Year of the Monsoon Read online

  “Gotta start sometime,” Leisa answered.

  Jo Ann pulled in behind them, and they entered the house together. “Where to start?” Jo asked, depositing a bag of groceries in the kitchen.

  “Would you two be willing to start in the bedroom? I’ll start in the office,” Leisa suggested.

  The third bedroom upstairs had been turned into Daniel’s office, and Rose had continued to use it for that purpose. Leisa paused on her way down the hall, looking in on her old bedroom, still decorated with old movie posters from Grease and Star Wars. With Jo and Bruce being the only remaining family, no one had stayed here, even as a weekend guest, since Leisa had moved out. Rose had left it exactly as it had been. Leisa swallowed the painful lump in her throat and moved on down the hall to the office.

  She switched on the desk lamp and sat in the old-fashioned wooden desk chair, swiveling around to look at the photos scattered about on walls and bookshelves. Turning back to the desk, she sighed. She wasn’t really sure what to look for.

  She pulled open the desk’s deep file drawer and began leafing through the files there. She’d had the utilities switched to her name and had been paying the bills that had arrived over the past few weeks, so those files were familiar. She found financial statements for IRAs and other investments – presumably Rose and Daniel’s nest egg to carry them through retirement. She had to blink back tears at the realization that neither of her parents had lived long enough to see the benefits of all their planning and saving. There was a file filled with medical and prescription receipts ready for the accountant for last year’s tax return, another with receipts for the new gutters and roof that had been installed on the house. There were files with two life insurance policies – one had been Daniel’s.

  At the back of the drawer was a file marked “Will” and behind that another file which had no label. Leisa pulled these out and laid them on the desk. The will was pretty straightforward – Bruce’s partner had drafted it, and Bruce had already told Leisa that she inherited everything except for a couple of bequests to charities that Daniel and Rose had supported. She flipped open the last folder and stopped short – her hand hovering in mid-air.

  She was staring at her adoption certificate.

  Of course there would be paperwork with any adoption. She knew that. She dealt with this stuff all the time. Why had her parents never shown this to her before? Why had she never asked? She turned to the next page in the file. It was a birth certificate, but not hers. Or was it? She scrutinized it. It had been issued in New York State. The birthdate and gender were correct, but the name was not. In the space for the name was typed Margaret Marie. Just a first and middle name. No last name. Not Yeats. Not anything.

  She slid the birth certificate to the side and saw a different birth certificate. This one had her name, Leisa Ann Yeats. It was also from the state of New York, but the issue date was six weeks after she’d been born.

  There was a baptism certificate for Leisa Ann Yeats from St. Vincent’s Catholic Church in Albany, and some early immunization records.

  The very last piece of paper in the folder was a hand-written note. It was written in pencil, faded and a little hard to read.

  Margaret Marie likes her bottle not too warm. She likes to sleep with a fan blowing and one light blanket.

  She is a good baby and will usually sleep through the night and hardly ever cries.

  “Aren’t you curious?” Leisa’s friends had always asked when they learned she was adopted. “Don’t you want to find your birth mother?”

  “No,” Leisa always answered, laughing at their consternation. “I have two great parents. Why would I want to go hunting for the woman who gave me up?”

  She suspected that most people didn’t believe her, but she meant what she said. She’d never been curious about “the incubator,” as she had come to think of the woman who gave birth to her. She felt only a sense of gratitude to the woman for carrying her, especially since abortion was a legal option by then. Leisa was actually grateful the woman had had the good sense to realize she wasn’t prepared to raise a baby. She couldn’t imagine more wonderful parents than Rose and Daniel Yeats. This was especially true after she began working at St. Joseph’s.

  Even Nan had been a little skeptical at Leisa’s insistence that she wasn’t curious. “You’ve really never thought about trying to find her?” she had asked.

  Leisa thought Nan looked oddly relieved and joked, “What? Were you worried about having to deal with two mothers-in-law?” It was the first time either of them had talked in terms of a future together. It had just popped out.

