Union Street Bakery (9781101619292) (34 page)

“Is that why you left me? Did I ask too many questions? Was I just too demanding?”

I sensed if she could have melted into the cushions she would have. “As I said before, none of this had anything to do with you. I just wasn't ready to be a mother.”

“I'm still trying to wrap my brain around the fact that you walked away from your own kid.”

She set her cup down. “I know you have a right to be angry, but I'm not interested in sitting here and getting beat up.”

“As tempting as that is, I really don't want that either.” Odds were my anger would return but for now it was quiet. “I just want answers.”

She fiddled with her wristwatch. “Look, you were a good kid. You were cute. Everyone loved you. I just couldn't hack it.”

“But you are hacking it with your sons. I can see that you love them.”

“I am older. I'm in a better place and ready to be a mother. Frankly, Daisy, I wouldn't wish teen motherhood on my worst enemy.”

“My timing was just bad.” Bitterness tightened my throat.

“Yes. I suppose.”

My stomach clenched. “You said my birth father was too young to drive. What was his last name?”

“I don't know. He never told me.” She held her hand to silence my next comment. “It was a one-night thing at the fair. I only knew about the driving thing because he asked for a ride home.”

“That's all you know about him.”

She sighed. “I'm not proud of what my life was like when I was younger. I made a lot of really big mistakes, both before and after you were born.”

This was just getting better and better. “You've no idea who he was?”

“No.”

“What did he look like?”

“Short. Reddish hair. Blue eyes. He had a thing for baseball.”

“That's not much.”

“No.” She threaded her manicured fingers together and nestled them in her lap. “I'd doubt I'd even recognize him if he walked into the room right now. And before you ask, you look nothing like him.”

“Where did you two meet?”

“Here.”

“In Alexandria?”

“Yes. My dad had sent me here to spend a week with Mabel. At the time it felt like punishment and I was looking to get back at him.”

I sat back against my chair. For a moment I simply stared at the ceiling. As much as I wanted to rant and rave I just couldn't seem to summon the energy. I was the product of teen rebellion. “When is my real birthday?”

“May 12.”

“May 12?”

“You never knew your real birthday, did you?”

“I didn't.”

“What date did you celebrate?”

“That's the kicker. Mom and Dad chose May 12.”

“Really?”

My head felt like it was pounding and I didn't have the reserves to figure out how they'd landed on the correct day. “So where do we go from here?”

She frowned. “I'm here to give you pieces of your past. But . . .”

All the background noises in the room vanished and all I could hear was the rush of wind in my ears. “You don't want to see me again.”

She rubbed her palms together. “Look, if you ever have questions—medical questions—I can try to help, though you'll find most of what you'll need in the file. But no, as far as a mother-daughter thing, I just can't go there.”

“I'm not really in the market for a mother. I have a great one. But I thought if we could just correspond.” My voice sounded far away, as if it belonged to someone else. “It would be nice to have some kind of connection.”

“I don't think that's such a good idea. There's no sense in it.”

“No sense?” I laughed.

She raised her chin, the one that looked so much like mine. “I don't see what's so funny.”

“You don't? Well, I do. I find it somewhat hysterical that the lady who abandoned me when I was three doesn't want anything more to do with me. Again. God, I thought after all this time something would have changed. I'm not a high-maintenance toddler and you're not an overwhelmed teenager.”

Stress sharpened angles on her face. “I'm sorry. I really am sorry.”

“Me, too. Shit. Me, too.” As much as I wanted something between us, I wasn't going to beg. “Best of luck to you, Terry.”

I rose and left.

•   •   •

I was not sure where I was going after I left the Armistead, and for a while I walked around and around, just circling the block over and over. Finally, I thought about Mom. She was the one to talk to about Terry. She knew me better than anyone. But Mom also had a dog in this fight and I was afraid she'd get wound up. Margaret and Rachel would parrot Mom.

