David Bell - The Hiding Place

And then she had another thought: was her father really her father?

Who was he?

“I have to go home,” Janet said.

She stood up, although that word resonated in her head. Home. She thought she knew what that meant. Even after everything that had happened, at least she knew what that word meant. Battered and bruised and complicated, she knew where home was.

Didn’t she?

“Let me drive you. You’re upset.”

Janet held out her hand. “I’m fine. I can get myself home.”

“Can I follow you?”

She walked over to Stynes and held out her hand. He looked down at it, his face puzzled. They shook. “I know it was difficult for you to have to tell me this news,” she said. “Thank you.”

“I’m sorry I had to tell you,” he said.

“No, I know it’s your job.” She let go of his hand. She didn’t even know why she shook it, except that she felt like she wanted some kind of connection, something to show that she recognized the importance of what she had been told. She didn’t want him to think her irrational or incapable of accepting the worst. She was capable. She knew she was. And she had to believe Stynes knew it too. But still…she wondered. “Are you sure, Detective? About all of this? Are you sure?”

Stynes nodded. “I’m sure.”

“My brother’s dead. Really dead. And my father…”

“I’m sorry.”

But she didn’t want to hear that, didn’t want to or need to hear those words, so she left, heading for home.

“Dad?”

The house wasn’t just quiet-no TVs playing, no conversation or music. It felt quiet. Still. Like something had been removed. But she worried that the thing that had been removed had always been in her head: her own notion of home. Did the place just feel different because of what Detective Stynes had told her?

Janet went down the hall to the bedroom. The door was open, the bedclothes pushed down. The TV was off. She stepped back into the hallway. The bathroom was empty as well.

“Dad?”

As she drove home from work with Detective Stynes’s words spinning through her head, she tried to make sense of it all. And worst of all, it did make sense in ways Janet didn’t want to admit. Justin’s paternity made for a grand unifying theory of her father-why did he refuse to speak about the past? Why did he not cry at Justin’s funeral? Why did he throw those photos away? Because Justin wasn’t his? And the fact that it started to make sense made Janet feel even worse.

Her dad had known all along and didn’t tell Janet. Her mom must have known all along and never told. Who were these people after all?

Janet walked back out to the living room and into the kitchen. The lights were off, the late-afternoon sun slanting in through the back window. The trees in the yard provided shade and made the kitchen darker than the rest of the house during the summer. He was there, sitting at the kitchen table, an open bottle of beer in front of him. He didn’t say anything when he saw her, but he studied the look on her face.

“Is Ashleigh home?” Janet asked.

He shook his head. “She’s out with that boy.”

It looked to Janet like he knew, like he was anticipating the very question she was about to ask, but she asked anyway.

“Why did you provide that DNA sample, Dad?”

He nodded his head. There was nothing left to hide. He asked her to sit down across the table from him, and she did.

“It’s true,” he said. “That’s why I gave the sample to the police. I suspected it was true. Believed it really, all these years. I saw this as an opportunity to end the speculation for both of us.”

“You knew?”

“I suspected ,” he said. “Your mother suspected, too. Nobody knew for sure. Nobody ever did a test or anything. Until now.”

“You wanted them to find out? With this test?”

“There’s no other way to prove it,” he said. “And I wanted you to find out. I thought you should know. This business with Justin and this man in the jail, I watch it tearing you apart. And now Ashleigh’s getting involved. We don’t need it, Janet. It was time to end it, and I hoped this would be the thing to do it.”

“Who’s Justin’s father?”

“I figured you would be able to guess already. It’s someone who was close to us at one time.”

Janet started to speak, then stopped herself. She thought about it.

“Ray Bower,” she said.

Her dad nodded. “Our best friends, the Bowers. Your best friend, too. Michael. Your mom and Ray had an affair back when you all were little.”

Her father didn’t meet her eye. He looked at the tabletop as he spoke. She saw the pain etched on his face, something that hadn’t left him even after twenty-five years. She thought about backing away and not making him relive all of it. But her desire-her need-to know outweighed any concern she felt for her dad. She’d waited too long to know these things, things she didn’t even know she needed to know.

“Did you know about this when Justin was born?”

He sipped his beer. “No. I suspected something was going on between them before Justin was born. They were awfully cozy, the two of them. More than you would expect from a man and a woman who are just supposed to be friends. But when Justin was born, I tried to put those thoughts aside. Your mother was a good mother-she really was. You know that, right?”

“I do.”

“I don’t want that memory to change for you. This story doesn’t invalidate what she was to you or what you remember her to be. You got that?”

“I’ve got it, Dad.”

“She was devoted to both of you, you and Justin. But when Justin was about two, I guess, things started to change again. I noticed the flirtations between her and Ray, just like before. They made jokes that only the two of them laughed at. They shared looks, you know?” He shook his head. “I hate to even say it. It makes me sound like a goddamned woman. But I knew something was going on there. Hell, maybe I even accepted it a little bit. I thought whatever it was would blow over, that it would cool off. I thought as long as we had the kids, your mother and I, that it wouldn’t matter what went on with anything else. I guess I thought that would trump everything. Little did I know.”

“No one could blame you for saying or doing anything.”

“I know. But I didn’t do anything. I just stewed. I think I deserve more blame for that, for just sitting there and taking it like an asshole.”

He stood up and placed his empty beer bottle in the sink. He reached into the refrigerator and brought out another one, twisted the cap off, and drank.

“Would you get me that wine?” Janet asked.

He grabbed the wine bottle and a glass and brought them to the table. He sat down with his beer while Janet poured her own drink. She needed it to listen to the rest of his story.

“Remember how fair-haired Justin was?” he asked. “Completely blond?”

“Sure.”

“Neither your mom nor I were blond, even as kids.”

“But that doesn’t mean anything.”

“He didn’t look like me, Janet. I could tell. I know you don’t like to think about it, but you look like me. But Justin, do you know who he looked like? His coloring, the shape of his mouth?”

“Michael.”

“Right. I wouldn’t have thought about it, but my suspicions made me look at those things closely. Janet, this is awful to say, but Justin just never felt like my kid. Not like you did. Not even the way Ashleigh does. Something told me he wasn’t mine.”

“But you never asked Mom?”

“Never. I didn’t want to know the answer. I came close a hundred times. Lying in bed, sitting at this table.”