Not My Daughter (20 page)

Pleased, he faced Susan again. "There's your answer, I believe." Before she could say anything more, he followed his mother.

Susan refused to leave, if for no other reason than to annoy Jack. She introduced herself to people who might have forgotten her, introduced Lily to some who wanted to forget them both. And when the issue of money came up again, this time from Jack's wife, Lauren, Susan was cool. "It isn't about money."

"Jack said you'd claim that," Lauren argued, her nasal voice a perpetual whine, "but if that isn't it, why are you back? You've never come before."

"I never felt welcome." Nor did she now. When she walked into the kitchen to replenish a plate of cookies, talk stopped. Old family friends watched her every move, not a one asking about Zaganack or Susan's work.

"Y'know," Lauren confided, "I probably shouldn't say this, but there really isn't much money. Well, there may be a small bequest, but most of what's left is going to Ellen." She seemed to wake up. "That's why you're here? To get in good with
Ellen?"

Susan felt no fondness for Lauren Tate. For all the gifts she had sent that had gone unacknowledged, she said, "The only ones obsessed with money are you and Jack. It makes me wonder whether you have that bequest already spent and are terrified you'll lose some of it to me."

"Why! No!"

Susan took her arm. "Please, Lauren, listen to me. I don't want money from anyone here. If someone offered it, I'd donate it to the church."

Lauren just pulled her arm free and walked off in a huff.

And so it went, not a happy day. But despite Lily's pleading looks, Susan stayed. She had let herself be driven away once. When she left this time, it would be her choice.

She chose to leave at eight, after dinner and dessert were done, the coffee urn was washed and set up for the next day, and Jack and his family were gone. Only a few of Ellen's friends remained when Susan finally ushered Lily to the car. The girl was silent until they pulled away from the house, when all she had swallowed came back up.

"Okay, Mom. I understand that my cousins have never met me before, but for a
five
-year-old not to warm to
me
means that there's been some serious brainwashing. Every time I tried to talk with them, they ran away. I did
not
try to talk with my uncle Jackson, nor did he try to talk to me, probably because he was too busy talking for your mother. He acts like she doesn't have a brain. Why does she put up with it?"

Susan could only rationalize. "It's how she's always been. My father made all the decisions."

"That's sad."

"It works for some women."

"
I
couldn't live like that." Lily's profile was tense against the diner lights as they passed back through the center of town.

"Nor could I," Susan said, "but that doesn't mean it's wrong."

"But she's your
mother
. Doesn't she realize what it took for you to come here? Doesn't she have
any
feelings?"

"She's tired right now, probably numb."

Lily persisted. "But aren't you
hurt?"

Looking back on the day, Susan tried to decide how she felt. From the moment she decided to return, she had been dreading the confrontation, but it could have been worse. Silence was better than name-calling. "Hurt? After all these years, I'm immune. But I did hope that there'd be something warmer. So I'm disappointed."

"Disappointed that your mother wouldn't talk to you? I'd be
furious
."

"My mother was never a big talker."

"But you're her daughter, whom she hasn't seen in years!"

"She just lost her husband."

"Fine," Lily granted, "but that is
not
how a good mother behaves--and see, that's what I mean, Mom. I may be only seventeen, but I know this. A good mother is sensitive to what her child is feeling."

Susan had a striking thought. In a shame-filled voice, she said, "By that standard, I've failed."

"Are you kidding? You taught me this. You totally understood what I was feeling when the Zaganotes voted me out, and when Robbie's parents came over? You knew then, too. We were absolutely on the same page."

"Not about the baby."

Lily took a quick breath but said nothing.

Susan tried to explain. "It's hard sometimes. I do understand what you're feeling, but my own feelings get in the way."

They were silent. On the outskirts of town, now, the car sliced through the dark with only the headlights to mark the road.

"At least you're telling me that," Lily finally said. Her voice lowered. "Do you still not want the baby?"

"I want the baby," Susan said.

"You don't sound convinced."

"I'm working on that."

