The older woman finally stepped forward, her arms held out hesitantly. Nevvie thought of what Tyler had said about Marcus. If she couldn’t be generous, it was spitting in the face of the good fortune she’d had.
Nevvie stepped in to hug her. Mary broke down crying. Nevvie couldn’t miss how frail and bony the older woman felt.
“I never thought I’d ever see you again,” Mary sobbed. “I always hoped I would, but I never dreamed it would ever happen.”
Kyle wiped tears from his eyes. “Mom, let’s all go inside where it’s cooler. Come on.”
They stepped inside, and Kyle closed the door behind them. Somewhere, a noisy air-conditioner kept the apartment at a tolerably cool level compared to the heat outside. It was sparse and plain, but clean, with secondhand furniture—or really old firsthand furniture—in the tiny combined living and dining room area. A small, old black-and-white TV sat on a battered coffee table in one corner.
Before they got comfortable, Nevvie wanted to find out something. “Where is Jim?” she asked. She saw no signs of him in the apartment. Pictures in the living room were of the boys, or of Mary and her sons, but none of Jim at all.
Mary frowned, but Kyle looked absolutely enraged. “I don’t know, and I don’t care. If he was on fire, I wouldn’t piss on him to save him. Neither would Jacob.”
“Kyle!” Mary chastised. “That’s not very Christian!”
He looked at her. “Mom, I don’t care if it is or not. If either me or Jacob ever see that man again, we’ll kill him. We don’t give a damn if he’s our father.”
Nevvie felt a huge weight lift from her. “What happened?”
Kyle turned to her. “The son of a bitch left five years after he dragged Mom and us out here. Ran off and joined one of those religious cults with some batcrap crazy preacher friend of his. Jacob and I finally convinced Mom to file for divorce a few years ago. Her being single allowed us to help her get government aid she wasn’t eligible for when she was married.” He scowled. “I hope he’s miserable.”
* * * *
Once they were settled in the living room, Nevvie and Andrew sharing the small couch, Mary seated in an old, threadbare chair, and Kyle standing, Nevvie plowed ahead. “I’m here for a few reasons,” she said. “First, I want to find out about my birth family.” Mary listened, nodding but not interrupting. “Second, I want answers. About why you let him get rid of me.”
Nevvie didn’t clarify who she meant by “him.” If Mary didn’t understand who she meant, Nevvie probably wouldn’t get good answers anyway.
Mary started crying again. “I’m so sorry, Nevvie. I never should have let him do it. I didn’t want to, but he threatened to leave if I didn’t. I didn’t know how I’d take care of you and the boys.”
Kyle stared at his hands, glaring. “Not that it did us any good, Mom.”
“Hush,” Mary said. She turned her gaze on Nevvie. “Tammy and her husband were good people. They promised to take care of you, and I knew you were unhappy at home. I wanted you to have a chance to be happy. I knew you’d never be happy with us. You were so smart, I wanted you to have a chance to go to college, get an education. That wouldn’t have happened with Jim. He didn’t believe in college for women.”
Nevvie sat there, stunned. She’d expected a lot of answers, but not that one.
Andrew reached over and gently squeezed Nevvie’s hand.
“But how could you just abandon me?” Nevvie asked.
Mary shook her head. “Believe me, I didn’t want to. If I thought I had any choice in the matter, I wouldn’t have. I was so scared. After your father died…” She shrugged. “I know I don’t deserve your forgiveness. If I could do it again, I would have kicked Jim out and taken my chances on welfare.”
Kyle nodded. “I wish you had, Mom.” He looked at Nevvie. “You were the lucky one,” he said. “There were lots of times Jacob and I wished they’d left us with you. We begged for Mom to send us back to Florida to live with you.”
Nevvie didn’t know how to answer that, so she didn’t.
An uncomfortable silence descended upon them as Nevvie tried to absorb the info. Then she realized she’d never introduced Andrew. “Oh, I’m sorry. This is Andrew Paulson, my father-in-law.”
He flashed a polite smile. “Hello.”
