THE TRUTH, A bitch who pulled no punches, needed to be confronted. The Truth would never let me back into the world I knew before, although that's exactly where I wanted to be. Calming my breathing, I got out of the car and went into the house. Valerie and Ruby stirred pots and cut vegetables in the kitchen. The sight of them chilled my body; the Truth slid her icy fingers up my spine. I shivered. "Hey, I'm back," I announced.
Valerie came into the den and hugged me. "Are you okay? Ruby told me what happened."
My cold clammy hands shook as I pulled away from her embrace. "Yeah, it's been a bitch of a day." I reached behind me to find the chair and lowered myself into it. The sum of Kathleen finding me in Mark's bedroom, being attacked by Bert Carter in the park, realizing Edwina and Roscoe were behind the harassment, and now this, didn't add up to a red-letter day. My mind and body ached as if one more life-changing event would turn me inside out-and what I knew was inside, the betrayal and anger, would not please anyone.
"Are you sure you're okay? You're pale as a ghost." Valerie wiped her hands on a dishtowel she had tucked in the waist of her jeans, then felt my forehead.
I jerked away from her touch. How could she have lied to me all these years?
"Maybe you need to lie down for a little while," Ruby offered from the kitchen. "Have you eaten?"
"No," I mumbled.
Valerie still stood in front of me, staring as if she didn't recognize the person who sat before her. "Derek, what's wrong?"
"Well, everything." I said, the tension in me ready to explode. My head throbbed; my heartbeat felt like it rattled the walls of the house; what little food I had digested during the day tried to creep up my throat. I couldn't play the game, now that I knew. "Valerie, why did you leave high school your sophomore year?"
The blood drained from her face as she cast her eyes toward the window, then stared at the floor. She didn't seem to know what to do with herself; frozen intime, maybe memories flooding back, her body didn'tmove. Finally, the trance broke, and she reached for the remote control and clicked off the television, then, with trembling hands, sank into the chair next to mine.
In the kitchen, Ruby turned off the stove and covered a pot, then sneaked back toward her bedroom. Valerie and I settled into the silence and solitude of the den.
I watched Valerie wipe her eyes with the dishtowel. My breathing shuddered my whole body. Trying to calm myself again, I focused on the vase of roses on the coffee table and how the breeze from the ceiling fan fluttered their jagged leaves against the unforgiving thorns jutting from their stems.
A deep sigh signaled Valerie's intent to say something to break the silence. Her reasons deserved to be heard; hopefully, they could make up for the hurt I felt. I wiped the sweat from my upper lip and dried my hands on my jeans, braced for what she had to say.
"Mother and I went to New York to stay with Uncle Earl," she began. "You never met him, but he was the youngest of Grandma's brothers. Our intent was to take care of my pregnancy."
The word hitme hard. I fished my pack of cigarettes out of my jeans, tapped out two, lit both, and handed one to Valerie. I inhaled deep, letting the smoke fill my lungs and the nicotine absorb into my system.
After a quick hit on her cigarette, she continued, "Uncle Earl took us to a doctor he knew, but in the waiting room, knowing what I was about to do, I couldn't. Mother and I cried all night." Valerie glanced up at me, tears spilling down her cheek. "We all knew adoption was out of the question, but a family member could raise the child. Walterene and Ruby popped into our minds first, but the questions from the neighbors and other family members would be too intrusive. Uncle Earl offered to help me with the baby; he always wanted children. The prospect of raising a family in the Village seemed appealing to me at the time. I imagined staying on with Uncle Earl, and together, teaching this child about art, music, life, but Earl was almost sixty and not in good health, and I knew I couldn't manage the city and raise a child alone. That night, Mom decided she would take the baby and raise him as her own son."
I noticed the long drooping ash at the end of my cigarette and tapped it into the ashtray between us. Avoiding direct eye contact, I nodded to keep her going.
"Afraid of the stigma, we decided to stay in New York until you were born."
The finality of hearing her saying "you" brought tears to my eyes that I swiped away with my hand.
"And," she continued, "tell everyone Mom was pregnant, not me." She didn't look up at me, but I saw the tears trickle down her face.
"Mother did come back to Charlotte for weeks at a time during my stay. She wore maternity clothes and had Dad prepare a nursery Tim never knew what was going on. I came home for Christmas starting to show, but covered my secret with bulky sweaters. I told my classmates I attended a private school focused on art, which I did. I can't begin to tell you how scared and happy I was during that time, walking the city streets with Uncle Earl, the gallery visits, the lectures at NYU, the occasional dinner party, and the theatre every Saturday afternoon."
I stole a glance at her faint smile of the memory.
