Hi all, thanks for stopping in. Sorry it's been a bit longer that usual, but real life demands wouldn't be denied. If anyone is interested, I thought I'd put together a private mailing list and let you know when each installment gets published. There is definitely a long ways to go with the story, but the publishing schedule is going to be a slightly erratic. Drop me an email if you'd like to be on it. Thanks.
There had been a lot of different looks on Brad's face since they had met -- from ecstatic and glowing to determined and tough. But Mike had never seen anything like this. Empty wasn't the right word -- maybe there wasn't a right word. Brad just stared straight ahead.
"Babe, you there? You OK?"
No reaction.
"Can I see that?" he heard whispered behind him, as Julie in turn quietly took the letter out of Mike's hands.
Getting himself into a cross-legged pose at Brad's feet, Mike silently stroked the back of Brad's legs. "Babe, there's a lot here we don't know. We're making a big leap here, we've got to be careful about where we are, OK?"
It was like his voice just went in wave patterns around Brad, who sensed what was going around him only in muffled sounds. His own sensory apparatus was so preoccupied with sorting out what it had just read that the only part of his brain excused form working on this where the parts that controlled involuntary muscles, like heartbeat and breathing.
Except for the tiny fact that there was not proof that this baby was ever born, it just made so much more sense out of his life. For Brad, it wasn't that he had to go out and prove that it was true so much as it couldn't not be true, the logic of the universe depended on it.
That was the `factual' part of the story though, and so far the pieces of the puzzle fit clearly together and a picture was emerging, Brad thought. But it wasn't exactly clear yet.
Reading what was happening from the outside, Mike could almost see the changes coming over Brad just in how he breathed. They were that tuned in.
"Mike, my Dad killed himself for me. So did my Mom."
Mike could now feel shaking, and was very afraid of where this could go.
Reaching up to his shoulders as he raised himself on his knees, Mike forced Brad to look at him. "Brad, do you hear me?"
"They both died, for me. It must have been awful for them." He whispered
"Brad..."
"I guess it was my fault that it happened..." he said, as Mike saw Brad's eyes rapidly blinking.
"Babe, look at me!" Mike ordered.
Brad looked back down at him, barely able to acknowledge the words but at the same time not ever capable of ignoring Mike.
Looking momentarily away from Brad and down at the floor, Mike squinted his eyes and rubbed his forehead. Now he was the one straining to get out the words. "Brad, I know how you feel. Not with my folks dying, but close." Brad's head tilted sideways in a questioning way.
"You know, my parents gave up their lives for me, too. They did it to take care of me, to do what they thought was best with no thought to how it was for them. They left everything, and everyone, except for each other" Brad was now looking back at him, silently, sympathetically, now realizing what he meant.
"There's not a day that I don't think about that, over what they had to do for me..."
"Pup, you never told me how much this bothered you, I thought you were OK. You never say much about it " Brad said, reaching over, running his fingers through the soft brown hair. "You know, you shouldn't feel that way - they did it for you because they cared. That's what parents do" He slipped down onto the floor, kneeling alongside Mike and leaning into him.
"Exactly, babe." Mike said, so quietly that Brad could barely hear. Just mentioning this drained him, the huge debt he felt that he could never repay. "That's what parent's do. And that's what we'll do when we have kids," he continued, slowly gaining his strength and bearings back. "But you," he hesitated, "no, I mean we, can only make this right by being as good to our kids as our parents have been to us. Maybe neither of us will ever get over what we owe, but we have to try to focus on the future, and when they come, taking care of our own."
It seemed to Mike that it might be appropriate to remind Brad that it was still yet to be proven that he was the person who was being written about, but that seemed pretty pointless right now. There wasn't much doubt in either of their minds as to what had happened, but they also both knew that this wasn't the end of the story. Not by a long shot.
"I guess there's still a lot to figure out, but I think I just have to accept this." Brad said as he rubbed his eyes.
"You OK?" Mike asked.
"uh huh, it will just take a little while for this to sink in...."