Mary sniffled. “You’re married?”
Nevvie took a deep breath. What these two people thought about her would make no difference in her life. She sat up a little straighter, prepared for condemnation and ready to rebut it if necessary. “Yes. I have two husbands.”
Kyle looked confused. “Two?”
Nevvie nodded. “We’re polyamorous. Andrew is my husband Tyler’s father. My other husband, Thomas Kinsey, his father died years ago. We have two beautiful children, and we live in Tampa.”
Mary didn’t seem to know what to say. “That’s…nice.”
More silence. Nevvie finally spoke again. “Look, can you tell me anything about my birth family, or at least give me the information about the adoption agency you used? I’d like to locate them, if at all possible. I want to know if there are any health issues or anything I need to be aware of for my kids’ sake. The records were sealed and our attorney can’t find out anything else without the information.”
Mary nodded. “We didn’t use an adoption agency,” she softly said as she studied her hands.
Mary’s body language confused Nevvie. “What?”
“It was a private adoption. That’s why the records were sealed.” She finally met Nevvie’s gaze. “Your birth mother was Michael’s younger sister, Kelly.”
* * * *
Nevvie sat there in shock. Andrew reached over and covered her hands with his. “Nevvie?” he softly asked. “Are you all right?”
Nevvie dredged up memories from her past. No one spoke, waiting on Nevvie’s reaction.
Nevvie barely remembered meeting her Aunt Kelly a few times, when she was a little girl. Then Aunt Kelly went off to college and Nevvie never saw her again after her daddy died. She barely remembered what she looked like. The only solid memory she had of her was her reddish auburn hair, much like her dad’s, and the fact that back then, to a very young Nevvie, she’d appeared to be an adult. “Do you have any idea where she is now?” Nevvie finally asked.
Mary looked thoughtful. “I heard she moved back to Tampa after college.” She blushed. “I haven’t stayed in touch with people there, unfortunately.” She looked down at her hands. “I was ashamed of what I did, of how I left you there.”
Nevvie forged on. “Why did she give me up?”
“Her parents made her. She was a junior in high school when she had you. She was twelve years younger than your father. Than Michael, I mean,” she added.
“Do you know who my biological father was?”
“I never met him. He was a boy she went to high school with. They’d dated over two years when she got pregnant. I don’t know what happened to him. He was a senior in high school. His parents made him sign you over after you were born because her parents threatened to have him arrested for statutory rape if he didn’t. I think his parents shipped him off to the military when he graduated.”
She looked down again. “I’m so sorry.” She sighed deeply. “Michael’s parents basically cut me out of their lives once he died. That’s why we rarely went to see them.” She finally raised her head and looked at Nevvie again. “I don’t even know if they’re still alive or not. They barely spoke to Kelly. They were so angry and disappointed with her at what she’d done, getting pregnant. Michael was always the one to force them to see us. He wanted you to have a relationship with your family.” She shrugged. “I guess I should have had a better backbone.”
Nevvie didn’t want to rehash that right now. “Do you have any paperwork that would help me find my birth parents?”
She nodded and turned to Kyle. “That box on the top shelf of my closet. Can you please get that for me?”
“Sure, Mom.” He went to do it.
/> She offered Nevvie a nervous smile. “Jacob is at work until five. Today was Kyle’s day off. I don’t know what I’d do without them.” She worked her fingers together in a nervous way. It was then Nevvie noticed how twisted and gnarled her fingers looked.
“Do you have arthritis?” Nevvie asked.
“Yes. Runs in my family.” She sighed. “And congestive heart failure.”
Kyle returned with the box and set it on the coffee table in front of Mary. She opened it after fumbling the lid at first.
An old memory Nevvie hadn’t thought about in over fifteen years came to mind, of her maybe five years old, and standing in the kitchen helping Mary make chocolate chip cookies.
She brushed away that memory and focused on the present. She didn’t want to be bogged down in melancholy memories. She was here for a specific purpose.
