Finding Cassidy Read online

  He had the same weird, knobby knuckles I did.

  I dropped my hand, looked up, wiped my eyes.

  Was he…my father? This wrinkled, old doctor with the watery blue eyes and the condescending smile?

  It wasn’t possible.

  Of course it was. Anything was possible.

  But I’d never know.

  It was one of a million things I would never know.

  EIGHTEEN

  The Native Peoples say Canada Geese teach us to cooperate and take turns. Sometimes geese lead and sometimes they follow. It depends on what kind of day their having.

  Cassidy MacLaughlin, Grade Four Science Project

  Did you see the word ‘prick’ tattooed on his forehead?” Quinn asked as we walked through the mall. “‘Cause I sure did.”

  Grunting a word that could have passed for yes or no, I dragged Quinn into another store. I hadn’t reached Mom, I had no idea how Frank was and we had two hours until the next ferry. I needed a major, all-out, mind-bending distraction. Like shopping.

  “This won’t fix what’s wrong,” Quinn said, “and spending money is a classic way to avoid dealing with loneliness and pain.”

  “The only pain I’m worried about is the pain I get when I look at your clothes.” I handed her three new outfits. “Go try these on.”

  Of course, she was right. A Louis Vuitton bag or Manolo Blahnik shoes wouldn’t fix this. Nothing would. But I figured shopping would help. And it did until Quinn complained about clothes made in sweat-shops. We argued about Third World economics for a while until I got mad and told her she could wear whatever she wanted and I would wear whatever I wanted, and that it might be suede. She shut up pretty fast. It was like the good old days, only better.

  In less than an hour, my charge card got quite the workout. Clothes that don’t itch—at least, clothes that don’t itch on Quinn—were surprisingly expensive.

  However, the pain hit me hard on the ferry.

  “I’ll never know who my father is,” I told Quinn as we sat in the boat’s cafeteria. Cassidy the Separate Anonymous One. That was me for the rest of my life.

  “Define ‘father.’” She shovelled in the last of her hot dog, licked the mustard from her fingers, eyed my untouched dog. “Are you going to eat that?”

  I handed it over. “Come on, Quinn, you know what I mean.”

  She opened the foil wrap, slid out the dog, slathered mustard and relish onto the bun. “If you think a real father is defined by DNA, then you’re dumber than I thought.”

  Big Mac had said the same thing, only in a much nicer way. Belonging is about love, not genetics. Would he and Quinn still feel that way if part of their history was missing? “Thanks for your sympathy.” Condensation from my Coke slicked my fingers as I fiddled with the can.

  “I am sympathetic. But my sympathy is about as helpful as that doctor telling you to count your blessings.”

  A picture of Frank lying in the hospital flashed through my mind. It would be a blessing if he got well. I couldn’t think about that quite yet. “Somewhere in the world is a guy who donated sperm so I could live.” Noting the curious looks from the table beside us, I turned my back and lowered my voice. “I don’t know why he did it, and that matters. I mean, what kind of guy was he? Altruistic or egotistical? A nice guy or a psychopath?”

  “Well, you are weird, but you’re no psychopath,” Quinn said around a mouthful of hot dog. “I’d pick the first one.”

  I didn’t want her joking about this. “It’s like there’s a big black hole inside me,” I whispered, “a part that’s blank. How am I supposed to deal with that?”

  “I don’t know,” Quinn admitted. “You either wallow for the rest of your life or you accept that it sucks and move on.”

  And look everywhere for tall, blue-eyed men with weird knuckles. And wonder if every guy I meet is somehow related to me.

  “Did you hear Dr. Anderose?” I asked her. “The guy had kids. I have brothers or sisters somewhere.”

  “Brothers are overrated,” she joked. “You don’t know how happy I was when Liam left for college.”

  “Quit it!” Disgusted, I pushed my drink away.

  “I’m sorry.” Quinn flushed. “That wasn’t fair.”

