Binding Arbitration (42 page)

I spooned around her, tracing the length of her body with my burning fingertips. Her flesh rose in gooseflesh to greet me. I covered our bodies with soft blankets and listened as her breathing calmed. She nodded off for a bit, but she was awakened by my gentle thrust into her easily readied body. After her initial gasp, she started to push back against me. I held her hips in place refusing their urging until she surrendered. Then I stroked the length of her body, calming her, relaxing her into the acceptance of my body in hers for a length of time. Without moving to completion, I worshiped there in the deep recesses of her core.

I would wake several times during that night, my body roused by a fleeting touch in her sleep, a whispered gasp on dreams fulfilled or a simple arch of her dreamlike self against mine, proving once and for all that my voracious need for her was far greater and more profound than even I could have imagined.

30

FAMILY PURPOSE DOCTRINE

The owner of a car is vicariously liable for damages incurred by a family member while using the car with the owner’s permission.

Libby

By the second week in December, Cass was much improved and was becoming increasingly anxious to leave the hospital. Even Aidan, who was patient, was running out of ways to entertain him. He taught him how to play chess, and he read everything ever written about Star Wars, his new obsession, second only to ESPN Classic, where they watched old baseball games, especially those staring Band-Aid Palowski.

On the way to the hospital, my mother had phoned and asked me to join her for lunch. When I started making excuses, Aidan tapped me on the thigh and encouraged me to go with a brush of his fingertips. I agreed, grudgingly, and then hung up. “I’d rather watch three World Series games than sit across the table from Jeanne today. I wonder if she’ll come as Hildy.”

“You are going to have to come to terms with your mother. She isn’t going to go away, and she doesn’t bother anyone other than you or Suzy,” Aidan said with a tilt of his head and the voice of a diplomat, which he often used on Cass.

“If only she’d make it easy to ignore her.”

“I think she’s got something going on with Dr. Seuss, so she isn’t going to fade away. What does she want anyway?”

“She wants to talk over lunch at Atwoods in Hotel Burnham. Why can’t she send Bozo with a clown-oh-gram?”

It was another one of my mother’s empty-headed ideas and in the taxi on the way there I brainstormed what she could want to discuss. If she did have something going on with Dr. Seuss she could only want one thing: to live with me. Crap.

I took in the large, plate glass windows with the gold lettering and burgundy café curtains as I stepped out of the cab. When I entered the street-level restaurant, I took in the custom glass chandeliers, the floral arrangements centered in beautifully upholstered banquettes and the white table clothes filled to overflowing with cutlery, china, and glassware.

My mother was facing me, but I couldn’t see the person she was speaking too across the table because of the height of the booth. I prepared myself for Dr. Seuss, but when I made the corner it was a man with a superior stature and dark hair with a streak of silver over each ear. When he caught my approach, he looked back and forth between my mother and I, like a trapped animal. I had seen him somewhere before, but when I caught the green of his eyes, I blinked. A snapshot I had stared at for hours swilled through my mind.

In the seconds it took me to compute who he was and what my mother had set me up for, bile bubbled in my throat like Liquid Plumber. But I wasn’t a clogged pipe, and I certainly didn’t need her to repair my plumbing. I was a grown woman, and if I wanted an introduction I would have sought the man out myself. “Jeanne,” I plungered out.

She smiled without a qualm; it had taken my mother twenty-nine years to decided she knew what was best for me. And I was prepared to flush her familiar notions down a drain. I dropped into the seat next to her and crossed my arms. The man’s green eyes focused on my face. “You look alike,” he said.

“Elizabeth, I wanted to introduce you to your father. I looked him up before you found out that Aidan was a donor. He had business in town, and I thought you should meet.”

I glared at my sperm donor. He held up his hands in defense. “I didn’t know anything about this.”

“I have more pressing matters than a family reunion.” I regurgitated.

Jeanne latched onto the sleeve of my coat and insisted I stay put. “If you’re going to move forward with your life, and be happy with Aidan, you need to resign yourself to putting the past behind you so you don’t repeat the same mistakes.”

“The only mistakes are the ones you make every time you interfere with my life. Except this time you’ve gone too far.”

“Has Aidan explained why he abandoned you?”