Mary slowly and carefully began removing items from the box. Loose pictures and two small photo albums. Paperwork. Several envelopes. Old cards. Mary began looking through the paperwork until she finally found what she was looking for inside a large manila envelope.
“Here is the order,” she said, handing a small sheaf of papers to Nevvie.
Nevvie glanced through them. It was the adoption paperwork.
“And here is your original birth certificate, and your new one after the adoption was final.”
Nevvie looked at the names on her original birth certificate. This one she’d never seen.
Mother—Kelly Barton. Father—John Fleischman.
Nevvie stared at the two names for a minute. Then something hit her. “Why did her parents force her to give me up? You said she’d dated my father for a couple of years in high school. Why didn’t they let them get married?”
“Unfortunately, Michael’s parents were very…I wouldn’t say bigoted, but by today’s standards they certainly would be considered closed-minded. They couldn’t stand the fact that her boyfriend was Jewish. They thought she’d outgrow the relationship. Then she said she wanted to marry her boyfriend and neither her parents nor his would allow it.”
“Then why did you and Dad adopt me?” The longer this conversation went on, the more surreal it felt, but Nevvie was here and would see it through till the very end.
“We begged them to let us adopt you. We’d tried so long to have children of our own when the doctors diagnosed it was Michael who was infertile. He was crushed. He wanted us to have a baby so badly. When Kelly got pregnant, Michael finally convinced his father to let us adopt you. We promised never to tell you the truth.”
She picked up a picture and looked at it, a sad smile on her face. “We were so happy that day when we brought you home from the hospital.” She handed the picture to Nevvie.
Nevvie held it so Andrew could also see it. A much younger Mary, proudly smiling, with Michael Barton, also proudly smiling and with his hand on her shoulder. In Mary’s arms, a swaddled baby.
Her.
Nevvie stared at the picture of the man she’d known as Daddy. She only had one picture of him. The rest were lost in Hurricane Katrina, when she’d forgotten to grab the only other photo album she’d had before she and Alex fled.
She felt the tears welling up in her eyes as she stared at her dad’s face. She could remember his voice, how warm and loving it sounded. Running to him when he got home from work. How he’d scoop her up in his arms and hug her.
“He was such a good man,” Mary softly said. “I loved him so much. And you were his world. He couldn’t have loved you more than if you were his very own.”
Unlike you, Nevvie struggled not to say aloud.
Nevvie didn’t want to be bitter. This wasn’t what today was about.
“You were our heaven,” Mary said. “Our little miracle. Our little angel. I thought our family was complete.” She looked down at her hands. “I’m sorry I wasn’t a better mother to you. I’m sorry I left you behind.” She started crying again.
Kyle looked at her, but made no move to comfort her. Instead, he looked at Nevvie. “Can you stay until Jacob gets home? I know he’d love to see you.”
Nevvie still felt like she was in shock. “I don’t know. We need to get back to the RV. We left the boys with Tom and Tyler.”
“Can you all come back for dinner?” he asked, his hope unmistakable. “Please? Let me cook dinner for everyone. I’d…” He swallowed hard. Nevvie suspected he was choking back tears of his own. “Jacob and I want to get to know you. Please?”
Nevvie glanced at Andrew, who subtly nodded.
With a deep breath, Nevvie nodded. “Okay.”
* * * *
They talked for another hour. By the time Nevvie was ready to return to the RV, she’d made peace with the past—mostly—in her mind, and felt glad she’d taken this chance. It didn’t soothe the past hurts in her heart, but it settled her mind and allowed her the freedom to feel charitable toward the woman.
Forgiveness would take a little longer in reality, even though Nevvie could give lip service to it.
When they finished, Mary gave Nevvie the entire box. Andrew picked it up to carry for her while Nevvie gave Mary one last hug.
“Thank you,” Nevvie quietly said.
Mary broke down crying again. “Thank you for finding us. And thank you for forgiving me. I’m so sorry. I know that doesn’t make up for what I did, but I am. I’ve regretted it every day.”