She puffed on her cigarette in thought; the tears had stopped. "You were the most popular baby in the Village. Uncle Earl knew everyone, and they were so accepting of a pregnant teenager." She slipped out of her chair and kneeled next to me, holding my hands in hers. "Derek," her pleading eyes searched mine, "I'm sorry I never told you. A secret so covered with lies soon becomes the truth to everyone involved."
Sorrow for the life I never knew, the life I didn't have with my real mother, the possibility of how things might have been, teemed within me as if the grief would churn my heart into pieces. We held each other and cried. I wanted to say how proud I was that she kept me, how thankful I was for having her in my life, how I didn't hold anything against her for her decisions. Tears streamed down my face. "I love you, Val." I couldn't say any more; sobs of pain for me and for her took over my body.
She stroked my hair. "I meant to tell you when you were old enough to understand, but the timing never seemed right. You left us before I had a chance."
"Gladys sent me away. No evidence, no crime," I said; resentment for the Bitch still harbored in my soul.
The words seemed to hit Valerie hard; she pulled back to her chair and wiped her eyes. "I think Mother was afraid you would find out and misunderstand. She wanted to shelter you from the truth. Send you out into the world to be your own person, not someone shaped by the secrets and lies of this family."
That statement didn't hold reality for the person I knew as Gladys. "Who else knows?" I asked, wondering how many people kept the undisclosed truth.
"Walterene, Ruby, and Father," she answered. "Ruby and Walterene confronted Mother with their suspicions, but held the secret safe. That's why I worried when you found Walterene's diaries. She mentions it and says how much she and Ruby wanted you as theirs; in fact, over the years, they helped raise you as much as I did, as much as Mother did."
"I didn't see anything about me in the diaries," I said.
"I took them last Sunday before Edwina and Roscoe came over." She rubbed her eyes, weary from the conversation.
"Edwina and Roscoe are talking to the police about the man who hurt Ruby and threatened me." I briefly explained how the phone calls and attacks focused on getting me out of town to avoid hurting Vernon 's campaign. I wanted to get back to us, not allowing the stupid antics of family business politics to swerve the discussion away from the words we had avoided for twenty-five years.
"I hate them," Valerie stated with a flat tone. She looked back to me. "If you didn't see the diaries, how did you find out?"
I tried to explain as simply as possible. "I read about Mr. Sams. Walterene thought Papa Ernest and Vernon had been part of the lynching."
Valerie rubbed her forehead and stared at the floor as I talked.
"Daniel didn't know what I wanted to research at the Observer archives, but thought it had something to do with the family. He did some digging, talked to a few people-specifically, to his brother who was a year behind you in school. I saw Daniel's notes saying you left school the year I was born." The pain I saw in her face almost kept me from venturing the next question. "I wasn't a child of a high school sweetheart, was I?"
"No," she mumbled.
Fear seized my mind. The truth and shock of who my mother was led to the dread of discovering the identity of my father, and from the secrecy and pain of Valerie's pregnancy, I could only assume I was a product of rape. Brutality, cruelty, violence, and aggression resulted in my creation. My eyes watched her, posing the question of who the fiend had been.
"No." She shook her head. "Derek, you know enough."
Anger stirred in me again. "Val, we got this far; there's no going back. You owe me the truth. Was it rape?"
She bowed her head letting her dark hair hide her face; her thin body slumped in the chair. For the first time I considered how much we resembled each other; as brother and sister, the fact seemed natural, but as mother and son, I wanted to know why my genes coded me so much a Harris. Papa Ernest had raped his daughter, producing Vernon; could Dad have done the same to his daughter? The thought struck me as ridiculous as soon as it snapped within my brain; the gentleness and kindness of the man I called my father, and Valerie's devotion to him, cleared him in my mind. But Dad wasn't my father, he was my grandfather; the question of my biological father persisted. "Val, who?" I couldn't call the man "my father." The phrase evoked love, tenderness; this man was a rapist, a child molester; he had raped a fifteen-year-old girl. "Who did it?"
Sobs shook her shoulders. She mumbled something.
I kneeled at her feet, holding her hands in mine as she had done to me a few minutes before. "It's all right. He can't hurt you now. Who was it?"
She said the name again.
I couldn't believe it. "No!"
"Yes," she cried, " Vernon, Uncle Vernon raped me!"
Hate boiled in me. "Why is he not in jail? Did the Bitch cover for him? I can't believe she can even look him in the eyes."
Valerie cried, "No one knows. I never told anyone. Mother never knew." She gasped for air between sobs and words. "She thought it was some boy from school. I couldn't tell her the truth. I was too ashamed."