  But this? Leisa ran her hands through her hair. She could feel her heart hammering in her chest.

  “How are you doing in there?” Jo Ann’s voice called as she came down the hallway.

  Leisa flipped the adoption folder closed and stood up.

  “I’m good,” she said. “I think I found all the life insurance policies and investment accounts that will need copies of the death certificate.”

  Nan followed Jo into the office. “We got everything in the closet boxed up –” She looked more closely at Leisa’s face. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m… I’m fine,” Leisa stammered. “I guess this was just harder than I expected it to be.”

  Jo Ann came over and hugged her. “I know, honey. It is hard.” She let Leisa go and wiped her own eyes. “I kept remembering as we took clothes out of her closet, where we bought this and where we were when we found that.”

  “Is there anything you want?” Leisa asked. “Any jewelry, or anything of Grandma’s you’d like?”

  Jo Ann gave her a tearful smile and patted her cheek. “You are so good. But who would I give it to? You’re the daughter I never had.”

  “Come on, you two, before you get me crying again,” Nan said. “Let’s get some lunch. Can Bruce join us?”

  Jo Ann nodded. “He said to call him when we were done here.”

  They went downstairs to the kitchen where Jo Ann had left a bag containing rolls. “Leisa, would you get the soup from the refrigerator?” Jo asked as she reached for the phone.

  “Hello?” came Bruce’s voice from the foyer not long after.

  “In the kitchen,” Jo Ann called.

  “Hi, girls,” he said as he entered the kitchen. He removed his baseball cap from his balding head and took off his glasses so he could wash at the sink.

  “I smell sawdust,” Nan said as she poured water for everyone. “What are you working on?”

  “A new hutch for the dining room,” Bruce replied as he wiped his ruddy face with a paper towel. Woodworking was his outlet for the stress of legal work. “Someone keeps buying new china and we’re running out of space to put it,” he said, with a sideways glance at his wife. “As if this family is going to get any bigger.”

  There was an awkward silence. Bruce laid his callused hand over Leisa’s in apology. “I’m so sorry, Leisa.”

  “It’s okay,” she smiled. “We’re all going to have to get used to it.”

  Bruce looked around the kitchen. “Have you thought any more about selling the house?”

  “I’ve thought about it,” she admitted, “but I’m not ready to let it go yet.”

  There were so many memories attached to this house. Jo Ann and Bruce were just a few streets away, and all her life that she could remember, Leisa had called this house home. She had prayed Nan would agree to look for a house in this neighborhood.

  “Are you sure you won’t mind being this close to my family?” Leisa had asked anxiously as Nan caressed the carved oak newel post on the stairway of the house they were touring.

  Nan pirouetted slowly in the foyer, taking in the stained glass window on the stairway landing, the built-in bookcases flanking the fireplace, the graceful arches separating the rooms and knew she could fall in love with this house. She looked at Leisa. “Are you absolutely certain they’re okay with us?”

  Leisa smiled. “For the hundredth time, the
y love you! I have to warn you, though, they’ll expect us over for dinner at least once a week.” Her expression became serious. “I know you’re not that close to your family –”

  Nan came to her and took her by the shoulders. “I love your parents, and your aunt and uncle. They are so unlike my family.” She took a deep breath. “I can’t deny there have been brief moments of panic,” she said with a wry smile, “but I want us to have a home together. I’ve never been ready to take that step with anyone before.” She looked at Leisa with a hunger that make Leisa’s insides tingle. “I’ve never loved anyone this much.”

  Leisa stepped closer and kissed her, her lips soft and open, pressing her body into Nan’s. “I love you so much,” she whispered when they parted.

  “Oh,” Nan groaned as Leisa pulled away. “I suppose we should buy the house before we make love in it.”

  “Do you want to continue this next Saturday?” Jo Ann offered, snapping Leisa back to the present.

  “Sure, if you’re available,” Leisa responded. “I really appreciate having help with this.”