Gordon again was the logical choice. But I'd spent the better part of the week ignoring his calls and was not sure if he'd be pissed or glad to see me.

Feeling like it all couldn't get much worse, I walked to his shop and I pushed through the front door. I wove down the rows of bikes and found him in the back working on a mountain bike.

“Hey.”

He glanced through the spokes at me. “Daisy.”

“Am I interrupting?”

“I'm putting a new derailleur on this bike. The owner needs it in the morning but I've got a few minutes to spare. What's on your mind?” His tone was clipped, direct, and not the least bit welcoming.

I deserved that. I'd been rude. “I'm sorry I didn't call back.”

He fitted his wrench on a bolt and tugged until it loosened. “What can I say?”

This was like removing a Band-Aid. I could peel it off slowly or just let 'er rip. I ripped. “What is it about me that makes people leave me?”

He cocked his head as tension rippled through his body. “Say that again?”

I folded my hands over my chest. “People leave me. What do I do to drive them away?”

He shoved out a deep breath as he set down his wrench and grabbed a rag. He wiped the grease from his hands. “You left me.”

“Because you had left me. I mean, not physically but you'd checked out mentally. Your life became all about work and there didn't seem any room for me.” I picked up some of his business cards and then set them back down in a neat stack. “I was trying to save us both grief.”

He shook his head. “That plan didn't work out so well. At least for me.”

“I know. I'm sorry. And if it helps, I didn't do myself any favors by leaving.”

He tossed the soiled rag aside. “Want to know something? I thought if I moved back to Alexandria and put myself in your way every chance I got, you'd eventually start talking to me.”

“And here I am, which brings me back to my original question.”

Blue eyes narrowed. “No question is simple with you, Daisy. Ever. What happened?”

“I went to see Terry. I won't bore you with all the details but basically she doesn't want a relationship with me.”

The lines on his face deepened with sadness that heightened my edginess. “She said that?”

“She was quite clear. Several times. So what is it about me, Gordon? Why do I drive people away?”

He came around the bike and stood so close I could smell the bike oil mixing with his scent. “I didn't leave you, Daisy. At least, I didn't see it that way. I was trying to work as hard as I could so things would turn around in the company and we could stay together. Your mom and dad and sisters haven't gone anywhere. Fact is, I think they'd all kill for you.”

I dropped my gaze and shook my head.

He shoved out a breath. “You are a hard, exasperating woman with strong opinions, a mouth like a trucker, and the work ethic of a sharecropper.”

“Those are my good points?”

“You're funny. You make a great grilled chicken. You can play chess, and you're one of the best investment bankers I know.”

“But there is something wrong, Gordon. Otherwise we'd have done a better job. And Terry wouldn't have left me in that damn café all those years ago.”

He laid his hand on my shoulder and I absorbed the warmth while resisting the urge to lean into him and cry.

“I could see how shitty the investment numbers were, Daisy. I knew I was going to put a lot of people out of work.” His voice was barely above a whisper but the words were as rough as sandpaper. “I was fucking up and I couldn't stop it. And I couldn't be with anyone.”

Tears burned my eyes. I heard the words but they didn't satisfy me. “I thought we were friends.”

“We were. We are.” His fingers tightened on my shoulder. “I just couldn't deal with anyone.”

“Not even me.”

“I'm sorry I pulled away. And I'm sorry Terry doesn't see what she has in you. You really are special.”

Tears trickled down my cheek. “Special. Right. That doesn't exactly answer my question.”

“You've had the unfortunate luck to be surrounded by damaged people, starting with Terry and, more recently, me.”

He captured my hand in his and pulled me toward him. He wrapped his arms around me and held me close. The dam of emotions cracked, letting the sorrow leak and then flood free. I clung to him and started to weep.

Finally, when the tide ebbed I was able to pull free. I felt foolish standing there all red-faced and weepy. “I better go.”

“I want a second chance, Daisy.”

“What?”

“It's why I came back. I want to try again.”

“I don't know, Gordon. I don't have it in me to endure another breakup.”