  “No, it wasn’t.” The people at the table beside us stood to leave. When the little girl stumbled over the chair leg, her father swooped her up in his arms before she hit the floor. Giggling, she patted his cheeks. “Thank you, Daddy bear.” He kissed her forehead.

  I wanted to be little again. I wanted to fall and stumble so Frank could swoop me up in his arms, too. Instead, I was stumbling all over the place and there was no one to catch me.

  “Maybe I’ll contact QTGYRL.” I voiced my thoughts out loud. “Find out about her plans to lobby for offspring rights.”

  Quinn leaned forward, her eyes bright. “That’s a great idea,” she said. “There are hundreds of thousands of offspring out there in your exact situation.”

  I snorted. “Maybe I’ll find a thousand siblings and get into the Guinness Book of World Records.”

  She ignored my sarcasm. “The more people who fight for the rights of donor babies, the more likely the law will change.”

  “I’m not about to carry the banner and march at the front of the parade,” I said. “I’ll just see what she has to say.”

  “Why don’t you contact Jason, too?” Quinn suggested. “See what he has to say?”

  “No.” Jason was bossy-stubborn. And charmingly persuasive. “He’ll just tell me I’m imagining things. That we aren’t related. That it’s okay to…you know.” I dropped my voice. “To be together again.” Of course, being related was a long shot. But so was Huntington’s. So was finding out your father wasn’t really your father. I was the queen of longshots.

  “Maybe just listen to what he has to say.”

  Something in Quinn’s tone roused my suspicions. I narrowed my eyes. “Have you been talking to him?”

  She filled her mouth too full with the last bite of hot dog. “Maybe,” she mumbled in a spray of crumbs.

  “Is there any way in the world to get you to mind your own business?”

  “Not really.” She grinned. “I’d be bored silly if I did that.” She leaned close. “Besides, Jason and Yvonne? Come on, Cass. What were you thinking? She might be your friend and everything—”

  “She’s not my friend.”

  “Then spare the guy. Fight for him.”

  “You don’t think I should leave him for the shark?”

  “Shark?” Quinn raised an eyebrow. “I can think of way better words to describe her.”

  For the first time that day, Quinn made me smile.

  I dropped Quinn off and headed for the hospital. Mom had finally called; Frank was through surgery. He was back in ICU, and still in a coma. When she asked how the meeting went, I spared no details. “We’ll talk later,” was her only response.

  ICU was quiet when I arrived. The dark-haired nurse at the desk said Mom had just slipped out and I could have five minutes.

  I walked past the curtained-off cubicles to the last bed on the right. Machines still beeped and whooshed, and I still smelled that rancid mix of antiseptic and sickness, but maybe I was used to it, because it hardly bothered me.

  However, seeing Frank still did.

  I couldn’t get used to all that white.

  Swallowing my nervousness, I slid into the chair beside him, picked up his uninjured hand and gently squeezed his fingers. “It’s Cassidy,” I whispered. “Mom said you came through surgery great.”

  No response. Studying the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest, I remembered what the nurse had said yesterday: He looks like he’s asleep, but he can hear you.

  “I…uh…went to the clinic. The guy was an asshole.” I glanced nervously over my shoulder. The curtain separated me from the others, but someone could still hear. I leaned closer to the bed. “Don’t worry, I have a plan.”

  I didn’t—not really. But I
didn’t know what else to say. I stared at Frank’s eyelashes, red-gold against his skin, his bleached-out freckles. Grinning slightly, I whispered, “Remember when I used to count your freckles?” Usually it was at night, after he’d read me a story and I didn’t want him to turn out the light. “And how you’d complain because all I ever wanted you to read was that story about Millicent and the wind?” Wind made me think of the time he’d made me a kite and Quinn and I had wrecked it the first time out and he’d built us another one. For some reason that sparked a memory of a school play, when I was so disappointed at playing the wicked witch instead of Snow White and how he’d insisted the witch was better. More range, he’d said.