"Brad, I think that you should be the one going through these letters, not me." Julie said as she began to pack away here stack and hand them back to Brad. "They're personal."
Brad slowly reached out his hand to take them. "I'll let you know if I find anything suspicious here Jules." He carefully place the letters next to the others.
"Thanks so much for getting me this far. I wouldn't know any of this if you weren't here."
"Not so bad being a cop's daughter, huh? She asked.
Brad managed to respond with a fragment of a smile. "You're asking me? Of course not, not with these free private investigator services I get."
"Free?", she said with a laugh. "You can cook a nice dinner for Rog and I, that's what I expect."
"You're on." He replied.
She put her hand on Brad's shoulder. "Mike, he's from much better stock than we originally thought, but in nature vs. nurture, be careful that nurture didn't get the upper hand here." She said with a laugh. "Anyway, I should go and leave you guys to your little box."
After pulling back her blond hair, she gave each of the guys a hug before leaving, slipping Brad an extra peck on the cheek. He was still a bit numb, but didn't neglect to acknowledge the gesture by giving her an extra squeeze.
Now holding the letters with two hands, like a Japanese salary man would handle his business cards, Brad placed them in the middle of the desk top, edges perfectly parallel to the edge. "I need to repack things a bit more carefully before I put them back in. Just want to make sure that I can keep track of all of them."
"How does it feel to realize that your from respectable, how would, you say it.... " Mike said, reaching for the proper colloquialism, " oh yea, folk! How does it feel to be from respectable folk?
It take some time for Brad to figure out how he felt about anything right now. He had learned so much so fast, about who he was and where he came from. Yet he spoke very deliberately, like he was as sure of at least one thing as much as he was sure of anything. "Oddly enough, pup, I actually feel good. Really good, in fact, if this is all true."
He looked at Brad, confused. He expected that Brad would have a lot of conflicting emotions right now, but this one was not in the mix . "How do you mean?"
A small smile appeared on Brad's face, but he still didn't understand how Brad could reach that state right now.
"You know what, pup? I don't know enough about these people yet, I mean if they are in fact my parents. But if it is true, it makes me feel like I've always had a real family, like I feel here in this house. It's awful to think what they went through. I might not ever get over that. But there was not doubt that I had a home, or would have had one. They were both good people and they did everything that they thought was right to take care of me, and each other."
"Maybe you should read some more of the letters. You might like them even more." In the meantime, Mike was putting his own stack together to give back to Brad.
"I don't have any doubt that I will," he said, as he pushed Mike's offer away. "You need to read these with me."
"I'll be here, babe, you know that. But they really should be for your eyes first," Mike carefully placed the letters back on the desk in the same manner as Brad had. Written on simple white stationary, they were rapidly taking on a sacred quality.
As he was speaking, he got up out of the chair and turned back for the bed, as much to get ahead of a reminder from Mike about taking care of the leg as to just take some time to relax and think. A moment later Mike had slid over and wedged himself on the floor next to the bed. Carefully leaning his head back against Brad's leg, Mike tried to lay out their next steps.
"What are you going to say to your wicked stepmother, if that's what she really is?"
"Is your emphasis on wicked or stepmother?"
"Wicked! It's OK being a stepmother. It's the other part that I object to."
"I'm not sure right now, I don't know. On one hand I want to explode at them, for all the obvious reasons. I feel like they cheated me out of so much, if this is in fact all true."
"You could be angry, babe, but be careful with that. As much justification as you have, that kind of stuff will just eat at you." It was the same kind of feelings that Mike had had toward his own illness, the anger and frustration, that took him years to overcome. One important lesson that he had learned from his mom.
"You probably won't ever be able get them totally out of your head, but try to focus on the good things." Mike turned his head to almost face Brad behind him. "Like this Jill person, his sister, and his whole family. I think you've got to read more to figure out where this goes, but it sounds like they were close. Maybe we could track her down, or somebody else in the family."
"Is there a byline on any of the newspaper stories? A reporter, or someone like that? Brad asked, as Mike dove back into the box to retrieve what he could find from the old newspapers.
