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“You don’t think it’ll upset them? Finding out they have a surprise half-sister they never knew about?” The probing look Erin gave me was one hundred percent Tess.
“It might at first, but once the initial shock wears off I suspect they’ll be curious about you. They might even be excited about it.” I hoped so, anyway. Jack was a pretty easygoing kid, but Maddy was a different story. Things between the two of us had been difficult lately, but I wanted to think she wouldn’t take her issues with me out on Erin.
There was a lengthy moment of silence as Erin seemed to think about it. My fingers gripped the edge of my chair until she finally nodded. “If they’re comfortable with it, I’d like to meet them.”
I exhaled my relief. “After I talk to them, we’ll see if we can’t set something up. My mother will definitely want to meet you as well, if you’re willing.”
My neck itched at the prospect of telling my mom about Erin. I could already feel the weight of her disapproval pushing the oxygen from my lungs. God have mercy, she was going to give me the guilt trip of all guilt trips. On the bright side, Mom was going to love her to death, especially when she found out she was expecting. Hopefully, the prospect of becoming a great-grandmother would temper some of her disappointment in me.
A faint smile curved Erin’s lips. “I’d really like that.”
“I wish you could meet my sister Shannon and your cousins, but they don’t get back to the States very often.”
“What’s your sister like? I mean, besides the fact that she looks like you.”
“She looks likeus,” I said, and was pleased to see Erin smile. I scratched my temple as I considered how to describe my twin. “She’s more serious than me and a little quieter—more thoughtful, I guess. She doesn’t always say everything she’s thinking, which is probably what makes her a good diplomat. But she can be funny when she lets loose.”
Erin’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “Are you implying you’re not serious or thoughtful?”
I fidgeted with my knife and fork, lining them up so they were perfectly parallel with the napkin. “I’m better than I used to be, but I’ve always been more impulsive than Shannon. I don’t always think things through, and it sometimes gets me in trouble.”
Erin’s slow nod triggered a suspicion.
“Tess said something about me, didn’t she?” I’d been expecting it, so I wasn’t surprised. I just hoped she hadn’t badmouthed me too much before Erin had a chance to make up her own mind about me. “Let me guess: she called me unreliable.”
Erin blinked, startled by my question. “No. She didn’t say anything like that. She only had complimentary things to say about you.”
“Oh.”Well, fuck. Now I felt like a shit for assuming Tess would run me down behind my back. I should have known that wasn’t her style. She was much more of an “insult you to your face” type of person.
“Did she think you were unreliable? Is that why…” Erin clamped her lips shut and shook her head. “Never mind. You don’t have to answer that.”
I shifted in my seat, eager for a change of subject. “Can I ask…what made you decide to try and find us?”
Erin’s gaze dropped to her water glass, where she was rubbing her thumb over the condensation. “I’ve always wondered about my ancestry and medical history. It nagged at me every time I went to the doctor and had to leave the family medical history questionnaire blank. Or when people would say, ‘Oh, I’m X percent this and X percent that,’ and I had no idea what percent of anything I was. I used to come into the city and see all the different neighborhoods, and I’d wonder, ‘Am I Polish? Am I Irish? Am I German?’ I think I felt a little disconnected, like I didn’t know where I belonged because I didn’t know who my people had been.”
“For the record, you’re about as Irish as they come,” I said. “At least on my side, and I think Tess’s family is similar. My mother could give you the whole history of our family, tell you exactly who immigrated when, what town in Ireland they came from, and list all the family we still have in the old country—if you’re interested in that level of detail.”
Erin’s smile grew. “I’ll definitely ask her about it.”
The waiter reappeared, and there was a pause in the conversation as he dropped off our entrées before bustling off again.
“Getting back to your question,” Erin said, picking up her fork, “I decided to sign up for LineagePlus when I found out I was pregnant because I wanted more information on my ancestry and genetic health risks. Initially, I didn’t even think about the fact that it could help me find my birth parents. It was only after I’d sent off my DNA kit and went on the website that I saw the relative matching service. I knew when I opted into it there was a possibility it would turn something up, but it wasn’t like I decided to actively go looking for you. That wasn’t something I’d ever seriously considered doing before.”
“Why’s that?” I asked as I stirred around the salmon, brown rice, and vegetable bowl I’d ordered.
Erin frowned at her plate as she cut a piece of her chicken kebabs in half. “I guess I was worried my parents would think I was trying to replace them, and I didn’t want to hurt their feelings.”
“Do your parents know you’ve been in contact with us?”
“My mom does. I told her as soon as the DNA match showed up, before I worked up the courage to message Tess.”
“How did she take it? Was she upset?”
“No, she was great.” Erin smiled as she sipped her water. “At first I wasn’t sure what to do about the match—I didn’t know if I actually wanted to make contact—but my mom didn’t put any pressure on me one way or the other. She let me decide for myself, and once I had, she helped me write the message to Tess.”
It was a huge load off my mind that Erin’s mother didn’t begrudge our presence in her life. Also that Erin seemed to have such a good relationship with her mother. “Sounds like you two are close.”
“We are, yeah. Although we didn’t always get along so well—you know how teenagers can be.”
