He nodded. “I need to talk to you,” he said, “and I’m afraid this will shock you a little, honey.”
I pressed my lips together, unable to imagine where this was going. He looked worried about me. “I’m fine,” I said. “You can tell me anything.”
“You have a good friend,” he said. “Noelle Downie.”
He’d met Noelle a few times over the years, but I couldn’t imagine why he’d be talking about her now. I hadn’t mentioned her death to him. There’d seemed no reason to mention it, and something in his voice told me not to bring it up now.
“Yes.” I nodded.
“Noelle is your half sister.”
I leaned toward him, frowning. A few times in recent weeks he’d said things that made no sense. There are butterflies in the bathroom or They always give me spaghetti for breakfast here. The staff told me it was the medications talking. Was that what was happening now?
“What do you mean, Grandpa?” I asked.
“Just what I said. She’s your half sister and my granddaughter. You were never supposed to know.”
“I… Would you explain—”
“Yes.” He turned away from me, looking out the window at the manicured landscape. “I can’t die without telling you the truth about Noelle.” A tear slipped from each of his blue eyes and I reached for a tissue and blotted his cheeks. My mind scrambled to take in what he was telling me.
“Your mother had a baby when she was fifteen years old,” he said.
I sucked in my breath and sat back. “Oh, no.” I tried to picture my mother as a teenager. Discovering she was pregnant. Grappling with a decision. “You’re saying…that was Noelle?”
He licked his parched lips. “Susan was going with Frank at the time, but another boy got her pregnant. We didn’t know until she was pretty far along. Frank didn’t know. No one knew, and Susan wanted it that way. We sent her to your great-aunt Leta’s in Robeson County. She told Frank…well, I don’t remember exactly what she told Frank. That Leta was sick, I think, and she had to help out. Leta found this midwife to take care of your mother and…make the problem go away, so to speak.”
A midwife? Noelle? I felt suddenly, thoroughly confused. I rubbed my forehead. “I don’t understand how—”
“The midwife wanted a child,” he said. “She and her husband adopted the baby.”
“But…how do you know it was Noelle?” I asked. I felt a crushing pain starting low in my rib cage as the loss of one of my closest friends began to grow into a greater loss than I ever could have imagined.
“Around the time your parents moved to California, your mother began toying with the idea of finding her daughter,” he said. “She held off, though. She was afraid to tell your father the truth, even after all that time. Afraid he’d be angry she’d lied to him. But, anyway, your mother knew the midwife had the last name Downie and she knew where she lived and I guess it wasn’t that difficult to find out Noelle’s name. She found all that out right around the time she died, but we never realized you were friends with her…with Noelle…until a while after her death. We were shocked, your grandma and me, the first time you mentioned her name to us. It wasn’t such a coincidence that you both went to UNCW, but to end up friends was just…” He shook his head, then gave me a long look. “Do you think somehow she knew?” he asked.
I thought of Noelle’s will. Naming me executor. I thought of the surprise split of her money with seventy-five percent of her assets going to Jenny. I remembered the first time Tara and I met her in our dorm room. Even years later, we joked about how weird Noelle had been that day, questioning me about my family, my name, my grandparents.
“She knew.” I could barely speak. “I don’t know how she figured it out, but she knew.”
“Your grandma and I decided we’d best keep it to ourselves, since your father never knew about her. We didn’t want to do any harm to his memory of Susan. But now your father’s gone, and I’m about to leave this good earth myself, so it’s time.” He looked at me with hope in his blue eyes. I’d always loved those eyes and suddenly I saw Noelle in them. “I want to ask you a big favor, Emerson,” he said. “Only if you’re comfortable with it, okay? I know it’s a lot to ask.”
I nodded. “Anything,” I said.
“I’d like her to know the truth. I want to spend some time with her. My granddaughter.” His lips trembled in a way I couldn’t bear. “Would that be all right?”
