. I’m in full
emotional free fall here and the conversation instantly transgressed to
Chrissie.

“Mom is avoiding everyone these days.”

“Grief can do that,” Linda says sadly.

Trapped in upwardly surging fury, I snap, “Grief
doesn’t have a goddamn thing to do with any of it.”

Linda’s expression tightens.

Oh shit.

I hate that the bitch of the past months has
chosen to surface now because Linda caught more than I wanted to tell with that
remark and it shows clearly on her face.

“Aha.” Linda lifts her dark brows. “Don’t think
you’re getting away without explaining that to me.”

She puts an arm around me and guides me to a
large family room in the back of the house.

“Christ, Mom,” Bobby says. “Can you give her a
chance to get through the door before you start the third degree?”

“Put a lid on it, Bobby,” Linda warns. “The girl
looks upset.”

She motions me to sit.

“I’m not upset at all,” I state stiffly.

“Aha,” Linda says again in a strangely
challenging and knowing way.

I shift my gaze and stare out the window. I
should get the fuck out of here. Right now. This is not going to be good. Not
for my mother. No way.

The afternoon has diverged so wildly from what I
expected today that I can’t seem to catch my footing with each new shift. And
somehow I’ve brought myself here, with Linda Rowan staring at me, clearly far
more perceptive than her appearance suggests. She has a way of studying someone
that looks uncomfortably like Dr. Phil, as if she is constantly analyzing those
around her and trying to resolve a plan to fix them.

My temper spikes up again. I don’t need fixing
and I won’t be the object of someone’s new pet project. 

I stand up. “I really should go.”

“Like hell you’re going. What’s wrong with your
mother?” Linda asks.

Not Chrissie again!
“Not a
fucking thing.”

Linda stares at me, dark eyes amused and not the
least bit intimidated by me.

“So you think you can get me to back off with
that burning black stare, do you? Sorry to disappoint you, love. I’ve been
friends with the original, Alan Manzone, for thirty years. Consider me wrapped
in a fireproof suit. Sit down.”

The barked order makes me flush and obey.

It is more than how intimidating Linda is or in
being transparent to this woman; it is her knowing matter-of-factness about
everything that puts me in check. Matter-of-factness is in fact intimidating.

Linda leans back in her chair.

“OK,” she says with a satisfied smile. She looks
at Bobby and Zoe hovering in the background. “I want the two of you out of
here.”

“There’s nothing she’s going to tell you that I
don’t already know,” Bobby says.

He sinks protectively onto the arm of my chair.
The gesture both amuses and annoys me.

Linda glares at her son. “Aha.”

In the tense quiet that follows, Zoe doesn’t seem
to know what to do with herself. She just fades away into the background.

“So what’s up with your mother?” Linda says
abruptly.

I try smiling this time. “Nothing is up with my
mother.”

“That’s nice to hear, but we both know that’s not
true. I’ve been sitting here for weeks in my house thumbing magazines and
wondering what I could have done at the funeral to have Chrissie treat me this
way. Like, if she was going to tell me that she never wanted to see me again or
simply continue to ignore me. She lives a mile from me and pretends I’m not
even here. So when I ask you what’s wrong, don’t flash your smile or give me
the black stare and pretend I’m imagining things. I get enough of that from Len
these days.”

“I was simply explaining that my mom is OK.”

Linda’s eyes flash. “OK? You keep saying that.
Why does it sound insincere?”

“I don’t know that it does. It’s the truth.”

“I saw Chrissie today,” Bobby says. “She looked
fine to me.”

Linda glares at Bobby. “Right, thank you. That’s
nice reassurance. I guess.”

“Everything is not about you, Mom.”

“Right! Thank you again.”

There is something so uncomplicated in the way
mother and son fight that I allow myself a moment to feel mildly jealous of the
Rowans. There is nothing uncomplicated about my relationship with my parents.

