Chapter 5: What Jessica Could Not Forgive
She sat down across from me without taking her coat off.
That told me everything about how long she intended to stay.
"I got the results," she said.
"I know.
I got them too."
"So it's real." She said it like she was confirming a diagnosis.
"Ryan is your son.
Which means I married my brother."
"Half-brother.
And you didn't know.
Neither did he."
"That doesn't change what it is."
"No," I said.
"It doesn't."
She looked at the table.
Her hands were flat on the surface, very still, the way hands are when the person is working hard to keep them that way.
"I want to understand something," she said.
"And I need you to be honest with me."
"All right."
"Did you know?
At any point?
When Ryan and I were dating, when we got engaged, when we got married — did you have any idea?"
"Jessica." I held her gaze.
"I was told my baby died.
I had no idea he existed.
I had no idea Ryan existed as anything other than the man my daughter loved."
She studied my face for a long moment.
Looking for the crack in it.
"I believe you," she said finally.
"I hate this, but I believe you."
"Thank you."
"Don't thank me." Her voice sharpened.
"Because believing you doesn't fix anything.
It doesn't fix the fact that my marriage is—" She stopped.
"The lawyer I spoke to this morning said that in this state, a marriage between half-siblings, even unknowing, is void.
Not voidable.
Void.
Like it never legally existed."
I hadn't known that.
The word landed hard.
"Ryan and I have been married for seven years," she said.
"Seven years.
We have a mortgage together.
We have joint accounts.
We have—" Her voice broke for the first time.
She pressed her lips together and waited until she had it back.
"We were talking about trying for a child.
We had an appointment scheduled."
I wanted to reach across the table.
I didn't.
"I'm so sorry, Jessica."
"Are you?" She looked up.
"Because part of me — and I know this is unfair, I know it is — part of me is so angry at you.
At the fact that this secret existed.
That you had a baby and didn't tell us.
That somewhere out there was a person connected to our family and none of us knew."
"I was nineteen.
My mother told me he was de@d.
I had no choice in any of it."
"I know that." She pressed her fingers to her eyes.
"I know that.
And I'm not — I'm not actually blaming you.
I'm just—" She dropped her hands.
"I don't know where to put this.
I don't know who to be angry at and the person most responsible for it has been de@d for eleven years and I can't even—"
She stopped.
I watched something move across her face.
A realization arriving.
"Grandma knew," she said.
It wasn't a question.
"Yes."
"She knew Ryan was alive.
She arranged it.
She let you believe he was de@d and she watched me bring him home and she sat at our wedding and she—"
"Yes."
Jessica stood up so abruptly the chair scraped back.
She walked to the window.
Stood there with her back to me, shoulders rigid.
"I loved her," she said.
"I gave a eulogy at her funeral.
I talked about what a strong woman she was."
I didn't say anything.
"What do I do with that now?"
"I don't know," I said honestly.
"I've been asking myself the same thing since this morning."
She turned back around.
Her face had changed again — the fury had gone somewhere deeper, replaced by something rawer.
"Ryan wants to meet with you," she said.
"Alone.
He told me this morning."
"I know.
I want that too."
"I told him I needed a few days first." She looked at me.
"I'm asking you to give me those days.
Before you and Ryan have your — whatever it is.
Your reunion.
I need a few days to figure out how to be in a world where my husband is my brother and my mother kept a secret that destroyed my marriage before it even—" Her voice fractured.
"Please."
"Of course," I said.
"Take whatever time you need."
She nodded.
She picked up her bag.
At the door, she stopped with her hand on the frame.
"Mom."
"Yes."
"I don't blame you." She said it to the doorframe, not to me.
"I want to.
It would be easier.
But I don't."
Then she was gone.
I sat at the table alone for a long time.
On the counter, my phone lit up with a text from a number I didn't recognize.
*This is Ryan.
I know Jessica asked for time.
I'll respect that.
But I need to ask you one thing and I need you to answer honestly.*
*Did she — our mother — did she ever mention me?
Even once?
Did she ever seem like she was carrying something?*
I looked at the message for a long time.
Then I started to type, and stopped, because the honest answer was the one that would hurt the most.
Our mother had mentioned, once, near the end of her life, that she had made a decision she wasn't sure God would forgive.
May you like
I had assumed she meant something small.
I had been wrong.