Reading through the letters became Brad's after work obsession for the next week. First, though, he organized them chronologically so he could start where his Dad did.
If he wasn't this guys son, he would have wished that he was. He felt that they had a lot of things in common with the kinds of feelings and emotions that were expressed in the letters. Sports was a big topic, and the mood changed on days that his teams lost, especially if it was a blowout. There was some politics, too, although not as much as Brad himself would have been interested in.
There were other divergences, too. For one, Rich really enjoyed teaching, and wanted to make it a career. Williams didn't have pedagogy courses, at least the type that got you a high school teaching credential, so he was obliged to supplement his B.A. in English with a one hour commute to the closest teachers college to get his certificate.
Rich seemed to like the rural area that they were from, and since he actually returned there after school in the east coast the thoughts were probably sincere. There was a family construction business, but he didn't want any part of it. It was more a problem with the people than the product. "If Did didn't hold the reigns and other things so tight" he wrote, "It might not be a bad place to work. I like dickering with these crusty old sub-contractors and developers. And they'd probably be honored to know they've earned a place in one of my novels."
Besides the obvious familial connection, one the things that Brad most enjoyed from the letters was just the quality of the writing. It was really smooth, he thought, much better than his own, which wasn't bad at all. "I'm more like Theodore Dreiser, if that," Brad thought, `I wish that I could steer words better. I'd rather be like F. Scott Fitzgerald, like Rich. He really does have a command of language.'
His Dad tried to threw out lots of advice, but it never seemed like he was lecturing or hectoring -- he was just being a Dad. And sometimes a scared one, at that. A person who wanted but justifiably feared the responsibilities of fatherhood.
"Hey bud, this is pretty scary stuff. I'll try my best, I hope that I can be a good Dad, but this is a big monster, humongous job coming up."
While Rich was writing to his son, it also seemed at times that he was writing to his own dad. It didn't take a lot of reading between the lines to understand that they had a difficult relationship. Rich didn't complain or whine but instead tried to understand what made his Dad the person that he was.
Evidently he had built up a pretty successful business, constructing homes in the new subdivisions at the edges of their small town. But his was a rough and demanding world with a lot of sharp elbows, which he sometimes, perhaps unwittingly, brought home to his family. And from what Rich could tell, his Dad's forbearers may have been the role model for the behavior.
You'll like your Grandpa, eventually,' Rich wrote, but he's a tough cookie. He demands a lot, and sometimes your best isn't enough. He has his own way of showing he cares, it's just not the way that most people would practice caring, or would even recognize as caring. But I think it's the only way he knows how'
The writing continued. `All I know from mom is that Dad's father was not a nice guy, more like an abusive drunk, and probably his father before him. We're all lucky that Dad has done what he has to break the cycle.'
The feelings for his Mom were said with a lot fewer qualifications. "Like I said earlier, guy, you'll probably learn to like your Grandpa, but I know that you'll love your Grandma, and she'll love you, too." Brad smirked when Rich mentioned that she wore her religion lightly, unlike Rich's Dad, or his own so called `parents." According to Rich, she didn't have a lot growing up but got a lot of street smarts from her rough neighborhood in the east side of the city.
She never had a chance at college herself, but Rich gives her all the credit for any literary ambitions or talent that he had. "Dad sometimes pretended indifference to my extracurricular writing efforts in high school, in the name of trying to make me tough and realistic about life. Where Dad would say `don't live in fantasyland,' Mom would want me to buy a condo there.'
Letter after letter continued on like this, sometimes with Rich's deepest fears and hopes about fatherhood and his career, and his feelings about his family, but also with lots of mundane things about the weather, sports teams, or some other non-cosmic event in his life. He even passed along some secret nicknames that he and his sister had for each other.
But the most passionate writing was about Veronica. When he wrote about her, it was always with such joy and happiness that Brad felt sometimes like he missed her, too. It all reminded him of how he felt about Mike, especially one line in the very last of the letters:
"....and make sure that you fall in love with someone who's better than you. I sure did. I wish I could tell you about how special she is, but you'll find out soon. enough. Your mom is more than I could ever have hoped for, and a lot better than I deserve."