  A different nurse, with short, brown hair, pulled the curtain aside and smiled at me. I pushed back from the edge of the bed. “And you are?” she asked, picking up Frank’s wrist to take his pulse.

  “I’m his daughter.” The response was automatic, and surprising. I should correct myself. But then I looked at Frank—at that warm, dear man with his messed-up red hair and his freckles—and I knew it was true. The big, black hole was still inside me, but a part of Frank lived inside me, too. And I realized that that made me his daughter, in all the ways that counted. “I am his daughter,” I repeated, the words catching in the back of my throat a little. “I’m Cassidy MacLaughlin.”

  “I’ll be monitoring him from the desk,” the nurse said as she adjusted the IV line, “but feel free to call if you have any concerns.”

  “Is he going to be okay?”

  “We hope so.” She pointed out the white call button and then left.

  We hope so. What kind of guarantee was that?

  It was no guarantee at all.

  I scooted the chair forward and leaned over until my head rested on Dad’s shoulder. I realized from some far-off distant place that I was crying. It didn’t matter. Something needed to be said, and I couldn’t leave the hospital without saying it, just in case Frank never did leave the hospital and died without knowing how I felt. “I love you, Dad. I just want you to know that, okay?” I didn’t expect an answer, so I kept on babbling. “Because you are my dad and I am your daughter and everybody’s been telling me that since the beginning—Jason and Quinn and Mom and Big Mac, too. And they were right and I was wrong.”

  That’s when I heard a soft mumble, only slightly louder than a breath. I drew back to make sense of it, but Dad wouldn’t let me. His good arm grabbed for my shoulder. “Cass,” he whispered, pulling me into a weak hug.

  I choked back a sob. I was stumbling and Dad was swooping. Okay, so it wasn’t much of a swoop and I wasn’t a little girl anymore, but he was my dad and I knew he’d be there to catch me for as long as he could.

  “It’s okay, Dad.”

  The mumble came again, louder this time. His eyelids flickered. I stroked his cheek. “You rest, okay? I love you. I’ll be back later.”

  As I gently disentangled myself, I saw Mom standing by the curtain. “How long have you been here?” I asked.

  “Long enough to hear you say you loved him.” Her eyes shone with tears. “Long enough to hear you call him Dad.” And she smiled.

  “I hate what you did.” We sat in the kitchen, devouring cheese on toast and drinking milk. Frank was still in serious condition, but the doctors were optimistic that he was coming out of the coma. “I’d never do it. I’d go without kids before I’d let some strange guy’s sperm inside me.”

  The words were petty and designed to hurt. Judging by the way Mom flinched, they did. “You don’t know for sure until you’re faced with that decision.”

  “I do know. I’d never do it.”

  She drank her milk, dabbed at her lips. “I wanted children so much—I never thought until later that I was signing away your rights.” Her lower lip trembled.

  I pushed the box of tissues in her direction. “Not just my rights, my roots.” Frank was my dad—I couldn’t think of him as anything else now—but I had a biological father somewhere, too.

  Mom looked stricken. “I know. And I’m so sorry. I wish I could change that.” Dabbing her eyes, she said, “We tried to give you a brother or a sister.”

  “You did?”

  She nodded. “I wanted you to have a genetic sibling, but the donor had moved away.”

  Relief made me temporarily light-headed. So Dr. Anderose wasn’t my father. But cynicism brought me crashing back to earth. I didn’t know that for sure—the good doctor could have lied.

  Mom got up, ran water into a cup, popped it into the microwave. I took another piece of toast. Now that Frank was improving, so was my appetite.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked. “In the very beginning?”

  Mom was silent. When the microwave beeped, she slid a tea bag into the cup and sat back down at the table. “Not only did the doctor recommend we keep it a secret, so did Grandpa Hunt.” Her voice was soft. I leaned forward to listen. “People confuse male infertility with male virility. Your grandfather was no exception. He thought it reflected badly on your dad’s masculinity, not fathering his own child. And then, well, the secret just grew.”

  She still hadn’t answered my question. Not really. “Mom,” I probed gently, “you and Dad could have told me. Why didn’t you?”

