Would any of them treat me like a normal human and welcome me into their lives as a friend?
I don’tneedthem to be my friends.
But I’m curious. And after being warmly welcomed into Cooper’s large family, I want to know if I can be a friend to someone else like me who wants to learn where they came from too. And where better to start than with people that I share actual genetic material with?
I blow out a slow breath. “Okay. I’m getting out.”
Cooper waits.
Kiva waits.
I don’t reach for the door.
“No one has phones or cameras.” Kiva points to the security checkpoint where Hiramys is charming everyone into turning in their electronics. My genetic half-siblings are aware there’s a possibility I’ll show up. I’ve seen the posts in the family channel on the MatchDNA site, and I’m taking comfort in how many of them are excited to meet each other, with relatively few mentions of me specifically compared to mentions of the rest of them.
Aunt Zinnia registered me under one of the fake names that I use when I check into hotels. Unfortunately, though, she used her own real credentials to pay, with her Waverly Sweet, Inc. credit card, and that’s where things got messy with the data leak.
Clearly, Aunt Zinnia wasn’t young enough to be the daughter in question for my sperm donor.
I could call him Norm.
I could.
But I’m not there yet.
He’s also not invited today. As my half-sister Laurel put it, he’s not our dad. He didn’t raise us, and he crossed a line.
We all get to choose what we want to know, and he took that choice from you, she messaged me privately.He won’t be there.
I blow out another breath, and this time, I slip on my sunglasses and reach for the door.
Cooper follows me out of the car with his normal ease and grace, like he’s not sweating this at all, and his calm confidence settles my stomach. I’m sure he can feel my uneasiness. He picks up on the subtlest changes in my mood, sometimes before I even realize I’m feeling it.
“You think I can have a tumble-off with anyone in there?” he says as we head toward Hiramys’s checkpoint. Yes, we’re following the rules like everyone else, going through the one entrance to the roped-off pavilion, but we both left our phones in the car already.
“Cooper…”
He squeezes my hand and flashes me a grin. “What? I won’tstartit. But I’m happy to make a scene if it takes any pressure off of you.”
“I know.”
We take our nametags from Hiramys, who squeezes me in a quick hug. “They’re all very nice, sweetie,” she whispers. “You’re gonna be fine.”
I inhale deeply, and then we push past the entrance and into the picnic, where probably seventy-five people are already milling about. Many of my half-siblings have spouses and kids, and family was invited, probably so none of us felt totally alone or weird.
“Waverly?” a woman with dark hair and brown eyes and light brown skin says. “Hi. I’m Laurel. We had a small private conversation—”
“About shrimp,” I finish with a smile, because we talked about that too.
“Yes.” Her shoulders relax, and she smiles back at me, and it’s spooky to realize we have the same smile. But also good.
I have connections here.
“No shrimp here,” she tells me. “At least seven of us get sick every time we eat it, even though we didn’t when we were younger. Let me know if you have any questions about anything else on the menu. And I wanted to introduce you to Jean. Her mom passed away when she was young too. I thought you two might have a lot in common. More in common, I mean.”
We slowly make our way through the picnic area, meeting my half-siblings and their families and finding out that a bunch of us hate pickles—who knew?—and that over half of us always sneeze four times anytime we sneeze once.
Nobody crosses lines or presses boundaries or makes me feel uncomfortable when they ask what I’m working on in my time off. I’m not asked for my autograph or pictures. When people congratulate Cooper on the World Series, he takes it in stride.
