The Lost & Found (16 page)

“Let me just put these in my car,” she said.

I followed her to her station wagon. She put the letters and the apple drawing on the passenger seat and then she rummaged around in the back for a minute before
withdrawing a pair of sunglasses, a bolt of fabric, a piece of paper, and . . . a Babolat tennis racket.

My Babolat tennis racket.

I ignored everything else and reached for the racket first.

It was warm.

My hand brushed against Frannie's hand.

That was warm too.

Everything was warm.

A
rrow and I had been sitting in front of Wallace Green's house for twenty minutes, and for twenty minutes Arrow had been trying to get me to tell her about my night with Louis. I was enjoying coming up with more and more complicated reasons of why I didn't want to tell her, mostly because it kept my mind off the fact that we'd been sitting in front of Wallace Green's house for twenty minutes and I wasn't yet ready to address that.

“I think there are things that should exist only in your memory, or only in the shared memories of two people. And if one of those people breaks the unspoken code of silence and shares those memories with another person, it
is only doing a disservice to what should never have been spoken about again. So in conclusion, that is why I refuse to tell you about last night.”

Arrow looked venomous.

It was a feat for Arrow to look venomous, because her face was usually so soft and so happy. The muscles weren't used to forming the extreme scowl they found themselves in now. As a result, her face looked more funny than anything. But I didn't laugh. I knew better.

“Frances,” she said, “are you fucking kidding me?”

“I told you all the important things. We met for dinner. He gave me the letters. We decided to skip food and go for a walk instead. It was really nice. I had a really nice time. Nothing happened.”

“I love you so much. I would do anything for you. You're my oldest friend and my legal relative. But at this moment, I just want you to be perfectly clear on this, I could kill you. Okay? I am a nonviolent person, but I am admitting that somewhere deep inside me, the nonviolence is losing to the extreme desire to hit you over the head with my muffin.”

“Well, you'd have to do more than that if you want to do any real damage. I think my head's tougher than a muffin.”

“It's a really stale muffin,” Arrow said, her disappointment momentarily shifting from my unwillingness to share the details of last night to her muffin, which was beyond really stale and moving toward inedible.

The truth was, I didn't feel like talking about it for exactly the reason I'd said. Because it was one of those nights that felt so perfect and so contained within itself, and talking about it with someone who wasn't there ran the risk of cheapening it or tainting it with an outside perspective. I didn't want an outside perspective. I wanted to keep it as close to me as I could. I wanted to keep it so close to me that it was inside me. Just me and Louis and the streets of Austin and the heat of the night and the way he did not put the tennis racket in his car, just held it as we walked and swung it around in his hand and looked at it like it was much more than an impulse decision I'd purchased at a pawnshop.

Here are the things that I will say about it: it was sweet, it was quiet, it was perfect. I wished I was back there now, because I felt safe in every respect, and I did not feel safe now, sitting in the hatchback of my station wagon parked across the street from Wallace Green's house, which was I guess technically a mansion, although I couldn't see it from the road. There was a fence that looped around the entire property and at the gate was a call box.

Arrow ate her stale muffin next to me and drank a coffee. She hadn't gotten me anything because I hadn't wanted anything and because she was mad at me. I understood why she was mad at me, but if I had to tell the truth, I also didn't care.

“How long are we going to sit here?” she asked. “Just so
I can prepare, you know.”

“You could have gotten me a muffin,” I said.

“You said you didn't want a muffin.”

“You could have gotten me one anyway. You usually get me one anyway.”

“Next time I run into a coffee shop and you say you don't want anything, I'll be sure to use my mind-reading powers to see if you really don't want anything or you're just being difficult.”

“Great, thanks. And we're going to sit here until I stop feeling like I'm going to puke. Okay?”

“Okay, fine. See if I care.”

I jumped off the back of the station wagon and went around to the driver's side. I'd left my phone on my seat; I reached through the rolled-down window to grab it, and that's when I noticed the cup of coffee in the cup holder. I opened the door and grabbed it. Still warm too.

“Hey, you're not all bad,” I said, joining Arrow with my coffee and my cell phone. “Thanks for the coffee.”

