Danielle Steel - Remembrance

“Vanessa …” His voice was firm but it didn't reach her. “Baby, it's all right. I'm here. Everything's going to be all right.”

“Can we go home now?” She turned her eyes to his at last, and it was as though she had retreated yet another step. And this time he was obliged to shake his head.

“You're going to go home with your aunt Pattie, sweetheart. She wants you to come and stay with her.”

“Not with you?” Her eyes filled with tears. “Why?”

“That's what the judge wanted, so you'd have an aunt and an uncle, like a mommy and daddy.”

“But I need you, Uncle Teddy.” She was pathetic as she sat there, and held up her arms to him.

“I need you too, sweetheart.” It was almost more than he could bear. “But I'll come to see you. And you'll be happy with Uncle Greg and Aunt Pattie.” He felt like a liar and a beast for what he was saying. He couldn't imagine her anything but miserable with Greg and Pattie, who were total strangers to her, but for the moment they had to comply with what had been ruled in the courts. The matter of Charlotte he knew was over. What the judge had said was true. He had no blood claim on the child, only his love for her mother, and that would never hold up in court. But with Vanessa it was a different matter, he and the child had a relationship that had been built up over nine years. And as he watched his sister-in-law lead Vanessa from the courtroom, he decided to appeal.

“Do I have a chance?” he asked his lawyer as they watched Vanessa glance back over her shoulder helplessly as she left with Pattie.

“We can try,” his lawyer answered. “We can always try.”

Teddy nodded then and followed him from the courtroom, his face grim.

47

When Teddy went to see Vanessa at Pattie and Greg's apartment, it tore at his heart in a way that nothing ever had before. She sat in her room, staring out the window, and when he spoke to her, she seemed to hear nothing he said. She didn't stir until he touched her shoulder and shook it gently, calling her name. Then she turned to him with wide, empty eyes that told him almost more of her grief than he could bear.

He tried to talk to Greg about the insanity of Pattie's taking custody of Vanessa, but it was virtually impossible to talk to Greg. He was no longer ever sober past noon. He sat in his office purely to maintain the fiction that he still ran the law firm, but there were other people to do that for him. He only had to sit in his office and drink quietly, and manage not to fall out of his chair. To speak to him coherently about anything, Teddy had to get to him first thing in the morning, which after a week of fruitless efforts he finally did, collaring him in his office only moments after he got there and before he had had time to pour himself a drink.

“For chrissake, man, how can you let her do this? You and Pattie are strangers to that child. She doesn't know you. She needs people she's comfortable with right now. She's lost her mother, her home, her baby sister. The child is in shock, for chrissake. When you look at her, her eyes are glazed.” He had been unable to speak to her about anything important, but even discussing trivia, she seemed to shy away. “Pattie doesn't even know her, what's more she hated her mother. What in hell do you want with a nine-year-old girl?”

“I don't.” Greg stared at him blankly. “But she does. She always wanted a child.” And then he pulled a bottle of bourbon out of his desk, as Teddy stared at him in horror. “She told me once that she always wanted Brad's baby. I can't have any, you know. Got the goddamn clap when I was in school.” He shrugged and took his first sip. “I told her before we got married, she said it didn't matter to her.” Then he looked up at Teddy with a sad little look in his eyes. “But it did matter. I always knew it. I guess I should have told her before we got engaged but I didn't.” He looked up at Teddy sadly and then stared into his drink for a minute. “You know, I don't think she ever really loved me. She married me to get even with Brad. But I don't think he gave a damn what she did. He was crazy about Serena. Pretty girl too, I think Mother has been wrong to carry on the vendetta. Too late now though.”

“No, it isn't. You can still do something decent. Let me have Vanessa—she needs me.”

Greg shrugged. “I can't. Pattie's decided that she wants the kid, Teddy, and there isn't a damn thing you or I can do about it. You know how she is. In some ways she's worse than Mother, stubborn and mean and vengeful.” He said it helplessly as he finished his first bourbon, but Teddy's eyes narrowed as he looked at him.

“Yes, there is something you can do, dammit. You can refuse to keep the child. Pattie doesn't love Vanessa. I do.”

“Do you?” Greg looked at his brother in amazement. “Why? I don't much like kids myself.” It was hardly surprising to Teddy. Greg didn't like anyone, least of all himself. Besides, he had been stewed for the past ten years, it was a wonder he even knew he was alive. “I don't know why the hell you'd want her, except”—he looked Teddy over as he poured himself another drink—”you always loved her mother, didn't you?” Teddy didn't answer. “What's wrong with that? I've had a few babes myself in my day.” Teddy felt his stomach turn over slowly. His brother was thirty-nine years old, and he talked like a broken-down old man. But the worst of it was that he looked like one too. No one would have guessed his age if they'd seen him. He looked easily to be in his late fifties. The long years of boozing hadn't been kind. “Did you ever sleep with Serena, Teddy?” Greg sat back in his chair with an ugly grin.

“No, if it's any of your damn business. And I'm not here to discuss Serena. I'm here to talk about Vanessa, and why the hell your wife got temporary custody of that child.”

“She wants to adopt her.” Greg sounded totally without interest in the matter, and inwardly Teddy raged.

“That's totally crazy. She doesn't love her.”

“So what, for chrissake? What the hell difference does love make? Do you think our mother loved us? Shit, who knows and who cares.”

“Greg.” Teddy leaned forward and grabbed his arm before he had time to pour another drink. “Tell the courts you don't want her. Please. The child is miserable with you and Partie. I'm sorry to be so blunt about it, but all you have to do is look at her. She's dying inside. She doesn't ever see you, she's ill at ease with Pattie. You can't keep her in that household like a prisoner, for chrissake.…” Teddy's eyes welled up with tears and his brother freed his arm and poured himself another drink.

“So we'll buy her some toys.”

“Toys!” Teddy jumped to his feet. “Toys! The child has no father, her mother was just murdered, she has seen her baby sister probably for the last time, and you want to buy her toys. Don't you know what that child needs?”

Greg stared at him in annoyance. “She'll have everything she needs, Teddy. Now, for chrissake, forget about it. You can come to see her when you want to. If you want kids so damn much, get married and have some yourself. Pattie and I can't.”

“But you don't want children. And it isn't a question of that, dammit. It's a question of what's right for the child.”

“If you don't like it”—Greg got up and strolled the room, and Teddy saw that he was already unsteady on his feet as he glanced over his shoulder—”then take it back to court. They knew what they were doing. They gave the other kid to the Greeks, they gave Brad's kid to us. You don't have a wife, Ted. The kid needs a home with a man and a woman. You can't bring up a child as a bachelor.”