“Oh, Grandpa.” I took his hand again, holding it between both of mine, and then I told him the part of Noelle’s story that I knew. The ending.
28
Tara
Wilmington, North Carolina
Emerson and I sat side by side on the back steps of Noelle’s house, our arms around each other’s shoulders as we looked out toward the garden. We were waiting for Suzanne to stop over to see the house in the hope that she’d become the new tenant. Her current lease wouldn’t be up until the spring, but that was fine with Emerson and Ted, who needed time to renovate.
Suzanne had been in the house many times over the years, but it had been such a mess that when Emerson asked if she was interested in renting, she’d made a face before saying, “Maybe.” She would have to look past the scarred floors and dirty walls and the empty places in the kitchen where new appliances would go. Hopefully, she’d be able to see the potential, because we wanted someone who’d loved Noelle to have her house.
We also wanted to pick Suzanne’s brain a little to see if she knew any more than we did about the waning years of Noelle’s practice. We doubted it since Suzanne herself had been stunned to learn Noelle was no longer a midwife, but it was worth a few questions.
Most of all, though, Emerson and I were grieving all over again, this time for the Noelle we now knew had been Emerson’s sister. We’d been sitting there more than thirty minutes, remembering back to our days in the Galloway dorm when Noelle had befriended us. We’d felt pretty smug back then that this older girl—this woman, really—became our friend over all the other girls on the floor. Why didn’t she ever tell Emerson what she knew? If only she had. If only she and Emerson could have enjoyed their sisterhood out in the open. The truth explained so much. No wonder I’d always had the feeling of being a little on the outside of the two of them. No wonder Noelle seemed to love Emerson just a little bit more than she did me. I wished that Sam were alive so I could tell him. It would blow his mind.
We’d decided not to tell Jenny or Grace yet. Life was too chaotic right now, and besides, Emerson needed some time to absorb the news herself. She’d told Ted, of course, and with her permission, I’d told Ian. He’d come over for dinner last night while Grace went to the movies with Jenny. I felt as though I needed to sneak around with Ian these days. There was nothing between us other than a good and growing friendship, but Grace was so disapproving that I felt uncomfortable even mentioning his name around her.
He’d been astonished when I told him about Noelle and Emerson. He stood in middle of the kitchen, shaking his head in disbelief. “I was engaged to a woman I didn’t know at all,” he said. Then he ran his hand over his thinning blond hair. “I wonder if anybody knew her. It must have been so lonely, being Noelle.” For the first time, I realized he still loved her. Maybe only a little bit, but the love was still there in his eyes and in the sadness of his voice.
“Hello!”
Emerson and I heard Suzanne’s voice coming from inside the house. We’d left the front door open for her.
“We’re out here, Suzanne!” Emerson called, getting to her feet. She looked at me, motioning toward the garden. “We might as well show her the best thing first,” she said.
Suzanne pushed open the screened door and joined us on the porch, her blue eyes round with wonder, as usual. “Hi!” She gave us each a hug, then put on a scolding look. “Listen, you two. You have to let me do something to help with the party.”
“It’s all under control,” I said. Mostly the truth.
“We just want you to
have a good time,” Emerson said. Her eyes were a little bloodshot and I hoped Suzanne didn’t notice.
“The house looks so different without Noelle’s things in it,” she said. “Can I help choose the paint colors?”
“Absolutely,” Emerson said. “As well as the stain on the hardwood floors and the tile in the kitchen.”
“Look at Noelle’s garden!” Suzanne started down the porch steps and we followed. “I remember how spectacular it is in the spring.”
“It was Noelle’s pride and joy,” Emerson said.
“Her birdbath.” Suzanne pointed at the little girl on tiptoe. “Isn’t that the sweetest thing? And the herbs!” She bent over to touch the Thai basil. “She’d always give me some. Now I can be the one giving them away.”
Behind her back, Emerson gave me a thumbs-up. “We were hoping you liked gardening,” she said.