Nevvie didn’t feel the need to go into the gory details about what had happened to her after the abandonment. It was obvious Mary felt badly about what had happened.
And Nevvie didn’t want to dredge up horrific memories of her own just to rub salt in Mary’s wound.
Kyle also stepped forward to hug her. “Thank you, Nevvie,” he softly said. “I’ll have dinner ready at six. Do you all like spaghetti?”
She gave him a smile. “Yes. Spaghetti’s fine. Can we bring anything?”
He shook his head. “Nope. I’ll call Jacob and ask him to bring home something for dessert.” He grinned. “We’re uncles! That is so cool.”
She didn’t doubt her boys would think so, too. She didn’t begrudge her little brothers what happened and hoped Adam and Mikey could have a relationship with Kyle and Jacob.
“I can’t believe it,” Kyle said. “We have family. We always wanted to have family.”
Unbidden, her mind flashed back to that day when she was fifteen, Kyle and Jacob sitting on her bed and crying as she packed after Preacher Jim told her she was out of the house for good, and good riddance.
“Nevvie, please don’t leave!” Jacob had begged.
Kyle, also crying. “Don’t leave!”
How she’d hugged them, knowing it was the last time she’d see them.
How the little boys had also begged her to take them with her.
Nevvie pulled herself back to the present and forced a smile. “I’m sure Mikey and Adam will enjoy it.”
“Mikey?” Mary asked.
Nevvie nodded. “We named him after Dad.”
Chapter Eighteen
Back at the car, Andrew held his hand out. “Keys, love.”
Without argument, Nevvie handed them over. He set the box on the floor behind the driver’s seat, then climbed behind the wheel. “Are you all right?” he asked her.
She stared out the windshield at the apartment complex. “I don’t know,” she quietly said. “Part of me is relieved. Part of me is…thankful.”
“Thankful?”
She nodded, then looked at him. “I went through hell. But I could have easily ended up here, in the middle of nowhere, miserable and broke. I’d rather be thankful for the family I have than the family I wished I had back then.”
“I think that’s a very healthy way of looking at it, love.”
“I also feel guilty.”
“Guilty?”
“Yeah.” She stared at her hands for a moment as she tried to find the words. “I always thought that my birth parents gave me away because they didn’t want me. I mean, I knew the likely rat
ional reasons, but those were my feelings.” She shrugged. “I feel guilty that they were basically forced to give me up. That I didn’t look for them sooner.” She sighed. “I could have been with them all these years.”
“But that goes back to your original premise, that you might not have met Tyler and Thomas.”
She nodded, then smiled as she reached over to squeeze his hand. “Or you, Dad. Or you.” She took another look at the dumpy apartment complex. “I also feel bad they were raised like this. How sad was that, him saying they always wished they’d had family?”
“And now they do.”
“Yeah. I do want to get to know them again.”
When they returned to the RV, they found Tyler working while Tom kept the boys occupied. Both her men looked expectantly at her, concern in their faces.
Before she or they could say anything, Andrew put the box down on the table and smiled. “Who wants to go to the playground with Grandpa?”
Adam excitedly jumped up. “Me, Grandpa!”
Mikey grinned and bounced in his seat.
Andrew turned to Nevvie. “About a half hour, or would you like us to stay a little longer?”
She hugged him. “No, that’s fine. Thank you.”
“Of course, love.” He picked up Mikey and held out his hand for Adam. Once they’d left, Tom moved over to the couch and patted the space next to him. Nevvie went to sit, and found herself flanked by Tyler.
“You okay, baby girl?” Tom asked her.
“Yeah,” she quietly said, her head in his lap.
The men said nothing. Tom stroked her hair.
Finally, after ten minutes, Tom said, “Whenever you’re ready to talk, we’re here to listen.”
She sat up and hugged him, then Tyler. “I’m okay. And we’re going back tonight for dinner.”
“We are?” Tyler asked, arching an eyebrow at her.
“All of us, Evil Genius.”
“Did you tell her about us?” Tom asked.
“Yep. She didn’t give me any grief about it, either.”