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“All that food, and there was never enough to eat there. Fucking never. All six of us were skin and bones, but the Dabrowskis would yell at us all the time about how greedy we were, how we were eating them out of house and home, how the state didn’t pay them enough and we were such a burden. Anytime we got in trouble, even for the tiniest things, it was straight back to the hole.” A hard edge entered her voice when she said, “God, I still hate them so much.”
Her story made Mason so fucking angry, his hands shook. “Where the fuck was your caseworker? How did they let that happen?”
She shrugged. “It was 1992. Foster care was so different back then. I was just another drug addict’s kid. No one gave a shit about me.”
Mason made up his mind to research the foster care system as much as he could. He’d find charities and other ways to help. Not just in New Mexico where she grew up or here in Vermont, but all over the country. He had considerable resources at his disposal, and he would fucking use them. “If shit like that is still going on—” He was too angry to even finish the sentence.
“From everything I’ve read—and trust me, I’ve looked into this a lot—the system has gotten a lot better since then. It takes a lot more for foster parents to get licensed than it used to, and they check on the kids a lot more.” Her tone very clearly said, They fucking better. “Kids still fall through the cracks, but it’s nothing like it used to be.”
“Thank fuck for that,” he murmured, trying to regain control over his emotions. He needed to stay calm if he had any chance of helping her.
“Anyway. It wasn’t all bad. The other kids looked out for me as much as they could. They taught me how to steal food and hide the evidence.” A tear made a slow, solitary track down her cheek. Addison wiped it away with the back of her hand. “The oldest boy, Ricky, used to take the blame for the younger kids when he could. He’d sneak us food if we were sent to bed without dinner.” Her lips held the memory of a smile. “He always called me Addy.”
At least she didn’t have to go through it alone. He had to take some comfort in that. “Are you still in touch with Ricky?”
A sad little shake of the head. “I don’t even know his last name. I got moved to a new home about a year and a half later, and I never saw any of those kids again.”
“You’d think they’d let you stay in touch.” Why pile even more heartbreak onto a kid who already dealt with so much? “At least talk on the phone or write letters or something.”
“I would’ve liked that,” she said, a slight catch in her voice again. “I always wondered what happened to him. I really hope his life turned out well and he’s happy.”
“Was your next home better?”
Addison shrugged again. “Yes and no. They didn’t mistreat me. I was the only kid there, but there was a playground down the street, so I got to play with other kids a lot. They were always really nice to me. They even talked about adopting me for a while.”
“But?”
One corner of her mouth twisted into a sardonic smile. “There’s always a but, isn’t there?” She sighed. “I’d picked up some...less than entirely desirable behaviors at the Dabrowskis’ house. I was only seven when I moved there. It’s not like I could just flip a switch and turn them off.”
“Full grown adults can’t just flip a switch,” he assured her. “That’s not remotely how brains work.”
“Well, I wish someone told Mr. and Mrs. Boyle that. Almost a year after I moved in, I heard them talking about me when they thought I was up in my room. They must’ve found some food wrappers I hid under the sofa. They weren’t even mad. They were just...” Her lips pursed as she considered the best way to describe it. “They were just done. So done with me. They didn’t understand why I couldn’t just behave the way they wanted me to and be good all the time when they were so nice and gave me nice things and didn’t mistreat me. They must’ve thought I was completely nuts. I left that home less than a month later.”
“They wanted to be saviors of a cute little girl so they could feel good about themselves,” Mason said through clenched teeth. “As soon as it got hard, they bailed. What a fucked-up thing to do to a kid.”
She pondered his words for a while. “That’s interesting. I never considered that.” Her tone and expression gave no clue of how she felt about it. “It all worked out, though. After that, I moved in with my granny. I lived with her until she passed away almost two years ago.”
“Your entire voice changed when you mentioned her,” he said softly, kissing the top of her head again. “She must have been an incredible woman.”
“Incredible,” she repeated, and he could hear the smile in her voice. “That’s the perfect word to describe Mary Walker. Though she was a hard woman in a lot of ways. Absolutely hated talking about my mom or the foster homes. She flat-out told me when I was thirteen that the reason no one wanted to be my friend was because I talked about sad shit all the time.”
Mason froze. Jesus, how could he even respond to that?
“Probably would’ve been better to put me in therapy, but I mean, it was the nineties. I can’t be too mad at her. And I guess she was right, because as soon as I stopped talking about it, I made some friends. Including Kate, who’s my best friend to this day.”
“I’m glad it worked out, but it couldn’t have been easy.”
She sighed again, and this time it sounded almost wistful. “No. It was way better than anything else that came before, though. Granny may not have liked talking, but she showed me how to heal. When she saw how fucked up my relationship with food was, how fixated I was on it, she didn’t yell at me. Didn’t say I was crazy or kick me out. She taught me how to cook.”
So many pieces fell into place in that moment. “No wonder you grew up to be a professional baker.”
“From the moment she taught me how to make biscuits when I was eight years old, it’s all I ever wanted to be.”
“Where was your dad through all of this? They must’ve found him too, right?”
When her shoulders slumped forward, he wished he hadn’t asked. “I never found out who he is.”
“Did you try one of those ancestry things? See if you could find out that way?” He’d seen so many stories about people finding estranged parents or half siblings they never knew existed. Hell, they even found the Golden State Killer because of those companies.