“I do, and I’ve had no room to do any of it in the dinky little yard I have now.” Suzanne tore her gaze away from the garden. “Are you sure you can wait till March to rent it? I know that’s a long time.”
“Not a problem,” Emerson said.
“Will Cleve be living with you over the summer?” I asked. The house was fine for one low-maintenance person. Add a teenage boy and I wasn’t so sure.
“He’ll be doing his Habitat for Humanity thing and I know he wants to spend time with his father in Pennsylvania and who knows what else,” she said. “I can fit a daybed in that second bedroom for him, and I’ll probably set up my desk in the living room. Besides, Cleve’s not going to be living with me for the rest of his life, I hope.” She looked at me. “How’s Grace doing?” she asked. There was sympathy in her voice.
“She’s doing well,” I said. I felt protective of Grace. I’d never let Suzanne know how much my daughter missed her son.
“She’s a beautiful girl with beautiful manners,” Suzanne said.
“Thanks.” I smiled. Grace was definitely a beautiful girl, and I was happy to hear that her manners passed muster, at least away from home.
“Suzanne, I wanted to ask you if you knew Jane Rogers,” Emerson said. “She was a midwife who worked with—”
“Oh, sure,” Suzanne said. “She used to work at the Birth Center. She retired years ago and moved to Australia.”
“Australia!” Emerson said.
“You wanted to let her know about Noelle?” Suzanne asked.
I glanced at Emerson, wondering how much to say. “Actually, we were talking to an old patient of Noelle’s who said that when she went into labor, Noelle wasn’t feeling well and called Jane in to take over for her. So we were just wondering who Jane was.”
Suzanne nodded. “That would make sense. They covered for each other. I was really out of the business by then, though. After Cleve was born, I just wanted to play mommy for a while.” She bent down and plucked a leaf from the sage and lifted it to her nose. “Here’s something I’ve been wondering about,” she said. “If Noelle hasn’t been a midwife all these years, why did she still do that rural work every year or so? Some years, she’d be there a few months.” She looked from me to Emerson. Emerson’s eyes were as startled as mine and I knew she was wondering the same thing I was. Were the patients Noelle saw during those months documented in her record books?
“I don’t know, Suzanne,” I said slowly. “There are so many questions and I don’t think we’re ever going to get the answers.”
“Do you know exactly where she’d go?” Emerson asked her.
“I always thought she was going back to where she grew up. She said it was a poor area. A lot of Native Americans.”
“The Lumbee,” I said. “She grew up in Robeson County.” Was that where she went? Had she told us that or did we all just assume it? She’d always stayed in touch with us by email or cell phone, but I didn’t think we’d ever had an actual street address for her.
“Well, listen.” Suzanne sniffed the sage again. “I’m going to walk through the house and think about how my furniture will fit, all right?”
“Absolutely,” Emerson said. “Holler if you have a question.”
We watched her walk back to the house, then turned to each other.
“We’re idiots,” I said. “Are the months when she was away in her record books?”
“I don’t think so. I think I would have noticed addresses outside this area. I bet that’s when it happened.”
“You’re right.” But then I remembered the article about Anna Knightly and shook my head. “Maybe not, though. Anna Knightly’s baby was taken from a Wilmington hospital,” I reminded her. “Robeson County’s, what—an hour and a half away?”
Emerson put her hands on the sides of her head and looked like she wanted to scream. “I’m going to figure this out if it’s the last thing I do,” she said.
My cell phone rang, electronic strains of “All That Jazz” filling Noelle’s backyard. I dug the phone from the purse slung over my shoulder and glanced at the caller ID. Ian.
“Hey, Ian,” I said.
“Where are you?” He sounded almost curt, and I frowned.
“Emerson and I are at Noelle’s. Suzanne is here looking at the—”
“Can the two of you come to my office right now?” he asked.
“Right now?” I looked at Emerson. “We’ve got things we need to do for the party tomorrow.”