Back at the hotel, Susan's BlackBerry was dinging with e-mail sent during the day but only just arriving. There must have been a connectivity problem at her parents' house--how ironic was that?

She read condolence notes from Kate and Sunny, and a brief e-mail from Pam saying she had been in touch with the school board. More urgently, there were notes from Evan Brewer. Three disciplinary problems had arisen, one involving a boy accused of cheating. Susan's heart sank when she read that one. Michael Murray had recurring problems; she'd been working closely with the family. Evan complained that Susan's assistant wouldn't give him access to the boy's full file.

Susan kept certain reports under lock and key--namely, those that contained sensitive information from parent conferences--and the Murray file was one. Husband and wife were struggling to hold their marriage together. The home situation was occasionally violent.

As reluctant as Susan was to give Evan access to that file, she felt he had to see the full picture. So she instructed Rebecca to show him what she had, but asked Evan not to act on the case. She would be at school Thursday morning. It could wait.

Well after sending the e-mail, though, she was bothered. She wasn't convinced Evan truly needed the file. She was still the principal; her word should have been enough. And yes, she was being hypersensitive, but it had been that kind of day.

Trying to relax, Susan began to knit. It helped clear her mind of Zaganack, but not of Lily. The girl had fallen asleep after changing into pajamas, at which time Susan had noted a definite bulge. The image stuck with her.

In time, though, another image took its place. Her father's face. In this instance, the clock was not so much ticking as turned back. Good memories were returning--of being five and going with her father to Oklahoma City, of riding beside him in an open convertible for the Fourth of July parade when she was nine, of being hugged at eleven when she had tripped over Jack's outstretched leg and broken her arm.

Revisiting these memories, she found John's death all the more tragic. It was as if she was losing her father all over again.

The funeral was set for noon so that townsfolk who worked could attend during their lunch hour. In reality, though, much of the town was closed for the day, which meant that there were more people than ever at the house when Susan and Lily arrived. Some were actually friendly. Most left the living room, though, when the hearse pulled up outside to take John to the cemetery.

Susan waited, keeping her distance, while her mother stood by the coffin for a final goodbye before it was closed. Pallbearers carried it to the hearse. Ellen and the Jackson Tates followed in a black limousine.

Lost in the long line of cars, by the time Susan and Lily reached the cemetery, the crowds were twenty deep. Buttoning her coat to the throat and triple-wrapping her scarf, Susan told herself that standing in back was for the best. But the mass of humanity did nothing to cut the wind, which blew brutally cold across the bare land, and she couldn't shake the feeling that the crowd was intentionally keeping her away.

Listening to hymns sung by the church choir's soprano, Susan choked up at the intense sense of loss. She didn't realize she was trembling until Lily wrapped both arms around her. And then there was another arm. Through tears, she looked up at Rick. He kissed her forehead.

The wind wasn't as bothersome then. With Rick's warmth on her left and Lily's on her right, she listened to the prayers and the eulogies. By the time the soprano sang again, Susan was feeling loved, at least.

They didn't see her mother leave. Ellen would have been flanked by Jack and his family, anyway, and Susan was focused forward, working her way through the departing crowd toward the grave. Refusing to remember the bad now, only the good--how
many
times had her father succumbed to her pleading and reread
Amelia Bedelia
--she watched while two grave diggers shoveled dirt over the coffin, watched closely, making sure they were doing it right, until there was no mahogany left to see.

Finally, she took a shuddering breath. She held Lily for a minute, but it was only when she turned to Rick with clear eyes now that she saw the man who stood not far from his shoulder.

She gasped and, teary again, reached for him. She had seen Big Rick several times over the years, but always on the West Coast. Knowing that he was here for the first time in nearly as long as it had been for her, she began to weep.

"Thank you for coming," she finally managed. She had said the words dozens of times at the house, but truly felt them now.

"I wasn't sure I should," Big Rick said, and this close he was big indeed. If Rick was six-four, his dad had to be six-six.

