CHAPTER 34
SAWYER
Tuesday, June 30, 2015
Iam in Grant Park, near Buckingham Fountain, with my cell phone to my ear, waiting for Maggie to pick up. The nurse has told her I’m on the line and promised her nothing’s wrong.
My calls are notoriously few and far between because, historically, they’ve been drenched in drama. I sometimes wonder if Maggie fears the sound of my voice—or anything having to do with me on the other end of a phone line.
Hello. I killed my sister in a car crash.
Hello. My father told me he wished I had died instead of his precious, darling little girl.
Hello. I overdosed on pain pills.
You know—those calls.
On the other hand, she’s eighty-nine years old, and I do not wish to cause her grief. But this is huge—is Honoree Dalcour telling me the truth? Is she Maggie’s mother, my great-grandmother?
There is a gulp on the other end of the line, but I reassure her—everything is fine. My limbs are intact. My head is on straight.
We exchange a few pleasantries, greetings,How are you? Hope you are fine, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Then, I let her have her say because she’s angry at me about taking some things (a lot of things) from her long-ago box.
“I’m angry with you, Sawyer.” Her voice is gravel and sand and concern, giving my guilt a new check mark.
“I’m sorry about that,” I say sincerely. “I had to do something big, or I was afraid nothing would change for me. I had to finish the thesis, but I needed help, and you told me about the box.”
“When did I do that?”
There was silence, but Maggie knew what I meant. She’d watched my decline. I had lived with her since my release from the hospital. Maggie had been the sole witness to the sad state of my grief, guilt, and shame, which was a monumentally long, lousy stretch.
“I need to talk to you about something, and I hope you won’t be upset.”
“The longer you take to tell me, the more likely I’ll take whatever you say poorly.”
“I’m in Chicago.”
“I assumed as much.”
“I’ve been recording Honoree Dalcour’s oral history for my documentary. I got the idea from the papers and photos in your long-ago box.”
“The long-ago box belonged to her. She gave it to me when I moved her into the Bronzeville Senior Care Facility.”
“She claims she’s your mother.”
Silence, but surprise travels on the heels of the expected. “The old woman told you she is my mother?” Maggie’s voice peeled through the phone with a curious calm.
“You told us you were an orphan, which I told her, but I couldn’t give her answers to questions about your family’s surname or who raised you. Or how you came to own the house in Baton Rouge.” The pauses in between feel chaotic and calm at once.
“Did she give birth to me? Yes.”
I am speechless. My lips quiver as I attempt to form words. “But she’s never been a mother to me.”
Maggie is so matter-of-fact I’m stunned. “You admit it. Just like that. Nothing to add?”
Silence.
“You paid her bills for thirty years because she’s your mother. Except you don’t speak to her. Or tell anyone in the family she exists. I don’t get it.”