“I said I didn't get you anything,” Arrow replied.

“Actually, I have something for you too.” I'd put Hank Whitney's lost handkerchief in my pocket that morning. I took it out now and gave it to her. She regarded it suspiciously.

“HW,” she said, reading the embroidery.

“Indeed.”

“Where did you get this?”

“Louis found it on the university campus.”

“No, he didn't.”

“He did. One day you'll stop doubting everything I say.”

“That remains to be seen,” she said. I watched as she folded the handkerchief slowly, slipping it into her pocket like it was a lot more delicate than it was.

I took a sip of the coffee, burned my tongue, and wanted to die. Not because I'd burned my tongue. Because I was suddenly so nervous that my insides felt like they were going to hemorrhage and melt and leak out through a hole I'd cut in my shin while shaving my legs that morning.

“What am I supposed to do now?” I whispered.

“You're supposed to go up to that call box and press some buttons,” Arrow said. “Because we're here. We drove all the way to Austin and some cowgirl gave you his address and here we are and now you have to do something about it. It's time to step up, Frannie. I got your back.” She took a bite of her muffin and then looked sideways at me. She rolled her eyes and hugged me without warning. And hard.

“Ow,” I said.

“I can't be mad at you. I think you're a jerk, but whatever. Let's do this.”

We slid off the back of the car, and Arrow closed the hatchback. She threw her empty muffin bag on the driver's seat, and we crossed the street together. I was shaking. I was practicing what I would say.

Hello, Wallace Green. I'm Frances. Do you like metalworking? I think I might be your daughter.

“Take a deep breath,” Arrow said. “Breathing is so important.”

The call box had a pin pad with a few little buttons and a small speaker. I pressed the button that said
call
and we waited while a tinny dial tone turned into a phone ringing a million miles away, like it was underwater.

I wanted to turn and run. I wanted to run out of Austin and into Oklahoma; I felt sure that today was the day I would finally figure out how to do it, how to put one foot in front of the other without falling or losing my breath or ending up miles behind. I wanted to run and run and run, but just then the speaker made a little spitting noise and someone who sounded tired and a little sad said, “How can I help you?”

“Hi!” Arrow said when it became clear I wasn't going to say anything. “We're sorry to bother you. We just need a few minutes of your time. For, um, something that can't really be said to a speaker. It's more of a face-to-face thing.”

It was Wallace Green. The speaker was slightly garbled and distorted his voice a little, but it was definitely Wallace Green who had answered the phone.

“I'm sorry, sweetheart, this isn't the best time. This is my personal residence, you see, and as much as I appreciate fans of my work I must ask you—”

“YOU'RE MY DAD,” I yelled without meaning to.
I had opened my mouth prepared to say something calm and even, and there it was. An awkward scream. Arrow clutched her ear and moaned.

“I'm sorry?” Wallace Green said.

“I think you're my dad. Sir. My mom told me you're my dad. Um, maybe we could come in? Just for a minute? I promise we're not fans. Wait, I mean, I think you're fine. You're a good actor, you know? But you might also be my dad, which is why we're here.”

“So smooth,” Arrow whispered. “This is the exact approach I'll take if I ever decide to track down my birth parents.”

There was a click from the speaker, like Wallace Green had hung up his phone, and my heart fell a little before I realized the gate was buzzing. He was unlocking it for us.

Arrow lunged for the handle and pulled the gate open, and we slipped inside quickly.

“I did not expect that,” she said.

“Me neither.”

“What do we do now?”

“I guess we follow this path,” I said.

“The path to your destiny,” Arrow said, and sighed. She looped her arm through mine, and we walked together on the path that followed the driveway through pristinely manicured lawns to a house that looked a little bit like it had been plucked from a fairy tale and set down carefully in our world. It wasn't overly big but it was beautiful and
majestic and it made the nervous feeling in my stomach return so suddenly that I stopped walking and clutched my arms around myself, spilling half my coffee in the process. And that's when I noticed the paper coffee cup said
Sally's Diner, best coffee in LA
, and that is when I decided I was probably going to puke, so I dropped the cup and put my hands on my knees and bent over, taking deep breaths that I wasn't entirely sure were actually reaching my lungs.