  They quickly cleaned the kitchen and Leisa went to get the papers she needed, making sure the unmarked folder was among them.

  Chapter 5

  “DR. MATHISON? THIS IS Bill Chisholm. I know you’ve been receiving my e-mails,” said the voice on Nan’s office voicemail. “We need to discuss this matter. Please call my office.”

  Nan sat at her desk staring at the telephone number she had written down. She could hear Maddie’s voice in her head, saying, “What would you tell a client who was putting off some unpleasant task they know is unavoidable?”

  She glanced at her watch. She had nearly an hour before her next client was due. She might as well get this over with. She dialed the number.

  “Mr. Chisholm, please,” she said to the receptionist. “This is Nan Mathison.”

  She was put on hold while the call was transferred.

  “Dr. Mathison.”

  She recognized the voice as the same one she had just listened to. “Yes.”

  There was a pause as Mr. Chisholm waited for her to say something more. “Thank you for calling,” he said when he realized she wasn’t going to offer anything further. “I understand this is probably an awkward situation –”

  “It isn’t really a situation at all, Mr. Chisholm,” Nan interrupted. “A meeting, a relationship of any kind is out of the question.”

  Another pause, then, “I have dealt with many similar cases, and I do understand how difficult this can be.”

  “Do you?” Nan winced at the acid tone of her own voice.

  “Could you and I meet?” Mr. Chisholm asked, undeterred by her iciness. “Just us, I give you my word.”

  Nan closed her eyes. Several seconds passed.

  “Dr. Mathison?”

  “I have to be in Williamsburg next month for a conference. Can you meet me there?”

  “Give me the dates you’ll be there and I’ll be in touch.”

  A few minutes later, the conversation was over and Nan sat, staring at the wall.

  “What did she do to you?” Nan had blurted as she opened her apartment door to find Leisa standing there, crying. She took Leisa by the hand and led her to the couch. “What happened?”

  Those days had been some of the longest of Nan’s life, leaving her cursing herself for falling in love again. Leisa’s old girlfriend, Sarah, had called, saying she needed to see her.

  “Why haven’t you told her how much this is hurting you?” Lyn had asked when Nan told her and Maddie what was happening.

  “I can’t do that,” Nan protested, sitting at their island. “She has to decide for herself… If she goes back to Sarah, it doesn’t matter that I love her, does it?” Nan’s eyes filled with tears. “I told myself I was never going to do this again.”

  “What happened?” Nan braced herself for whatever might come out of Leisa’s mouth.

  Leisa wiped her eyes and said, “She said she misses me and wants to have me back in her life.”

  Nan’s heart went still and cold. “Hasn’t she said that before?” she asked, trying to keep her voice neutral.

  Leisa nodded. “I’ve told you part of this story, but,” She stood and paced, wringing her hands nervously, “there’s more, and it’s all twisted together in my head.”

  Leisa forced herself to stand still, but couldn’t seem to look at Nan. “I told you that we got together in college. Even then, I caught her cheating on me. But she always came back, and I always let her. When we graduated, she laughed at me for thinking our relationship could last in the real world.” She reached up and ran her hands through her hair and took a tremulous breath as she resumed pacing. “What I didn’t know then was that she already had plans to get married. She never wore his ring at school, but she’d been seeing her boyfriend every time she went home. She was sleeping with both of us, and who knows who else, but I wasn’t the one she wanted to take home to her family.”

  She paused her pacing and wrapped her arms around herself.

  Nan hesitantly asked, “So, did she get married?”

  “Yes,” Leisa replied bitterly. “But now, she says she’s realized that he can’t love her the way she needs to be loved, the way I loved her. She wants me back.”

  She began pacing again. Nan’s eyes followed her back and forth. “Has she left the husband?” Nan asked, although she was pretty sure she knew the answer.

  “Oh no,” Leisa laughed angrily. “She wants both of us.”

