“But this is really personal, not for anyone else’s ears.” Anne knows my suspicions and no doubt Margo will soon, but they don’t have to know I’ve asked Paul. “There are times—weretimes when I wondered if Dad loved me.”
“Of course, he loved you.”
“Ashisdaughter?”
Several beats pass. “Am I hearing something else?”
What the hell. He’s right. Beating around the bush is stupid. “Was he my father? Biologically? Was my mother the unfaithful one of the pair?”
Paul knew both of my parents. He talked law with Dad and most everything else with Mom. By rights, he could be on his feet in protest, scolding me for even thinking such a thing, telling me I’m wrong. But he is calm. The only sign of surprise is a straightening of his spine and maybe, just maybe a tic in the crease at the corner of his eye.
“Did he ever give you cause for doubt?” he asks.
“Not in words. But I annoyed him.”
“Annoyed, how?”
“He frowned when I entered the conversation. Like my existence grated on him.”
“Did he ever—”
“No,” I cut in, sensing where he’s headed. “He never hit me. It was all disapproval. I wasn’t smart enough—photography was a bogus art form—I didn’t have the right friends—Jack Sabathian was trouble. He was an exacting father, but at least the others understood why. I never did. He just… treated me differently from them.” I barely breathe. “You were his closest friend, Paul. Did he ever say anything to you?”
Paul frowns in contemplation. “Tom was a prideful man.” He doesn’t dismiss my charge, though. “Did your mother ever say anything?”
“No, but I never asked. I felt like my place in the family was conditional on my not making trouble. Asking my mother—putting her on the spot—might have done that. I kept hoping she would say something herself. Then she died.” Feeling the tragedy of that, I put my elbows on my knees, chin on my hands, eyes on the horizon.
Beside me, Paul is silent. But, of course, he knew the circumstances of Mom’s death. He had sent me a condolence note so thoughtfully written, so kind, so true to my mother that I cried over it. I still have it back in New York in the hand-painted box Mom gave me when Joy was born. She had meant it for things I wanted to keep for Joy, like the tiny band that circled her ankle in the hospital nursery, photos from those early years, and baby teeth retrieved by the tooth fairy. Now it also holds mementos of Mom herself, like the hoop earrings she wore the last time I saw her—and the very beautiful note from Paul. She didn’t envision my using the box for these, didn’t plan on dying so soon.
“I’m sorry,” he finally says. “She should not have died that way.”
“Not when she’d finally become someone she liked.”
His kind eyes are pensive. “I always sensed a restlessness in her”—he smiles fondly—“the proverbial bird in a cage. Was she finally fulfilled?”
“Very. More confident than I’d ever seen her. That’s one of the reasons I agonize. I could have asked her. She was in a good place. I kick myself for not doing it.”
“What about her will?” Paul asks. “Was there anything in it to give you a hint?”
I consider how much to say, but wills are in the public domain, are they not? “She left me more money than the others. The lawyer said she did it because I was a single mother, and my sisters were okay with that. So maybe that’s the only reason?” I ask, studying his face for a clue.
“Maybe,” is all he says, seeming mystified, too.
“Part of me wonders whether she did it because she figured Dad—Tom—wouldn’t leave me a cent—and if that’s the case, it’s fine,” I insist, lest Paul think me a gold-digger. “I have plenty of money. I don’t need his.”
Paul sighs. “I can’t tell you about that. I didn’t do his estate plan. Nate Yeager did. He’s in the firm. He’ll be in touch.”
In the ensuing silence, I hear Jack call out something about beach plum, then Mike shout something to Joy, but their words are swallowed by the surf. I’m thinking of taking up my camera again, when Paul says a quiet, “You look like your mother, you know.”
It is at the same time a most flattering and frustrating statement. “Yeah, well, that’s one of the problems. If I looked like Tom, we’d know.”
“None of you look like Tom. Your daughter is beautiful, by the way.”
“She is,” I say with a helpless little smile that is erased in the next instant by a sharp, loud noise inside the house. For a breath, I remember the gun in the shed that did not kill my dad. But no. This isthe clatter of a dish or a pot, and I feel a twinge at not helping Lina. What I’m doing out here on the steps is selfish. But I’m not ready for it to end.
Neither, apparently, is Paul. “If not Tom, who?” he asks.
“Beats me,” I say in an attempt to lighten the charge. “Jack says there were rumors.”