For Mike's part, he didn't know exactly what they had to do to unpeel this onion, to find out what had really happened back those 20 or so years ago. But there was an obvious place to start. If the decision had been left to Mike, the preferred method of extraction would have been strangulation until they confessed. But he would also admit satisfaction if the Norths would just state the facts, no matter what they were. Who knows,' Mike thought, maybe there's even more to this than we think.'
In his deepest feelings, though, all he cared about was to get closer to the truth, for Brad's sake. The guy was such a champ. In spite of all that was happening , he still soldiered on with his day, getting through his job, helping around the house, and providing Mike the great companionship (and sex) that kept him going, too.
They had waited a couple of days until they felt ready to take, the next, obvious step. Friendly cooperation was not expected, so Brad had carefully studied this secret archive for ammunition, especially in case of bald-face lies and denials.
Sitting on the bed next to Brad, Mike glanced over at him as he flipped open his phone.
"Your ready?" he asked, reaching over and once again gently rubbing Brad's now-healed leg. Brad decided that was one wound that he was going to miss.
He let out a breath of air. "As much as I'll ever be. Let's just do it." Brad picked up his phone, dialed the number, and hit `Send.'
"Hello, uh, Mom?" Mike picked up the hesitation in Brad's voice. As much as one can prepare oneself for events, there's always a surprise. Calling her `mom' just stuck in his throat.
"Yes, it's me what do you want?' she said, without a hint of any `I've missed you so much, dear' in her voice. It didn't make any difference to Brad.
"Well, nice to talk to you, too." He said with a hint of exasperation already. "I'll just get to the point. Who are Veronica North and Robert Campagna?"
The other end of the phone was silent. Nothing. Brad thought he maybe heard a lawnmower in the background. He imagined it was her brain moving and smiled to himself. "how do you...?"
"It's not important. Who are they?"
"None of your concern any more."
"Any more?" Brad replied
"I don't want to talk about this anymore, I'll just...."
"You can tell me now, or I'll just go to others. We have the letters here, the box with all the stuff. We accidentally grabbed it out of the garage when I moved, so you may as well tell me now. I'm going to find out."
"Bring that box right back here!"
"WHO...ARE...THEY?!" Brad emphasized every breath and syllable.
The was another long silence on the other end of the line, then he heard her clear her throat.
"Veronica was such a sweet girl, always down to earth, until she met him." The was another pause on the other side, then gush of air that sounded more like a dragon waking up than a person. "Then she changed. Got pretty full of herself. Didn't call me much anymore, just spent time with this guy. Even stopped going to church."
Mike, who had now moved his ear next to the phone to hear what he could, felt the tension in Brad's body.
"She didn't talk much about him, but when she did it was all about how wonderful he was, how handsome, how kind, blah blah blah. He had her wrapped around his finger. Gave her big ideas, like she'd be a big shot, better than her relatives.
Where Brad had seen the beauty of what this couple had, what he was hearing now was the resentment and hatred that it had ignited in people, at least this one. He would soon find out why.
"She felt like she didn't need us anymore. Like we were nothing. Oh sure, she'd call me and all, ask how we all were, even stop by. And, of course, when she gets in trouble she comes to me."
"Trouble?" Brad retorted.
She ignored his question. "I could tell something was going on with her, something was up. She tried to hide, but I figured out what was happening, especially when she'd come over and start throwing up. I know what pregnant is, and I know the signs. Why, I after realizing that I wanted nothing to do with her, or her little secret. They couldn't even tell his family, he was so ashamed, but...."
"He wasn't ashamed. He had his reasons. They both did."
"Well, isn't it pretty obvious that no one wanted them, or their problem. I think that his old man woulda been mad as hell, too. It was really too bad how they died, but God has his ways...
"They were good people who trusted the wrong people." Brad shot back.
"They were lucky to have us, and so were you! Yea , you! You were their little secret. Stupid of us to think that we could make you a righteous young man, like our Ralph, when you come from such bad stock."
