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"I loved having you, so I never questioned her for it. I should've..." Mom interjected fast, and Dad moved his hand from her leg to cover her hand on the table.
"Honey." He addressed her, and her shoulders slumped. He turned back to Lilly. "Mom always saw the good in people, so she would've never suspected anything being wrong with your biological mother." He emphasized the bio part. "You were at our house more days than not when Henry was gone. You were about a year old when you started having bruises that didn't add up with the stories Emily gave Heather. One day, you were around five, and you had a split lip. She said you had slipped after your shower and fell on the tiles in the bathroom. That was when I consulted with an associate about it. I didn't tell Heather about it at first. I didn't want your mom to worry or, worse, act differently and tip Emily off. You can't just accuse someone of child abuse without valid proof. My associate, Hector Lakatos, specialized in mental illnesses and, as you know, other areas of the brain." Dad paused, letting us digest all the information. Lilly's chest was rising and falling as if she had just run a couple of miles at full speed, and I didn't feel much better. I had the urge to jump up and pace the entire length of the estate.
"Hector owed me a few favors. He had me keep a log of Emily's behavior. I made a point to invite her and Henry over. We would meet them or make day trips together—anything that would allow me to study her. I cataloged every little thing and handed it over to Hector. One day, he asked me if any mental illnesses ran in her family, and I started digging into her past. There was not much to find, though. Emily's mother was institutionalized for endangering herself and her family when Emily was a toddler. She died a few years later. Her father was mostly unemployed and eventually dropped off the face of the earth when Emily was a young teenager. Hector managed to get a look at her mother's medical files somehow and concluded that Emily may have a form of Schizoaffective disorder."
"What the fuck is that?" I burst out.
God, I needed to get out of this chair. My leg started bouncing of its own volition.
Mom pulled her hand out from under Dad’s and clutched the arm of her chair as she explained, "It’s a mental health disorder. The person displays a combination of schizophrenia symptoms, as well as mood disorders, such as depression or manic behavior."
Motherfucker.
"Do I have that?" Lilly squeaked, her gaze ping-ponging back and forth between my parents.
"No. Hector didn't find any indicators when he...treated you," Dad reassured her.
Treated. Brainwashed. I closed my eyes and counted backward. Five, four, three... When I opened them again, I found my father staring at me with furrowed brows. He was expecting me to lose it, flip the table or something similar, and he wasn't too far off. I was working hard on controlling my anger, though.
I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding.
"When you disappeared and she wouldn't do anything about it, Henry was beside himself. Emily refused to go to the authorities. She acted like you were...visiting someone," Mom added with tears running down her face.
"That's when I filled your Mom in on what I had been doing," Dad admitted with a sigh.
"I was horrified that I had been so blind. All the signs were there when Dad laid them out, but I didn’t see them." Mom was full-on sobbing at that point.
"You turned back up in Santa Rosa, and I saw it as the right time to suggest for you to stay with us for a while. I meant to fill Henry in on my suspicion and hoped we could get Emily to seek help while we took care of Lilly getting past her...experience. But I never got the chance to talk to Henry in private. Emily heard Mom and me discuss it in the hospital and instantly agreed. She said she would speak to Henry and, shortly after, came to us saying he also thought it was a good idea under the circumstances. We never saw Henry after that. According to Emily, he had to leave to go to another job site."
"We should've questioned her further. Henry wouldn't have just left you. But we were so focused on you, worried because of the messages Emily kept getting," Mom pleaded with Lilly. She blamed herself for what Henry went through. "I just wanted for you to get bet—" She broke off, covering her face with her hands.
"Honey, please." Dad wrapped his arms around her, and she sobbed into his shoulder.
I was shocked to realize how much guilt my parents were carrying around—misplaced guilt. They made mistakes, no question there, but what Lilly's psycho mother did should not have been part of that.
After my parents filled us in about their knowledge of Emily's past, and Mom had somewhat calmed down, we sat in silence. Lilly flicked her thumb against the fingers of her hand when she suddenly stopped.
"So, you had Lakatos wipe my memory because of Emily, not just Nate?"
Huh?
"Something happened while you were, uh...gone." Dad didn't use the word kidnapped, and Lilly and I both noticed it—her tick stopped abruptly.
"We never figured out what. We talked about it last night. Nate was 100% transparent with us on everything that happened while you were with him. Whenever Emily would come near you in the hospital, you would start crying, cringing away. Even scream. You would cling to whomever was near—Henry, me, your nurse," Mom whispered. "It was heartbreaking. Nate couldn't tell us, either, what the trigger may have been. You were scared and wanted to go home, but there was nothing that would explain why you reacted toward your mother the way you did. You were terrified."
"I informed them what Hector would be able to do," Dad redirected the conversation before Lilly could get too worked up over what her mother may have done. "Emily agreed without a second thought." Dad scrubbed a hand over his face. "In hindsight, she probably wanted you to forget. I'm starting to suspect that your reaction in the hospital had something to do with what she did to you."
"She never wanted me." Lilly's words were barely audible, yet it was like she shouted them at us. My mother gasped and jumped out of her chair, rounding the table.
"Oh, sweetheart." She wrapped her arms around Lilly.
"You helped her by taking Lilly away," I told my father, who nodded solemnly.
He blinked slowly. "I never anticipated her being that—"
"Psycho?" I supplied with a raised eyebrow.
Neither of my parents contradicted my statement.