"You never confronted him?" Anger tore at my soul, but I tried to be compassionate, to consider her feelings. Surprised she had kept me and not gone through with the abortion, I couldn't imagine the fear and loathing she must have for the entire family. Gladys supported Vernon 's every decision, in the company and for the whole Harris clan. The star and head of the family, he commanded everyone. How could she have pointed to him? No one would have believed her.
"Derek, please! I want this to stay buried," she pleaded. "It's history. Nothing can be done now."
I glanced at the clock: eight fifteen. "Let's go." I pulled her hand to help her out of the chair. A movement from the corner of my eye caught my attention; Ruby stood in the doorway crying. She had heard it all. "We're going to see Gladys," I told Ruby.
I PULLED UP to the door of the Dilworth house; Valerie sat unmoving beside me. The front porch lights were on, and Dad, Gladys, and Grandma sat in rockers under the breeze of ceiling fans sipping their after-dinner coffee. Gladys stood when she saw me.
Opening the car door for Valerie, I helped her out. The worried look on Gladys' face as she watched Valerie's stumbling steps told me she knew the secret was gone. "Gladys, we need to talk," I said as I climbed the stairs with Valerie.
She didn't say a word, but rushed to Valerie's side to help her into the house. Dad and Grandma began to follow, but she said something to make them stay outside. She led Valerie into the back sunroom, away from the presence of Grandma and Dad. "What have you done?" Her accusing eyes slashed into me.
Valerie between us on the couch, I shot back, "Found the truth. The truth you hid. Lies you made up to save yourself embarrassment. You're a bigger bitch than I ever thought possible."
"Don't talk to me like that," Gladys seethed. "Leave Valerie here and go."
"Stop it!" Valerie woke from her daze. "Stop it, both of you." She got up and grabbed onto a chair from the table to support her weight, then dropped into it. "We're all we have. I'm sick of the snide remarks and digs you take at each other." She focused on Gladys. "Mom, Derek knows."
"What?" She jerked to attention so fast I thought her thin body would snap like a twig. "Knows what?"
Valerie took a deep breath and braced her hands on the table. "And he knows who his father is."
Gladys looked to me, then back to Valerie; her body still stiff and alert. "Some no-account boy from Myers Park," she turned to me, "that your sister couldn't say 'no' to."
I watched Valerie as she shook her head from side to side.
"What do you mean?" Gladys asked. "I thought it was that Watkins boy who played football with Tim. That's what you told me."
"I never said who it was. You assumed." Valerie's arm trembled from the stress of pressing her hands on the table. She released her grip on the tabletop and crossed her arms in front of her as if to help protect herself from what she was about to say. "One night, when I stayed over at Margaret's, Uncle Vernon told us we were making too much noise, so he made us sleep in separate bedrooms."
"Mike?" Gladys jumped to the conclusion it was Margaret and Mark's brother.
Valerie ignored her and continued, "It happened only once. At first, I hoped and prayed it had been a nightmare." She watched Gladys perched on the edge of the cushion. " Vernon," she began, but Gladys jumped to her feet.
I thought she was going to smack Valerie, so I lunged forward to grab her arm, but Gladys slipped away from me and wrapped herself around Valerie. She held her daughter and rocked back and forth as if Valerie were still a little girl. They both cried. Never having seen this kind of emotion from Gladys, I held my seat, stunned, wondering what they had gone through together: mother and daughter guarding a secret, Gladys not knowing the whole truth, and Valerie too afraid to confide in anyone.
For several minutes, I stayed quiet while they held each other and cried, then I noticed Gladys' body straighten and return to her normal stiff posture. She guided Valerie back into the chair and then turned to me. "He won't get away with this."
My spine tingled at the sight of a woman I'd thought I knew. I had expected her to deny it, to cover scandal, to blame me, but her eyes flashed with blue fire, and I knew her anger wasn't directed at me. Gladys turned back to Valerie and touched her face as if she stroked fine silk. "Stay here," she commanded with such gentleness it sounded like a question.
I jumped up. "I'm going with you."
Her eyes flashed at me, then the fire receded. "Take care of your mother. I'll take care of Vernon."
"But, I want to be there," I almost pleaded. "I'm not a child anymore. This is about Valerie and me. I have a right-"
"Okay," she conceded before I could finish. "But you must control your temper. I know how to deal with him." She thought for a moment. "Yes, you should be there. He will face what he did to my daughter and me, and to my grandson."
I smiled at her, glad that she was on my side. We walked out to my car, and I waited while Gladys said a few words to Dad, then I opened the passenger side door. She smiled at my newfound manners for her. The short drive to Vernon 's home on Queens Road allowed Gladys time to remind me to let her do the talking and to stay calm no matter what he said. Along the way, I thought about the arguments and tension between us; she had wanted to protect me from this secret, to keep Valerie safe from the rumors and accusing stares of the self-righteous in Charlotte 's society. Maybe telling her I was gay years ago had given her the opportunity to force me to leave, have my own life without the shadow of being the bastard child of the Harris family. I glanced at her, hoping she would spill the reasons for our years of discontent, but her own silent thoughts stilled her as we neared Vernon 's house.