  Nan looked down at her hands, surprised to see how tightly they were clenched. “What did you tell her?” she asked quietly.

  “This is the other thing I need to explain,” Leisa said, but she paced for several seconds more, trying to choose her words. “There’s no way I would go back to her, I mean, I wouldn’t with the whole husband thing anyway, but, she… she knows me, knows how to get to me. She came close… it was… we kissed,” she confessed. “She’s bad for me, or I’m just really pathetic. She’s like some kind of drug I can’t kick.” Leisa glanced sideways toward Nan. “You’ve probably never been with anyone who affects you like that.”

  “Oh, yes I have,” Nan admitted. She wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer to her next question. “Did it stop with a kiss?”

  “Yes.”

  Nan’s initial relief was followed by confusion. “Then why were you crying when you got here? What is it you want?” she asked a little defensively.

  Leisa turned to face Nan for the first time. “I want you,” she said simply. “I’ve never been able to tell her no, and I don’t know if I could have this time, except, I love you so much. I just had to be honest with you, even if it means you wouldn’t want to be with me anymore after hearing what happened.”

  Nan stood at last and came to her. Leisa’s eyes, as she drew near, reminded Nan of the turbulent gray-green surf off the stormy Oregon coast. “You haven’t pushed me away,” she said softly. “I love you, too.”

  “Even after this?” Leisa asked, her eyes reflecting her doubt.

  Nan’s answer was in her kiss, a kiss that was passionately returned by Leisa as they pulled each other close.

  Leisa pulled away, breathing hard. “Please don’t ever lie to me. I can handle anything you’ll ever tell me, but don’t lie.”

  Nan tenderly held Leisa’s face between her hands. “I promise.”

  Nan wasn’t sure how long she sat at her desk, staring at nothing. For ten years, she had kept that promise. Well, almost. She leaned forward and pressed her forehead against her hands. “What have you done?” she groaned.

  Chapter 6

  IN LATER YEARS, WHEN Mariela Gonzalez was grown, only a few recollections from her time at St. Joseph’s stood out in her memory. The most vivid, of course, was the paint can. When her mother was alive, Mariela learned very early on how to read her mother’s behavior. Sometimes it was safe to be around her; sometimes Mariela knew she had to stay hidden, unseen, especially when her mother had men wit
h her. That was when she went to her secret place, the place no one else knew about, where she could hide or get out of the building without anyone seeing. Once her mother was in the paint can, it wasn’t like that. Of course, the grown up Mariela realized how childish the memories were, but for six-year-old Mariela, the paint can came with a warm, soft bed, clean clothes and plenty of food, and no shouting or lying on the floor not answering when Mariela called to her.

  In her six-year-old mind, all of these good things were tied to Leisa. Things got better after Leisa came for her. Mariela remembered other people as well – Miss Maddie with the wild hair who looked scary but was very nice, and the fat Latina lady who read her stories and put her to bed at night. There were others, but it was Leisa she watched for, waited for.

  She remembered one day very clearly. Because she had never attended school, had never been taught numbers or letters, Mariela was being taught at St. Joseph’s the first year to try and get her up to grade level so she could go to school next year. Her teachers, dubious at first that she could make up so much ground in one year, were delighted with her progress. She was proving to be extremely bright, and was absorbing all she was being taught with an insatiable capacity for learning. She was in one of the classrooms after her school day was done, practicing her writing as she copied from a storybook, reading aloud to herself. Leisa walked by and saw her.

  “Hello, Mariela,” Leisa said, coming into the classroom and sitting at the next desk.

  “Hello,” said Mariela shyly.

  “How is school going?”

  Mariela beamed. “I can read now.”

  “Can you? Read me story,” Leisa said.

  Mariela pulled her book closer and read a few pages about a lost puppy. She stumbled over a word she didn’t know, and stopped reading, her head lowered, her hair hiding her face.

  “It’s okay,” Leisa reassured her. “That was really good. Let’s sound this word out. I want to find out what happens.”