I study them. Fuck, how do I defuse this?
Confessing Chrissie’s latest fuck-up to Bobby is one thing. Telling Linda Rowan
is another. No way will Linda stay out of this clusterfuck if she knows the
truth. She would tell Alan. And that would unleash a total shitstorm on
Chrissie.

I’m pissed at my mom, but I don’t want that.

“Mom is sort of stuck in limbo right now,” I
explain, cautiously. “It’s just the move and getting organized again. I’m sure
she’ll call you when she’s ready to. She’s not angry with you. She’s not angry
with anyone. Just sort of stuck in limbo.”

“Limbo. Aha.” Linda gives me another penetrating
stare then holds out her hand. “Give me your phone.”

I tense. “What?”

She shakes her hand in front of me. “She won’t
answer my calls, but I know she’ll answer yours so give me your phone or start
being honest here.”

“Fine.” I fish in my pocket and toss her the
phone. “Dial away if you think it will get you anywhere.”

I cross my arms, wishing I could take this one
back. It is the second uncool thing I’ve done to Chrissie today. I watch as
Linda clicks on the phone and searches through my contacts.

Injecting Linda into the mix is like tossing a
Molotov cocktail into Chrissie’s carefully constructed world. Still, if it gets
us out of being stuck in limbo—and that’s where we are in Chrissie’s
universe—then more power to Linda.

Still, I’m surprised that I have to squeeze my
eyes shut and lean back into the soft cushions of the chair to keep from
starting to cry. It is in this moment that I become fully aware of how
internally chaotic I’ve been since Khloe’s birth and how tense I’ve been made
by the forced secrecy and all the trauma of the past year. I hadn’t realized
how bad it was until today. But I feel it now in my limbs and how hard I have
to fight against the tears.

“It’s going to be OK, Kaley,” I hear Linda say.

When I open my eyes she has the phone to her ear.
I start to remember things about Linda from when I was little. She always
frightened the shit out of me as a child, but just then in her voice she
sounded older, more soothing and motherly.

“Am I allowed to ask if all is well with you?”
Linda demands, without preamble, into the phone.

Shit. I can hear my mother’s voice rapidly
streaming through the phone, but I can’t make out the words. I can only imagine
the conversation on the other end and how pissed off this is making my mother.

Linda can hardly get a word in—it is completely
unlike Chrissie to control any conversation—and in between the steady stream of
‘aha, aha, aha, oh shit,’ then ‘aha’ Linda seems to collapse back into her
chair and says, “Oh fuck.”

My stomach turns. That
oh fuck
confirms
that my mom, for whatever reason, just told Linda everything that’s happened
since my stepfather’s death.

After another ten minutes, it looks like Linda
has decided she’s had enough of listening to my mom.

“You are fucking this up the most you can,” she
says fiercely into the cell. “I hope you know that. No. No. Kaley is fine.
Sitting right here. And no you can’t talk to her. She is very upset. That’s why
I called you. One look at her told me something fucked-up was going on with
you. Damn, we’ve been friends forever, Chrissie. How could you have a baby and
not call me? Move here and not see me? I’m hurt. Really hurt. Why did you shut
me out, dear?”

That is followed by more ‘ahas’ and Linda
reaching for her iPad. She starts clicking the screen until she reaches her
calendar.

“Of course, Chrissie. Of course. You’ve always
been able to trust me. No, I won’t say a word. OK. Good, good, good. Yes, I’m
free on Friday. I’ve missed you. I can’t wait to see the baby. But I can’t
believe you didn’t trust me with this.”

Linda clicks off the phone and hands it back to
me. “You’re a very good daughter.”

For some strange reason that’s enough to make the
tears give way. “No, I’m not. I’m a real bitch these days.”

Linda smiles sympathetically. “All teenage girls
are. The problem is when we don’t outgrow it. Or worse, when we don’t know that
we are. And Lord knows you have had more than your share of shit to wade
through this year.”