Sins of Innocence (49 page)

Finding the high school had been simple. As Jess strolled down the empty corridors, for the first time she felt she was an intruder, invading the privacy of someone else’s life, about to disrupt the peace of another human being—and his family. She hadn’t felt that way before finding Susan’s son—meeting him had happened so quickly. She stopped in front of a trophy case now, which was crammed with tarnishing statues brandishing basketballs, and lined with photos of past years’ teams. She looked at
the young faces. P.J.’s son could be one of them. Her gaze moved to a photo of a group of cheerleaders, and Jess thought of her own daughter.
Amy. Amy Hawthorne. No
, Jess reasoned,
this is right. They have a right to know us. And we have a right to know if they want to
.

She left the trophy case and followed the black etched signs toward the school library.

A librarian was hunched behind a counter, examining a stack of books.

“Excuse me,” Jess interrupted.

The woman peered at her over half-glasses that were attached to her neck with a black nylon cord.

“My name is Jessica Randall. I’m doing an article on high school alumni, and where they are today. I was wondering if I could look at your high school yearbooks from, say, 1985 to 1988.”

“Newspaper article?”

Jess thought quickly. “Yes.”

“Which paper?”

“Not, ah,” she hesitated only a moment, “not the local paper.” With her luck the librarian would know the editor of the local paper. “It’s a generic article for the Bridgeport paper about schools in the suburbs. Fairfield won’t be mentioned by name.”

“You work for the paper?”

“No. This is sort of a speculative article.”

“You a free-lance writer?”

“Yes.”

“And you want to see the Fairfield yearbooks?”

“Yes.”

“Which high school?”

Oh, no
, Jess thought,
not again
. “This high school,” she said. “To start.”

The woman scowled. “You can’t take them out. You’ll have to look at them here.”

Jess sighed, grateful that at least she had passed the woman’s test. “That’s fine.”

The woman shuffled off to a back room, her long skirt dragging unevenly across the tops of her penny loafers.

Jess resisted drumming her fingers on the counter while she waited. She glanced around: A few students were scattered at desks throughout the brightly lit room. It was, Jess knew, too early in the school year for most kids to be worried about term papers. She watched one young girl who looked to be a sophomore, the same age as Maura. Jess shivered a little. Maura’s baby was to have been due at the end of April: When the young girl seated at the library table was getting ready for what would probably be her first prom, Maura should have been lying in a delivery room, about to be a part of the miracle of birth. But no. She had been spared that. There would be no baby, no threat of it being taken away.

Jess let her mind drift back to Maura, who was struggling each day to put the miscarriage behind her. Jess knew that time, though it would not completely erase the trauma, the pain, and the wondering “what if,” would help to form the scar that would eventually heal the raw hurt. She knew there would at some point be one entire day that would pass without her daughter thinking of what had happened, and later there would be two days, then three. But never, ever, would the memory be completely gone.

A stack of books slapped the counter and snapped Jess back to where she was.

“Nineteen Eight-five to 1988,” the librarian said dryly. “Take them over there.” She pointed to an empty table against the wall.

“Thank you,” Jess muttered, and took the books to the table, glad to be away from the questioning librarian.

She thumbed through the pages of seniors from 1985: no Phillip Archambault. 1986: nothing. 1987: nothing. 1988: the same. Surely he wouldn’t have graduated after 1988: Phillip, like the other children, would have been twenty years old then.

Jess looked across the room to the librarian, dreading asking her for the yearbooks of the other high school. Before she did that, she decided to double-check the ones in front of her. She opened the pages of 1985 again, slowly
thumbing through each page. There was, however, no Phillip Archambault. She picked up the 1986 book again and began turning the pages, not expecting to find anything. Suddenly, there he was: On the first page of the section on seniors was Phillip Archambault, one of four pictures on the entire page. Jess quickly looked at the title:
SENIOR CLASS OFFICERS LEAD THE WAY
it read. Phillip Archambault had been the class President. She looked at his picture: He was a handsome boy, with a round, friendly face and a cheerful smile. Jess squinted, trying to decide if he looked at all like P.J. Maybe. Maybe around the eyes. Although the photo was in color, it was difficult to tell if Phillip had his mother’s emerald eyes.