  Eyes brimming, she looked everywhere but at me. “This is so hard,” she finally whispered, “and I feel so guilty. I’ve abused your trust for so many years. I’m afraid things will never be right between us again.”

  Her pain touched me. It hadn’t occurred to me that Mom had paid a huge price for giving me life and love. For keeping the secret. “We’ll be okay, Mom.” It was true. I was still shaky on the trust thing—it would take me a long time to accept that they’d lied to me—but I loved her and I loved Dad and I knew we needed to pull together to fight the Huntington’s. “Just be honest. From here on, no more secrets, okay?”

  Mom sniffled. “Okay.” Methodically, she dunked her tea bag up and down in the water. “Remember what your dad said? That when you were four, he thought about telling you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He was afraid to. He thought it might change your relationship. And your relationship with your dad was so lovely.” She put the used tea bag aside, sipped at her tea. “He wanted to protect you from any social backlash.”

  “But he wasn’t in politics then. I don’t understand.”

  “It had nothing to do with politics. There was a lot of negative press about the whole donor thing. Not only that, if we told you, we’d have to tell the rest of the family. They’d ask questions we couldn’t answer. They might think of you as half ours. How would they treat you afterward? And what about at school, when you had to draw up a family tree?” A shadow darkened her eyes. “If you told the truth and you kept your father’s side blank, how would your teachers and classmates treat you? We couldn’t ask you to lie.”

  So they’d taken the lie on themselves.

  “I was conflicted,” Mom admitted, “but I felt I had no choice. Ultimately, your dad was the one who would be more affected by the news coming out.” Her hands cradled her cup; a sad smile slid across her face. She looked tired and old—way older than she had two weeks before. “My biggest fear was that you’d find out now—as a teenager. When you were already going through the teenage who-am-I stuff.”

  Now I’d be going through the who-am-I stuff for the rest of my life.

  The phone rang. We both jumped. Mom leaned over to read the call display.

  “It’s Jason.”

  “I don’t want to talk to him.” I took my plate and cup to the sink.

  Mom let the answering machine pick up. Our family message sounded through the kitchen, followed by the beep and then, “Ah, this is Jason. Calling for Cassidy. Cass, if you can, when you can, call me, okay?”

  Mom’s eyes burned a hole into my back as I rinsed my dishes. “I’m going to bed,” I said when I finished. “Get me up if the hospital calls.”

  “Cassidy, wait,” Mom called after me as I h
eaded for the door. “What’s with you and Jason? Why are you avoiding him?”

  “I’m not avoiding him. We broke up, that’s all.”

  That’s all.

  “Why?”

  I shrugged. “Things.” Things like I slept with him and he might be my half-brother.

  “Things like donor insemination?” she probed.

  “Maybe. Maybe not.” I couldn’t tell her. “Look, Mom, it doesn’t matter, okay? It’s over. I don’t want to talk about it.”

  Mom stood and gathered her dishes. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned, Dee Dee Bird, it’s that life is short. If you care about someone, don’t let anything get in the way of that.”

  NINETEEN

  Geese take care of each other when they are sick or hurt. In China, geese are a symbol of marrige because they merry and never devorse.

  Cassidy MacLaughlin, Grade Four Science Project

  I stayed away from school for almost a week, partly because I wanted to spend time at the hospital with Dad, and partly because I didn’t want to see Jason. But I couldn’t avoid Jason forever.

  He called to me in the parking lot my first day back. The sound of his voice sent my heart winging up past Mars. I took a deep breath, leaned against the car and watched him approach. Would I always feel this yearning whenever I saw him, I wondered? This sadness?

  “Hi.” A tentative smile, a nervous flick of blond hair, a glance at the kids who passed us by.

  “Hi.” I was close enough to smell his aftershave, to see the tips of his eyelashes. I was sliding…sliding under that wicked, wonderful Jason-spell. I wanted to throw myself at him; I wanted to run the other way.