I gave her the death stare. “That’s none of your business, Jeanne.”

“You might think that’s true, but you’re the kind of person who always needs an explanation. I thought this was one you deserved. I’m going to sit at the bar while you talk.” She pulled herself up and sauntered to the curved carved cherry bar.

I grimaced. “What pretext did she use?”

“She knew I was coming to Chicago, and she said she wanted to discuss your son. I told her I would be willing to help, if he needs another transplant, anonymously, of course.”

“Oh, yes, anonymously.” I slipped off my coat and took a drink of water. Since I was already here, blindsided, I might as well ask the burning questions, right? But, for the life of me, I couldn’t think of one. “What are you doing in Chicago?”

He glanced around the room as if someone might be watching him. Oh goody, he was a secret agent. That’s why he’d abandoned me. I might have believed it, but I wasn’t a season pass holder to Fantasy Land.

“I came for a plumbing convention.”

A chortle erupted. “You’re a plumber?”

“No, I sell plumbing supplies.”

I continued to laugh. “I see.” I looked at him closer. He was still an attractive man, very middle-America, in good shape, dressed in a nice pair of khakis and button down shirt.

“You’re a lawyer?”

“I’m a criminal defense attorney.” I continued to look him in the eye. I was impressed that he didn’t avoid direct eye contact.

“You look like my sisters when they were young, except you’re more elegant.”

“Yea, I’m a product of that nature vs. nurture controversy. I wasn’t nurtured and the only thing I knew about my nature was that I grew up with a manic depressive. I’m really self-made.”

His smile took on a grim tone. “But you’re more like my father. He had the same take-no-prisoners kind of attitude. And he didn’t believe in second chances.”

“Your needing them might be a character flaw.”

“If you smoked a pipe and blew the smoke in my face when you said that, it might be like having him back again.”

“Listen, I have no idea what went down between you and your father, but it has nothing to do with my contempt for you. You earned that on your own. Now if you don’t mind, I really don’t think anything good can come of this.”

“Probably not, but don’t you want to ask me why?”

It was a question that even few months ago haunted me, but somehow it just didn’t matter anymore. “Nope, but if you have this week’s Powerball numbers, I wouldn’t mind having those.”

“You’re beautiful and smart. You don’t need the sarcasm.”

“Did you get that out of ‘Daddy for Dummies’?”

“Tenacious, too. You’re used to having things your way.”

“It’s taken everyone else twenty-nine years to know me.” The Liquid Plumber that was climbing up my throat was not tasty.

“My sixteen-year-old is about as spoiled and belligerent as you are now.” His expression was narrowing slightly.

“But I got this way without any fatherly influence.”

He considered me for long moments. Our staring contest was like a tennis match; he dropped the ball just over the net, and he was waiting for me to charge forward and miss it. “Your boyfriend is a professional athlete, and he’s your son’s father. But you aren’t married?”

“Not much on commitment.” I smiled. “Now, that I definitely inherited from you.”
Eat that Draino man.

He rested his elbows on the table. “This bullshit isn’t getting us anywhere. We probably won’t see each other ever again, so why don’t you lay it on the line, or walk away.”

He had more spine than the average Roto Rooter. “It all comes down to this: How could you know you had a child somewhere, and not know her?”

“I never wanted a kid.” He was solemn, but not contrite. “I didn’t want to marry your mother. I tried to be what I was supposed to be, but I felt she was a chain around my neck and you were the ball at the end of the chain.” He brought his coffee cup to his lips. “I divorced her, but she still didn’t want to let me go. She used you to torment me. I tried to see you, but she thought you were a two-for-one promo.”

I wanted to slap him for his utter honesty, but I picked up my water instead and took a drink. Maybe I’d douse him.

“I knew if I stayed in your life, I would have to stay in hers, so I high-tailed it to California. The first couple of years, I was so high I wouldn’t have been able to pick my own mother out of a crowd, much less yours. By the time I was sober, you were old enough to ask hard questions. The longer I let it fester, the more cowardly I became. When I got my act together and remarried, I didn’t want my wife to know I had been so irresponsible. She knew about the drugs, but if she knew everything, I’d lose her. She still doesn’t know. I lost you a long time ago, and nothing was going to change that. But if she finds out, I’ll lose her, too.”