“Well, this is maybe the strangest story I've heard yet,” Wallace Green said, suddenly there before us, standing in the middle of the path.

Arrow squeaked, but I didn't look up until my stomach felt a little more settled, and then I straightened and saw him, in khaki shorts and a short-sleeved T-shirt, his forehead wrinkled as he looked at me closely. “Are you okay, sweetheart?” he said.

“I'm okay,” I said.

“I pretty much only let you in because this is the most clever story I've heard so far,” he said, not unkindly. “I thought you wanted an autograph, but now I'm a little confused.”

“I don't want your autograph,” I said. “I think you might be my father.”

“And what makes you say that?” he asked, like he was still humoring us, like he still thought we were two fans who might want to take a photo with him, get an autograph, potentially take a tour around his fairy-tale house.

“Look—my mother just died. And before that she was committed to a mental hospital—”

“Wellness center,” Arrow clarified.

“Right, except I didn't know that. I thought she moved to Florida. But she was really in this wellness center, and she wrote me all these letters and they were all about how you were my father. And I'm not sure I believe her. . . . I mean, it's probably pointless, me coming here. But she asked me to find you. She wanted me to find you, and I couldn't just ignore that.”

As I talked, I grew increasingly aware of how insane everything that came out of my mouth sounded. It was obvious to me now that this man in front of me wasn't my father. He was perfectly nice, perfectly reasonable to assume we were crazed fans, and perfectly right to call the cops and have us removed from his property. Maybe he already had. Maybe they were on their way.

“Arrow, let's go,” I said, grabbing her arm quickly and attempting to pull her back toward the front gate.

“Frannie, what are you doing?” she hissed.

“This was a mistake. This whole thing was a mistake. We have to go. I'm sorry, Mr. Green, this was a mistake. Please call the cops back and tell them not to arrest us,” I said.

“I didn't call the cops,” he said, confused, jogging after us. “Hey, wait a second! Frannie? Is that your name?”

Arrow yanked on my hand, stopping me so suddenly I almost tripped.

“Frances,” I said, turning.

“Okay, Frances, you seem like you're telling the truth. I believe you, that your mother told you all that. And what I have to say in response to that is . . . And you might not know this, okay, and it's not because I'm ashamed of anything, it's just because we unfortunately live in a world where not everyone is accepted for who they are. . . .”

“Oh my gosh,” Arrow said.

“What?” I said.

“The hole in your mother's story is that . . . I've never been with a woman,” Wallace Green finished. “So I can't be your father. I'm sorry.”

I stared at him, confused, my ears hot and ringing.

“I'm sorry you came all this way, just to . . . I'm just sorry. It's not possible. I'm gay.”

“Oh,” I said. “Oh. Okay.”

My ears burned hotter, and the ringing replaced the sounds of the real world. I couldn't hear Wallace Green anymore and I couldn't hear Arrow, I could only hear my mother's voice inside my skull, but she wasn't making any sense because my mother was actually, truly crazy. My mother was insane. Why had I ever believed anything my mother told me?

My grandparents were right to keep her from me. They
had made the right decision. Even with them protecting me, she had still sent me on a wild-goose chase to Austin to find a man who—obviously, of course—wasn't my father. Imagine what she would have done if she had still been in my life. Imagine how much worse it could have been.

But still—she was my mother. And now she was really, really gone. There was nothing left to tie her to me or to this world. My real father, Frances the First, was long, long gone. This man standing before me wasn't anybody. Or at least, he wasn't anybody who could bring my mother back.

“I'm so sorry we bothered you,” I said. My voice sounded distant and forced. Like it didn't belong to me. An unrecognizable thing.

“It's no bother,” Wallace Green said. “It's no bother at all. I'm so sorry. I wish I had something better to tell you.”

It only made it worse that Wallace Green was exactly what they said he was. He was unfailingly nice, a Southern gentleman with a subtle accent and horses and a cowboy hat hung up on a peg in his closet. I wanted him to yell. I wanted him to tell me I better get off his property, or else. I half wanted him to call the police because at least the sirens would cut through this awful, awful silence that was building up between us.