“There you go again.”

“What?”

He brushed a strand of hair away from my eyes. “Assuming the shit is going to hit the fan.”

“It always does. It always does.”

“Not always.”

“It's happened enough to scare the shit out of me.”

A hint of frustration snapped in his eyes. “Doesn't sound like you have a lot of trust in me.”

“Or myself.”

“So where does that leave us?”

“I don't know.”

His jaw tightened. “I'm trying to be patient, Daisy. But I can't wait forever.”

“I know.”

He stepped back. “Well, when you do, let me know.”

With as much dignity as I could muster, I walked out of the bike shop and back to the bakery. Instead of going to my room, I went to Mom's place and knocked on the door. Only seconds passed before the door snapped open. Mom stood there in her
RUNS WITH SCISSORS
T-shirt and her knitting in her hand. One glance and she set the knitting aside and took me in her arms.

Tears welled and before I could stop them, I cried.

For several minutes, Mom did not say anything but held me close. She patted my back and whispered, “I know, I know, my dear.”

Finally, when my throat ached and my eyes burned, I pulled back and rubbed fingers over my swollen eyes.

Mom studied me. “You went to see her again.”

“Yes. At her hotel.”

Mom ushered me inside and closed the door behind me. “Come in the kitchen. I'll make you something.”

“I'm not hungry.”

She squeezed my hand. “Neither am I but it'll give us something to do.”

“Okay.”

I settled into a chrome chair at her kitchen table. I'd sat at this table for as long as I could remember. I'd not only eaten but I'd colored, done homework here, learned to paint my nails, written my college applications as I wished for a different life. And now here I was again. Older. And not so much wiser.

Mom opened the fridge and pulled out luncheon meats, cheeses, and a loaf of bread from the bakery. With her back to me, she got her cutting board and serrated knife. “So what did she have to say?”

I watched as Mom sliced the bread. “She wished me the best.”

Mom glanced over her shoulder at me, her brow cocked. “Really?”

“I thought our first meeting was just too much and that maybe if she had time to think it over she'd want to get to know me. But she doesn't.”

I could see it was taking a lot of control for Mom not to unload. “Did she say why?”

“She's married and has a family. She doesn't want to remember the past. And I am the past. Nothing has changed since the other day.”

Mom dug her knife deep into the bread and into the cutting board beneath.

“She did say if I ever had any medical questions that I could contact her.”

“How generous.”

I traced circles on the table. “She doesn't know who my birth father is. He was a young kid she met at the fair. And I was conceived in Alexandria.”

“Really?”

“Terry is Mabel's great-niece.”

“Did Mabel know about you all along?”

“She did. Terry came to town with me looking for money. Mabel gave her two dollars and told her to come to the bakery and think over her life.”

Her mom frowned. “That was the spring of 1982.”

“Yeah.”

Mom's frown deepened into a scowl. “Mabel showed a lot of interest in you. She encouraged us to keep you. She even suggested we pick May 12 as your birthday.”

“Which, as it turns out is my real birthday, according to Terry.”

Mom slapped slices of meat and cheeses on the freshly sliced bread and squirted spicy mustard on it, like I preferred. She cut the sandwich on a diagonal and set the plate in front of me. She pulled up a chair across from me. “That crusty old broad knew all along and never said a word.”

I reached in my pocket and pulled out the photos of me as an infant. “She gave me these.”

Mom studied the photos. Her eyes alighted with joy as if she stared at a great treasure. “My goodness. You were a serious little thing even as a baby. See the way your mouth curves down? You do that when you are worried.”

“Rachel and Margaret are always smiling in their baby pictures.”

She took my hand in hers. “You had a lot on your plate, even as a little thing. My guess is that you understood things were not great even then.” She squeezed my hand. “Daisy, I know you. You have been carrying Terry's problem since you were a child. It's time to let go. Forgive her. And remember that you deserve all the love that is waiting for you to accept.”