twenty-seven
"This isthe last time I'm going to say how ridiculous I think this whole thing is." Susan was pacing in her office. The hearing was less than three weeks away, and though I told her about Lisa leaving over a week ago, I think she still thought it was some kind of joke. "The last time, Cole. Are you sure there isn't a way you can get her to come back? Can't she take a damn leave of absence or something?"
“No,” I said, “and I don’t want her to. I’m CJ’s only family. He belongs with me. I don’t need to lie. I won’t lie.”
“Jesus fucking Christ. I used to be like you when I was your age.”
"Principled," I joked. Susan looked at me with a smirk and raised one warning eyebrow.
"No, you schmuck, stupid." She sighed, seeming to drop the matter. We sat in silence for a few minutes when Dev walked in the conference room, holding a file folder, wearing a smile, and absentmindedly stroking the plain gold band on his left hand.
“Hey.” We bumped fists as he approached the table. “How’s married life?”
“Highly recommended,” he answered. His smile never faltered.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“We got the results from your and CJ’s DNA tests,” Susan said.
My heart started to thump wildly. What the fuck was Dev doing here? The tests were supposed to be a formality. My first thought was the DNA tests concluded that CJ wasn't my brother, but that was impossible. He was like my clone. I took a deep breath and tried to stay calm. I had to wait for more information before panicking. This was the advice I always gave my sister, but now I had an inkling of what she must go through daily.
“Okay,” I said calmly and waited.
“What do you know about your biological father?” Susan asked.
"Nothing. Crystal never mentioned him." As I got older, I got the feeling she might not have known who he was.
"What do you know about CJ's father?" Dev sat in the chair opposite me and dropped the file on the table.
“As much as I know about my own. Nothing.”
“Well.” Dev shoved the folder across the table to me with an inappropriate smile on his face. “This is going to be very informative for you.”
I snatched the file and opened it. I scanned the lab report and looked from Susan to Dev and back again. CJ and I had the same father. I slammed the file shut and slid it away from me.
"Who is he?" I asked Dev. I felt something building in me, something hot and sickening. Not only did Crystal know who my father was, but she also left me after she got out to find him and have another kid. Who the fuck was this asshole? Why did she lie to me? Did he know about me? Was he aware of what Crystal and I went through? Where the hell was he when I got sent to live with my uncles and cousins for those four months of hell?
"I don't know. Your dad's DNA isn't in any database I had access to, so he's not a convicted felon or related to a convicted felon. But I did a little digging and think I know where you should start if you wanted to find answers."
He opened the file again and pulled out a small stack of papers. They were statements from a bank in Missouri. The name on the account made my blood run cold: Arnold West. This was Crystal’s brother’s account.
"Around the time you were in Missouri, your uncle was making bi-weekly cash deposits of around two thousand dollars. They continued for three months after you were back in New York. Someone was paying him four to five thousand a month in cash. At the time, he didn't have steady employment. Odd jobs here and there, a couple of rental properties that brought in less than five hundred dollars a month. The timing is too convenient. That's where you should start. Have you called the detective yet?"
This was a lot to swallow. After I ran away from Missouri, I came home and hid in Kimmy's closet for over a week before we were caught by our mother. No one knew I was missing, because my blood relatives never reported it. They never reported it because someone was paying them to keep me a secret, and if I were missing, the gravy train would stop. It couldn't have been anyone who gave a fuck about my well-being, because it took three months for them to realize I was gone. I definitely didn't remember meeting anyone who could've been my biological father and definitely no one who gave a shit about me.
“Cole, the detective?” Dev asked again. I shook my head. “Really, man? It’s been almost six bloody months.”
I didn't have an answer for him. He was right. I should've called Detective Tan months ago, but I had a lot going on, and I was actively avoiding all this shit. Crystal's ashes were still in my mom's study. The shit from her Missouri home was stacked in the ground floor apartment that I'd been keeping for her like some kind of shrine. I still had her unopened letters. The pile of shit kept growing, and it was threatening to overtake me.
"Cole." Susan was sitting right next to me, but her voice sounded so far away. "I know this is hard. I know this is a lot, but your hearing is in three weeks. You don't want someone with a stronger claim on CJ to swoop in with a giant bag of money and fuck up everything we've been working towards for the last few months. We need to know. You need to know."
“Wow.”My mom was as shocked as I was when I told her what happened in Susan’s office today. It gave me a small measure of comfort that she didn’t know. She didn’t lie or keep things from me like Crystal. Of all the things my birth mother had done, this betrayal stung the worst.
“She never mentioned my biological father?” I asked.
“No,” Dad chimed in. “I asked. It would have been especially helpful if someone could have helped her financially. You said they were paying five thousand dollars a month?”
I nodded.