“It’s important,” Ian said. “I figured out when Noelle had a baby.”
29
Noelle
Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina
September 1992
This is the most despicable, most insane thing you’ve ever done, she told herself as she walked through the quiet, dimly lit hallway of the Blockade Runner. It was two in the morning and Wrightsville Beach had been sleeping when she pulled into the parking lot of the massive oceanfront hotel. She wanted privacy. She wanted everyone to be sleeping. There was only one other person she wanted to be awake.
She walked into the empty foyer. A huge sign greeted her. Welcome LSAS! She had no idea what the letters stood for. The L was either legal or law. It didn’t matter. She didn’t care about the conference. She turned left and started walking down the hall.
Her life was very full these days, and she was grateful. She was finally doing what she’d longed to do since she was twelve years old—practicing midwifery. She lived ten minutes from Emerson and her new husband, Ted, renting the little Sunset Park house Ted had lived in before he and Emerson were married. Sunset Park was exactly the type of neighborhood Noelle loved: diverse, utterly unpretentious, with a growing sense of community. Emerson was already pregnant and very happy, and when Emerson was happy Noelle was happy.
It seemed ironic that Ted and Emerson, who’d known each other less than a year, were already married while Tara and Sam still were not—although that was about to change. Their wedding was only two weeks away. Tara would have been delighted to get married the day after she graduated from UNC, if not before, but Sam had taken things at a slower pace. He wanted everything in place before he got married, he’d said. He wanted the bar exam behind him and his law practice set up before he took on a wife and family. Now, things were as in place as they were going to get. Tara was in her first year of teaching and Sam had sailed through the bar exam and joined an already established attorney, Ian Cutler, in his practice. Sam could stall no longer. That was the way Noelle had come to view his reluctance to plan the wedding. He was having his doubts, and although he never said as much, she felt certain she was the cause. How could he marry one woman when he had feelings for another? She couldn’t let him. Not without a fight. As full as her life felt, there was one thing missing and that was Sam. His wedding date now loomed on her calendar like a death.
She found his room easily. First floor, oceanfront. They could leave the sliding glass doors open and listen to the sea. She’d gotten the number from Tara, telling her she needed to talk to him about a midwifery case. She hated lying to Tara about why she wanted Sam’s room number. Som
ehow the lie felt even worse than what she was doing now. But Tara, ever trusting, bought her excuse. It wouldn’t be the first time Noelle had consulted with Sam about one of her patients. He was focusing on health law, which pleased her, and she liked to think she had something to do with his choice since she was always bending his ear with her concerns about child and maternal health. When the five of them got together, she and Sam often wound up talking shop while everyone else discussed wedding plans or the real-estate market. She felt closer to him than ever. He was the only person who knew that she was Emerson’s sister, the only person she could ever talk to about how that relationship gave her both joy and pain.
She knocked on the door to his room, then waited in the silence. Nothing. She knocked again, harder.
Sam pulled the door open and she knew she’d awakened him. His dark hair was tousled, his jeans unsnapped, his chest bare. His eyes widened when he saw her, his lashes so long that they cast shadows on his cheeks from the hallway lights.
“What’s wrong?” he said. “Is Tara all right?”
“Everyone’s fine,” she said. “I just wanted to see you.”
He hesitated a moment, and she knew he was trying to make sense of what she’d said. What she was doing here at two in the morning, two weeks before his wedding.
Reaching for her wrist, he drew her into the room. She walked straight to the unmade side of his bed and sat down on the edge. She felt the light from the night table pool over her and wondered what he saw in her face.
He looked at her, hands on his hips, and for the briefest of moments, neither of them spoke.
“Ah, Noelle,” he said, finally. The words sounded tired. They sounded a little bit like surrender. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to keep you from making a mistake,” she said. “A mistake for both you and Tara. And for me.” She swallowed. For the first time since making the decision to come here, she felt nervous.