She read the description under his name:
Varsity Football, Varsity Basketball, Varsity Track, Student Government, Debating Club, Art Club
. Art Club. So, Phillip had something in common with his mother after all. Then Jess read his ambition:
To go on to law school and become a first-rate criminal lawyer
. He had not only inherited his mother’s interest in art; it appeared he had inherited her intelligence as well.

Jess took a last look at the picture. “Phillip Archambault,” she whispered, “you are about to have the chance to meet your birth mother.”

She closed the book and returned all of them to the librarian, who gave her a distant nod when Jess thanked her again. Then Jess went out into the corridor and immediately walked to the pay phone. She pulled Miss Taylor’s letter from her purse, slipped a dime into the phone slot, and dialed the number. When a woman answered, Jess had the perfect words:

“Mrs. Archambault, my name is Jess Randall. I’m putting together a reunion of high school students, and to be honest, we’ve lost track of Phillip since he first went off to college.” She paused, and said a quick prayer that he had, indeed, gone to college. If his goal had been to become a lawyer, chances were he’d at least gotten as far as a freshman in college.

“Yes?” the woman replied. “How can I help you?”

“Could you give me his current address?” Jess held her breath.

“Why, certainly He’s in law school, you know … in Boston.…”

Jess smiled.
Boston. Where P.J. had gone to school. Where Phillip had, in fact, been conceived
. She clicked her pen, then took down the address Phillip’s adoptive mother was so willing to give.

Jess stretched out on one of the twin sofas in the living room after the kids had left for school. A quick trip to Boston and back yesterday, sandwiched in between school hours, had left her exhausted. But she felt it was still important not to let the children know what she was doing.

She opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling. Today was the day to track down Ginny’s daughter, Lisa Andrews. She was the one with whom Jess would have to be the most careful. It was highly doubtful that Ginny would come to the reunion, so Jess decided she would simply explain to Lisa that she would have the opportunity to meet some of her birth mother’s friends, and perhaps learn a little something about her.

Was that the right thing to do?

What if the girl demanded to know more?

What if the girl decided to track Ginny down herself?

What if Ginny reacted to the girl the way she had to Jess?

Was Jess opening a wound for the girl that was best left alone?

Jess weighed each question carefully, then came to only one conclusion: She wanted to protect the girl because of the way Ginny was, and maybe protecting was exactly what she shouldn’t do.
Maybe that’s when we all get into trouble. When we try too hard to protect others
. Well, Jess thought, good or bad, Ginny is the girl’s mother.
And maybe the girl has a right to know
.

The ruse of a “high school reunion” had worked with Phillip’s mother, so Jess had decided to try it again. She was glad for her small, childlike voice, and knew its sound made it believable that she was an old school chum of Lisa’s. She’d phoned the girl’s parents the night before: They told her Lisa was an actress, and that she was in a Broadway play,
Madeline
. They also told Jess that Lisa had no phone.

If she’s an actress on Broadway, she must be a lot like her mother
, Jess mused.
Chances are, she can handle whatever she needs to
.

She swung her legs off the sofa and decided to jump in the shower. She’d have just enough time to catch the train into the city for the matinee performance of
Madeline
.

It was a Pygmalion-type of play with a twist: A young hooker had been befriended by a man and his wife, who were eager to reform the girl. Ginny’s daughter played the hooker.

Jess sat in the third row of a half-empty house and watched with interest. The girl looked nothing like Ginny: Her hair was light and long, her body tall and lithe, and she did not strut as though she owned the world. The only similarity Jess could detect was the deep, almost masculine voice with the built-in sexuality.

Perhaps because Susan’s and P.J.’s children were both boys, Jess had not felt the connection as keenly. But now as she watched Ginny’s daughter, she was increasingly apprehensive about finding her own. Watching Lisa, so polished and mature, reminded Jess, once again, that her daughter was no longer a child.

“I don’t consider it fucking,” Lisa was saying to her costar. “I consider it performing a service for the under-privileged men of the world.”

