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“What’s the name of the company?”
“Futurium.”
I’d heard of it. I’d read about the company in the paper and knew they were expanding or consolidating or something in Vegas.
“Doesn’t this seem like destiny?” she went on. “I meet a guy and he’s moving to the city where my sister lives. Doesn’t it seem like fate to you?”
“No. It seems like bad luck.”
“We’re family.”
“A cross we both bear.”
“There’s someone I want you to meet.”
“Your new boyfriend?”
“Your niece.”
I sat up straighter. We hadn’t spoken in months. A lot can happen in months, but what in holy hell had my sister not shared? My mind went to an infant, since Betsy hadn’t had any children the last time I’d seen her. Had she gotten pregnant just after she’d killed our mum? She had a newborn, was that what she was telling me?
“You had a baby?” I asked. It didn’t seem possible this Futurium chap could be the father, unless Betsy was lying about the chronology. Still, I asked. “Is the father—”
“Adopted,” she said. “Marisa is thirteen. She was in foster care and then I was fostering her. She was twelve when we met. When I heard her story—”
“Her story?”
“A friend of mine in Vermont’s Department for Children and Families told me about this amazing tween who, yet again, was about to fall through the cracks and be screwed by the system. Well, we really hit it off. It seemed to me, it was time someone took this child under their wings—for good. I’ve seen so many kids who became lost because no one cared for them. If I could save one when I got out? I had to try.”
“And the Department let you adopt a foster tween?”
“Why wouldn’t they?”
“Because you killed—”
“You always say that, but I didn’t. I know the facts, I know what happened.”
“Let me make sure I have this right,” I murmured over her denial. I began to see why this would have been a lot to leave on a voice mail or send in a text. “You’ve quit your job, taken a new boyfriend, adopted a kid, and now you’re starting a new career.”
“You make it sound insane. It’s a lot, yes, I get it. But I realized in the pandemic I had to blow everything up. I was lonely, I was sad, I hated my life. And then our mother died. It was just too much, Crissy. It was like I was a load-bearing wall, but the load was more than I could bear. I just…I just broke.”
She had, for years, been the more reckless of the two of us. But when she opened her heart to me, her plan sounded a little less crazy. Her life really had become a heaping plate of haggis. And, as parents had said often to me over the years, there’s never a good time to have a child. Children, born or adopted, are capable of pantsing the most buttoned-up of adults. “When do you get here?” I asked.
“Next week. We’re flying. The apartment is furnished, so we don’t have to bring all that much. And Marisa would like to meet her aunt,” she continued.
I paused, taking this in. Of course, Betsy had told this adolescent about me. “What’s she like?” I asked.
“She’s wonderful. I mean, she’s different. She’s been in foster care since she was five. But she’s a great kid. She’s kind of a math genius. Even took a coding class for teens when she was eleven. And she’s very opinionated—like you. You’ll get a charge out of her.”
“What does your boyfriend think of her?”
“They get along great. There are literally zero issues between them.”
“Was Marisa a factor in your decision not to move in with him?”
“Frankie—”
“That’s his name?”