Mike couldn't hear all of the words exactly, but felt Brad stiffen.
"Money couldn't pay for all the pain we've suffered with you, the thanklessness, my God, how much we've done for you! Your lucky she left us some money, or I'm not sure we would have taken you." That comment shook Brad up a bit, but wasn't any revelation to Mike.
"I think we saved his family a lot of pain, too, by not letting them know what he had done to her. It was just mercy on our part." Brad heard her sigh. "His family were so distraught at the funeral. Especially his old man, I thought for sure he wouldn't make it through the funeral. Knowing about you would have just shamed him, of course," she said in her cocksure way.
Mrs. North was on a roll, now, and couldn't be stopped. "When they c-sectioned you out, I was had high hopes, maybe we could do something for you. You were so scrawny and sickly, being almost 2 months premature. You made it, but you turned out just like them, or I should say him. And every god-dammed day, you looked more like him. You got some of your Momma in you, but too much of that arrogant man. You're his spittin' image, and your attitude is, too."
Though she was trying to be as hurtful as she could, and some of her barbs dug deep into him, she couldn't have imagined how good those last words made him feel. That he looked like his Dad! She was droning on and on, But Brad was almost not listening any more.
"You know what, Mrs. North." Brad finally interject. "Thanks for telling me how much I resemble him. You couldn't give me a bigger compliment, except maybe say that I look like my Mom, my real mom."
"And that's all I've got to say to you. I guess I should appreciate that you did anything at all, so I'm just going to leave it at that. Just tell my little nephew Rick that I love him."
Taking the phone away from his ear and looking straight at it, he pushed `END.'
Being an executive had it's perks, but being the first female Vice President of a small Midwestern bank didn't allow much time to enjoy them. 60 hour weeks were not uncommon, and with an audit coming up they would probably get longer rather that shorter. But it's the life that she had chosen for herself.
After having to submit to the demands of a somewhat tyrannical father as the price of financing her college education, she was determined to claim her financial independence. Having the fortuitous combination of native smarts and a huge capacity for hard work, and adding in a couple of those lucky breaks that are often the unacknowledged partners in successful careers, she was indeed independent, and island unto herself in more ways than one. For a single woman in her thirties, who still looked younger than her years with her family's curly jet-black hair.
Some people call it summer Vacation, but for Brad and Mike this summer was anything but that. Besides their jobs and the preparation for 2 weddings in August, for Julie Roger and for Pete and Kate, a whole new life was opening up for Brad, and for Mike, too. Finding out more about who is real family was became his second job.
The biggest unknown for Brad now was finding out more about his Dad's family. As far as his Mom went, he pretty much knew about her family and relatives. Almost none were still around, and the ones' who were did not make for appetizing company. From what Brad could tell, both from his Dad's comments, and his foster mother's resentment, was that she really stuck out in her family, probably because she was the only kind, generous person in it.
His Dad's side, however, was a complete mystery. But he knew the town that they were from, and also knew that he had a younger sister. And that they were crushed by his Dad's death. His goal now was to make contact with them -- if they'd believe who he was.
"Rod," she called out to Rodney Smith, her administrative assistant, "I'm taking off now. Unless it's something important, just put any calls into voicemail, OK?
As she picked up her purse and keys, she asked him about his weekend plans. "Probably out clubbing Saturday night, usual stuff, other than that not a whole lot. What about you? Anything special?
"Probably a lot quieter than yours. I'm bringing some work home, maybe dinner with some friends. I've got a good book, too. That's what single women do on weekends, Rod, not gallivant like you,' she said with a laugh.
"Hey, it's not like I'm passed around at these clubs, ya know. we gay guys can have quiet, serious weekend, too!"
"OK! OK!" she admitted, smiling. "Anyway, whatever you do, have a great time. See you later."
"See you later, too, JC."
[C. M.1]Suggest that `from the old newspapers' might be slightly more clear.
[C. M.2]I'm not sure if you meant But it was a rough' etc. or But his was a rough'... both would work, but I prefer the first.