All the time I’d wasted wondering why, only to find out I’d been spawned by one intensely selfish individual. I thought about all Aidan’s acts of selflessness over the last weeks. He hadn’t left me because he was selfish, or trapped, he left because he was scared. He was just as scared as I’d been.

Before I could respond there was a blonde woman with her coat hanging off one shoulder standing at the edge of the booth. She had bed-head and when my examination made it to her feet, her shoes didn’t match. Something about her vaguely reminded me of Jeanne as she towered over our table waving her fist in Mr. Tucker’s shocked expression. “After all these years! Why, she’s young enough to be your daughter! If you were having an affair, why did you bring me all the way to Chicago?”

All the color drained from Mr. Tucker’s face. “Clarice, this is Elizabeth,” he managed to choke out.

“Don’t lie to me.” She started to cry in earnest. “I know you came here to meet Jeanne, I read your email. How could you?”

“It’s not what you think.” Mr. Tucker said.

“I knew something was wrong. You’ve been acting so strange. You never ask me to travel with you. Why did you feel the need to rub it in my face?”

Jeanne snaked up behind me and whispered, “I think we need to go, Libby.”

“Libby?” Clarice bellowed as she swiped away mascara. “You said her name was Elizabeth.”

Jeanne was forcing my coat around my shoulders; she thought we could tiptoe out of here with no one the wiser. I had half a mind to introduce Clarice and Jeanne, but that was his pipe to unclog, not mine. I got to my feet and looked at Mr. Tucker. “Good luck.” I turned to leave.

“Halt,” his one word sliced through the tension. “Everyone take a seat.” His angry expression forcing us back into the booth, except Jeanne, who hesitated. “Plant it like a tree with deep roots Jeanne.”

Deep roots have been known to do all sorts of damage to septic systems.

As Jeanne’s knees bent to sit, Clarice barely glanced at her before she lunged across the table. “Her? She’s older than me, for crying out loud.” The glasses on the table clanked together and silverware danced across the floor. Every eye in the place focused on our forced family reunion.

Jeanne pulled herself out of Clarice’s grasp, but Clarice was scrappy and started over the table top, glasses shattered and water ran into everyone’s lap. In the next instant two men were towering over the scene, Aidan had Clarice by her trench coat collar, trying to get her back on a leash, while Mr. Tucker was trying to get her hands out of my mother’s hair. I looked at Dr. Seuss as if to say.
See what you bought into?

But the command of the doctor’s voice drew everyone’s attention when he ground out. “What exactly is going on here?”

Aidan had gotten Clarice back in her seat and now raised an eyebrow in question toward Mr. Tucker. “Does she belong to you?”

Clarice looked at Aidan for the first time. I watched the realization brighten her face. Her dog catcher was really a God. “Oh my, you, I know you, from People Magazine.”

“Can I let you lose now?” He looked at Mr. Tucker. “Has she had all her shots?”

Clarice turned on him. I was certain she was going to bury her incisors so deep that a series of rabies shots would be required. “You’re that gay baseball player that abandoned his kid and dumped Vanessa Vanderhoff.” Yep, he was going to require a full series of shots.

He glared at me. “Don’t speak.” He turned on Jeanne. “What kind of hare-brained idea was this?”

Jeanne refused to speak, and when she wouldn’t, all eyes on the table fell on my father.
Gosh, that was weird to say.

“Clarice, let me make the introductions. If you’re going to divorce me, at least infidelity won’t be grounds. This is Jeanne,” he pointed at my mother. “She was my first wife, and this is Elizabeth, my daughter who I haven’t seen since she was an infant. This is her boyfriend, Aidan Palowski, and I’m fairly certain he’s not gay.”

Clarice skimmed over me and my mother. When her attention fell on Dr. Seuss she asked. “Who the hell are you? Dr. Seuss?”

“A person’s a person, no matter how small.” He shrugged his shoulders and pointed to my mother. “I’m with her.”

Jeanne smiled tentatively. Silence filled the table as everyone took cleansing breaths. The waiter’s retrieved broken glassware, righted the tablecloth, and replaced the china. The maitre d’ asked if we required any assistance. In other words, he wanted us out of his restaurant during the lunch rush.