Jess closed her eyes. It could have been Ginny talking.

As Act III ended, Jess smiled at the conclusion: Lisa/Madeline, the hooker, had transformed the wife of the genteel man into a streetwalker. The curtain came down, and a smattering of applause rose in the theater. The stage was
lit again, and the cast came out to take their bows. Jess clapped as loudly as she felt she could, watching Lisa the entire time, feeling a growing uneasiness about what she was to do next. Suddenly the lights dimmed again, then the house lights came on. On unsure legs Jess stood up, and made her way backstage.

It seemed a most appropriate day: Today would have been her mother’s sixtieth birthday.

Jess sat in her car, staring through the afternoon sunlight at the home in front of her: a Georgian redbrick mansion, flocked with perfectly trimmed hedges and big oak trees, their leaves beginning to show a first hint of amber. Lacy drapes hung at the twin bow windows on either side of the white wooden double front door; a three-car garage stood apart from the main house, as though looking up to it in awe. The name on the shingle at the foot of the drive read
HAWTHORNE
.

She hadn’t phoned. She knew that by coming here she was risking meeting Amy herself, but it was Monday again, and chances were she’d be out. Plus, part of Jess, if she was honest with herself, hoped no one would be home.

“I’ve done it for Susan, for P.J., and for Ginny,” she said aloud. “Now it’s my turn. It’s my turn.”

She got out of the car slowly, her thoughts churning over and over, in synchronization with her stomach. “It’s the right thing to do,” she tried to reassure herself.

She walked up the long, circular driveway, her head bent.
Why didn’t I drive in?
she wondered, then instantly knew the answer:
Driving into the driveway would have seemed a true invasion on their lives
. She could not see the irony of that thought.

Jess raised a quivering hand and pressed a finger on the doorbell. From inside the house she heard melodic chimes. She stood, waiting, hearing the sound of her
thumping heart above the rustle of the oak leaves in the autumn breeze.

The door opened. A woman stood there. A small, gray-haired woman. A small, gray-haired, pleasant-looking woman.

“May I help you?”

Beyond the woman Jess could see a wide foyer, a huge staircase, a crystal chandelier. A
Waterford
chandelier. Like the one in Jess’s dining room.

“Mrs. Hawthorne?” Her voice was barely above a whisper. For a moment she wasn’t sure the words had come out at all.

“Yes?”

Jess looked eye-to-eye with the woman. Her daughter’s mother. The woman who raised her, cared for her, loved her. The way she had done with Maura. Maura and the two boys. A flash of heat struck her. She couldn’t do this to this woman.

“May I help you?” the woman repeated.

Jess closed her eyes.
She has a right to know. My daughter has a right to know
.

“Mrs. Hawthorne,” Jess began, as she slowly opened her eyes. “My name is Jessica Randall.” She felt as though she were talking to a woman who might be old enough to be her own mother. She felt a great need to show her respect.

“Yes?” The woman shifted on one foot, not a sign of impatience as much as a sign of age.

“Mrs. Hawthorne, I’ve come to talk with you about your daughter, Amy.” The words were out. It was too late to turn back.

Jess thought she saw the color drain from the woman’s face.

“My daughter?”

Jess was confused. It seemed as though the woman didn’t know who she was talking about. Had Miss Taylor made a mistake? God. Was she at the wrong house?

“Yes,” Jess said. “Amy.”

“Why?”

“Nothing’s wrong, Mrs. Hawthorne, please don’t misunderstand.”

“I’m sorry, young lady, but I
don’t
understand at all.” Her face had grown tight; the friendliness had disappeared.

“Mrs. Hawthorne, you adopted Amy when she was an infant, am I correct?”

“Yes. That’s no secret.”

Jess stared at the woman and suddenly saw what looked like a veil of understanding cross the woman’s face.

“Oh, dear,” the woman said, and put her hands to her face.

“Mrs. Hawthorne.” Jess forced her words to come out stronger, louder. “I am Amy’s birth mother.”

“Oh, dear,” the woman repeated. “Oh, my dear.” Then the woman started to weep.