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The thermos is filledwith coffee, and I begin the short walk to the bench my grandfather installed to spend time with my grandma. In the past two years, their place has become our place. I see his silhouette, and as I get closer his body relaxes with the breaking of twigs, alerting him to my arrival.
Sitting next to him, I hand him a mug. He takes it, without a word. I pour the coffee with cream and sugar in his mug, then follow suit, pouring mine as full as I can get it.
“Does this bomb you just dropped on me, mean Tia and Liam are brother and sister, too?”
I’d not thought about Tia. I thought of the boy I grew up with—who up until meeting Ash has been my ride and die. How can he not be my twin, as I believed for so long?
“I guess it does. Wait, why were they together last night?” I’d not asked. Between almost losing my brother, or whatever Liam is to me now, and the thought that my father wasn’t my biological dad, I’d not pieced it together. Ash answers me when he arches one brow higher than the other.
“Oh, fuck. Tell me they aren’t…”
“Fucking? I assume they are. They’ve kept it on the DL since our wedding.” A year. They have been together a year. How did my mother let this happen?
“I’m trying to work it out in my mind, Noah. Help me make sense of it.”
His tone is low, but void of emotion. He wants facts.
“You have asthma, right? Didn’t Caitlyn say you needed breathing treatments from an early age?” Ash nods his head as an answer. “My mom was told after she gave birth to the second twin, and he was rushed to the hospital, that Liam would most likely have asthma, and would be on breathing treatments and an inhaler. She took Liam to a lung specialist a week after the birth, and they found nothing wrong with him.”
“Wait, I was airlifted, too. Did you know that?”
The puzzle pieces continue to fall into place. “You never told me, until my mother explained it earlier. But, I remember your mother mentioned the baby she gave birth to, had a scare, too. Hypoglycemia, right?”
“Fuck, the first time we had dinner with your brother, he mentioned he was hypoglycemic.” He drops his head to the back of the bench. “But how? How did your mother know?” He stops and stammers, as if he shouldn’t say mother.
“Right before our tenth birthdays, Mom had this feeling. She called it a mother’s intuition. Not only did Liam and I have completely different features, we were as different as two kids could be. We were close. You know that.”
“I assume there’s a but in there, right?” he asks.
“Well, yeah. She started doing research into babies switched at birth. The statistics were higher than she assumed. She asked my Uncle Jim to investigate. He has skills that are good for this situation, and after just two days of digging, hacking, and probably every other illegal thing he’s able to do without detection, he found that there was a one day old admitted to the NICU on the day Mom’s second baby was being air lifted. It didn’t take much investigation to put Liam’s hypoglycemia and your asthma together. He took a picture of you, gave it to mom, and she knew the second she saw you that you were the baby whose name should have been William Andrew James.”
“What? Evelyn has known this whole time?” His voice changes, and every bit of emotion he has been hiding is present in his question.
“Yes, she knew. But there’s so much more to the story, Ash. So much more.”
42
Ashton
I didn’t hearmy husband right. His mother knew? “What? Evelyn has known this whole time?” My voice cracks. Where I’ve tried to remain as detached to this clusterfuck as I could, I find it’s impossible.
“Yes, she knew. But there’s so much more to the story, Ash. So much more,” Noah begins, moving his hand to my knee, only to remove it quickly.
“Tell me, then. All of it. Your mother—I mean, I guess our mother—kept us separated. Why didn’t she come forward?” When Noah told me we were twins, I wanted to deny it. I tried to. But something as crazy as this can’t be simply made up. It explains so much; the connection, the chemistry and our pull to one another.
“Mom loved Liam. In her eyes, he was her son, but she knew she had you, too. And as much as she wanted to be there for you, the unknown was too scary. She was afraid your mom would take Liam and she’d never see him again. She loved you, as soon as she laid eyes on your picture—or so she claims. It was why she reacted as she had when she first saw you. The same with Uncle Jim.”
There are so many questions, but my fragile mind is limited on the amount of questions and information I can process.
“How did Uncle Jim become our social worker?” I always knew he looked familiar, but now the pieces are making sense, and I remember my mom welcoming him into our home.
Noah holds his head in his hands, massaging his temples. “Mom couldn’t bear the thought of you growing up in such a bad area. Her heart ached for Caitlyn. Mom has always known what motherly love looks like. Just because she struggled financially, didn’t mean your mother didn’t love you. Mom met Caitlyn once. Mom came in to order a drink at the bar she worked at when she needed money, and as it slowed down, they talked about each other’s kids. She spoke about how talented you were. A real genius with a paint brush. Showed her a picture of the four of you, one that included your dad. Mom recognized the resemblance right away between your dad and Liam. It was obvious you were taken care of, but she and Uncle Jim made up this whole elaborate grant program for single moms. Jim didn’t spare any expense making it look official. He backtracked it to make it look like others had been awarded it. It paid for your mom’s house, her tuition, an allowance while she was in school, and your education, along with Tia’s.”
“Wait—mom—or Caitlyn or whatever I should call her, paid a mortgage on that house. She paid on it for ten years. Which I know is on the shorter end of mortgage payments but—” I’m unable to say anything else because Noah interrupts me.
“That money went back into the account. Helping with repairs on the house, and other things. Mom wanted to make sure you and your family had every possible thing you needed.”
I process his words but I keep going to my original thoughts after he left me naked against the tree. “None of this changes who we are to one another, Noah. I can’t help that destiny brought us back together. That somehow, some way, we were going to live our lives together. Is it twisted? Yeah. Is it wrong? No. I love you. I loved you before I found out about our fucked-up lineage, and I love you still. We have children, our lives, and in it all, even if it’s a little fucked up, like everything else, we have a family who loves us, more than we ever imagined.”