"I insisted," Rick said. "He needed to be here. We were shooting to arrive yesterday but had to spend the night in Chicago. You doin' okay?"

Susan nodded. "Lily's been great."

Big Rick gave Lily a kiss. "It's been too long," he said. If he knew she was pregnant, he didn't let on, and once back at the house, Susan understood why. When he had expressed qualms about returning, he hadn't been kidding. He was awkward seeing these people again, and though old friends greeted him with smiles, he remained visibly ill at ease. Susan was about to ask Rick about that, when she noticed Ellen looking straight at his dad.

Quietly, Big Rick excused himself and worked his way through the crowd. He stood for a minute before Ellen, then gave her a gentle hug, and where Ellen had been dry-eyed moments before, now her shoulders shook and her hand clutched his sweater. Confused, Susan looked at Rick.

He smiled crookedly. "I didn't guess either."

"Guess what?"

"That there was more to his leaving than just us."

Susan was too astonished to follow. "
What
more?"

Rick steered her away from the crowd. "I'm at his house, thinking he's coming back here with me, and he starts to balk. He says John wouldn't like it. When I ask why, he explains. Apparently, he and Ellen had a special attachment."

"Special attachment?"

"Were sweet on each other."

"Had an
affair?"

"No, they just liked each other a lot. Your father thought it was more, though, and while he was railin' on about me, he lit into my dad. 'Chip off the old block. Can't get the one for you, so your boy takes the other. Apple doesn't fall far from the tree.'"

"That's awful!"

"Which--the accusation or the affection?"

"The
accusation
. Did your mother think there was something between them?"

"No. She knew my father loved her. Maybe it was a macho thing on John's part, because everyone else knew Ellen loved her husband. I don't know why he'd be insecure."

Nor did Susan. "Your father moved away because of that?"

"It was part of the picture."

Susan looked across the room. Ellen was talking with Big Rick now, only as animated--no more, no less--than she had been with other friends from out of town. When several local people recognized Big Rick and approached, she disappeared.

"Where's Lily?" Rick asked, looking around.

"Walking around, I guess. She's feeling a little lost."

"Does anyone know?"

"No. Does your dad?"

"No. I'm guessing this hasn't been a fun trip for her."

Susan shot him a rueful look. "She was hoping something good would happen."

Lily had been too cautious to explore the house the day before. She felt she was being watched and didn't want to be caught snooping.

This afternoon was different. She knew there were three rooms in the side wing and wanted to see which one had been her mother's. The first door she opened was to her grandparents' room, dominated by a four-poster double bed piled high with coats. The next door opened to a full bathroom, larger than the lav off the kitchen, and the one after that to a boy's room that she guessed, from the banners and trophies, had barely changed since Jackson lived there. The room at the end of the hall had to be Susan's.

Only it hadn't been a bedroom for years, to judge from the worn sofa cushions, stuffed bookshelves, and overflowing baskets of yarn. This was a sitting room, and, right now, perhaps escaping the crowd for a few minutes, it held her grandmother. She was knitting.

Lily hated the way Ellen had treated her mother, and would have liked to speak up in defense of Susan, much as she had done to Jack. But this woman was older. And she was her grandmother. Hadn't Lily always wanted to meet her?

Ellen didn't see her at first, and Lily didn't quite know what to do. Then the woman looked up, and Lily refused to run. The fact that Ellen seemed stunned gave her strength.

Ellen blinked first. Her eyes fell to her work. So did Lily's. Here was something to discuss.

"What are you making?" Lily asked from the door.

"A sock."

"Do you like making socks?"

"Yes."

"Have you made a lot?"

"I have."

Lily was challenged. Ellen might not be much of a talker, but there had to be a way to get her to say more than two words. "You're using circulars. Why don't you use DPNs?"

Ellen seemed surprised by the question. But her voice remained quiet. "I'm hemmed in by DPNs. Two circulars feel more open." She stopped, then started again. "Lots of ladders with DPNs. I don't get them with circulars."