Of course, I’ve been wrong about that kind of thing before.
But I couldn’t believe they’d hurt Brent. They both loved him.
Ironically, the only people I knew had hurt Brent were the ones who should have loved him most: his parents. They turned on him like milk left in the sun on a hot summer’s day. Rejecting him for being born as he was and for having the courage to live his life honestly. Of everyone on my list, I think I was most angry with them. If they hadn’t kicked him out of his home, Brent would be alive today.
His father said Brent had been dead to them for years now. Talk about a self-fulfilling prophecy. They may not have thrown him into that river, but their actions set into motion the events that led him there.
Now that their son really was dead, did they even have the decency to feel remorse?
I wondered if there was a way to get through to people who could be so heartless.
Maybe, I thought, remembering something Lucas had given me, there was.
At least it was worth a try.
The door to my office swung open. My mother strode in, not having bothered to knock or otherwise signal her entry. That would have implied she recognized a closed door as being a “boundary,” a concept she’s never been able to understand.
“I’m going,” she announced grandly, throwing her hands in the air like an actress emerging to thunderous applause, “to be a lady of the evening!”
I wasn’t sure she knew the meaning of that phrase.
“Say what now?”
“It’s true,” Andrew said, walking in behind her. They both sat in chairs across from my desk. “We showed the network the rough cut of the footage from Families by Design, along with some background interviews your mother’s been doing, and they were knocked out by it. They want to air it as a prime-time special. They think it’s going to be huge.”
“Can you imagine?” my mother gushed. “I’m going to have a prime-time TV show! Like Barbara Walters!”
“It’s great news,” Andrew echoed, “but let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Sophie. It’s just the one episode.”
“For now! Wait,” she said, pointing a finger at herself, “till they get a load of this!” She shimmied her shoulders like a burlesque dancer. “Bite me, Diane Sawyer.”
My mother tended to exaggerate her accomplishments to the point where you had to take them with not just a grain of salt but the full shaker. Still, this was a pretty remarkable achievement.
“I’m proud of you,” I told her, walking around my desk to give her a hug. She stood for the embrace.
“I’m proud of me, too,” she agreed. “And this guy.” She motioned toward Andrew. “It was my idea-my brilliant idea, I should say-to go after those bastards at the adoption agency, but he’s the one who made it happen. Come here, producer man.”
A group hug. Great. Just what I was in the mood for. I removed one arm from around my mother so Andrew could step in.
“You’re like another son to me,” my mother said to him. “Or a son-in-law. Which I wouldn’t mind, if Kevin ever decides to stop waiting around while his idiot boyfriend decides whether or not he’s going to poop or get off the pot.”
“Mom!”
“I just want you to be happy, baby.”
“Me too,” Andrew said, taking advantage of the moment to squeeze my ass. “Baby.”
“Don’t think I didn’t see that,” my mother said to him.
Andrew blushed. “Sorry.”
“Not that I blame you,” my mother added. “He does have an adorable little tush.”
“Mom!” I broke the hug.
“What?” my mother asked. “I’m not allowed to love every bit of you? My own son?”
I thought of Brent’s parents and the Merrs. A parent’s love was nothing to take for granted.
“You’d better love every little bit of me,” I said. “Because I love every big bit of you.”
38
The Dawsons’ house was as Tony had described it. A well-maintained, single-family brick home like every other one on the block. The bushes were trimmed, the grass cut, and the garage door painted within the past year.
But there were also three or four newspapers sitting on the porch that no one had bothered to pick up. They matched the overturned garbage can, its trash spreading across the lawn like the world’s ugliest confetti. The mailbox had been left open, revealing what looked like a few days’ worth of neglected correspondence. In the driveway, a late-model sedan was haphazardly parked at a careless angle. One tire pressed against the grass, having left a deep rut in the lawn on its way there.
Overall, it felt like a place where, very recently, someone had decided it was no longer worth his or her time to Keep Up Appearances.
I knew I should have called first. Unlike my mother, I did understand boundaries. No one wanted an unexpected caller-especially one sure to bring up painful memories. Showing up with no warning or invitation was rude of me.
Good.
I wanted to make this as difficult for the Dawsons as I could. Tony had told me they were both retired, and I was hoping to catch them by surprise.
At least I’d brought a gift.
The Dawsons’ doorbell played the first ten notes of “America the Beautiful.” The patriotic call was answered by a man I assumed was Brent’s father.
He was of medium height, medium build, and a once-handsome face of no particular character. His thinning hair might once have been as blond as his son’s, but now was the most nondescript brown possible. He wore a NY Yankees T-shirt that hung over baggy sweatpants. He was unshaven and his hair hadn’t met a comb yet, even though it was well after noon.
I’d been expecting a scowling scarecrow, an obvious villain of a man with the ungenerous features of an Ebenezer Scrooge. Instead, I found myself standing across from a man of stunning blandness. Even his expression was slack, as if his facial muscles couldn’t be bothered to reflect any particular mood.
Until he looked at me. Then, I saw the same spark of “Could it be?” in his gaze that I’d gotten from everyone else who knew Brent when they first saw me.
But where Charlie and Lucas were overjoyed that Brent might be back, the same couldn’t be said for his dad. His eyes widened in shock, then settled back to their normal size when he realized I was nothing more than a look-alike, then narrowed in suspicion.
“Yeah,” he greeted me. “Whaddya want?”
“Hello.” I extended my hand. “My name is Kevin Connor. I was a friend of your son’s.”
I let that sit for a moment.
“And?”
“And… I wanted to stop by to offer my condolences.”
“Okay, thanks,” he said dismissively. “Good-bye.” He started to close the door.
I blocked it with my foot.
“Wait,” I said.
“What?” he said, his voice close to a snarl.
“Harry?” A woman’s voice came from inside the house. “Who is it?”