This woman wasn't my mother, but my grandmother. The fact was hard to keep in my mind. All the family relationships I had known for twenty-fives years were false. Panic gripped my gut as I thought about Mark; I hadn't considered any one else besides Valerie and me since I heard the truth, now the revelation that Mark and I were brothers slapped me into reality. I had sex with my brother. All my abomination of incest within the family-Papa Ernest with his daughter, Vernon with Valerie-I had to add Mark and me to the list. Of course, as I turned the car onto Queens Road, I rationalized that two men can't be considered incest; laws against it are there to protect offspring of those relationships. Me, I'm the offspring of incest; twice over-Papa Ernest fathered Vernon, who fathered me. I felt acid bubble up my throat, the bitter bile pushing its way out. I calmed my breathing and dismissed my lineage from my thoughts.
As I pulled the car into Vernon 's driveway, Gladys warned me again, "Let me do the talking."
Aunt Irene opened the door of their sprawling house along the oak-lined street of Charlotte 's elite. Her eyes widened behind her half moon reading glasses. "Gladys, I didn't expect you this time of night."
"I need to talk to Vernon," she said as she pushed her way past her bewildered sister-in-law. I followed, only nodding to my aunt.
We found Vernon in his study, puffing on a cigar, reading through a folder of newspaper clippings. "What the hell are you two doing here? It's almost nine o'clock."
"We know what time it is," I started, but a quick hawk-like look from Gladys stopped me.
" Vernon, I," she glanced at me, "we need to talk to you. Derek, please shut the door; I don't think this is something the rest of the house needs to hear."
I closed the door as Gladys took a seat across from Vernon 's desk. A couch against the wall where I could see them both seemed like a good vantage point for me. Vernon 's jaw muscles twitched as he chomped on his cigar. He looked at Gladys then at me. Gladys poised in her chair, expressionless as a raptor ready to swoop down on her prey. The hate I felt for Vernon had to be contained; Gladys knew how to handle him. I would only end up in jail if I acted on my instincts.
"My daughter had a child at sixteen," she began as if reciting facts from a history book. "I had always believed the father was a high school boy-"
"Now wait one minute." Vernon sat forward. "What kind of lies has Valerie told you?"
"The guilty always deny before the accusation." She stood and placed her hands on his desk, staring into his eyes. "You bastard," she spit the words, "you stole my daughter's innocence and ruined her childhood. I have spent twenty-five years covering up what I thought was her mistake."
I tried not to take the word "mistake" personally.
"But you took what you wanted without thinking who you hurt. I should string you up by the balls." Her face flushed with emotion.
"You listen to me." The cold bastard didn't take his eyes off her. "I didn't do anything she didn't want."
I couldn't stop myself. "You fucking-"
Gladys glared at me, her index finger extended to shut me down. Her head and finger turned to point at him. " Vernon," her voice calm and calculated, "she was a girl of fifteen when you did this. She's your niece. You robbed my family. Your own son," she pointed to me, and my gut ached, "would love to make you pay for this by exposing you to the public."
His face paled, and he laid the cigar in the ashtray.
"But I know what family means to us," she continued, "even though you don't. I don't want this to go public. I don't want to hurt Valerie or Derek anymore." She picked up his folder of newspaper clippings and thumbed through them. "You will resign from the Senate race tomorrow."
"Are you out of your mind?" He came out of his chair and jerked the folder from her hands. "Who the hell are you to come in here and tell me what to do with my life?"
"I'm the mother of the girl you raped." Her controlled voice rumbled through the room.
"I'm not giving up this election," he yelled, "for something that happened twenty-five years ago. It's just her word against mine."
Gladys pushed him back toward the desk with her pointing finger. "You don't have a choice. If I don't attend a press conference tomorrow before noon, I'll hold my own. I have put up with your bullying for too long." Her predator side took over. "You will resign from the campaign, and you will resign from the board of Harris Construction."
He leaned on the edge of his desk, his face white and frozen. The wrath of Gladys had apparently surprised him.
She pushed the folder across his desk. "Something for your scrapbook. Derek," she motioned to me, "let's go. I'm sick of the sight of him."
I opened the study door for her, but she stopped to address Vernon one last time. "I have you by the balls, and I won't let go until they're mine."
A LARGE GROUP of reporters assembled for Vernon 's press conference: television and newspapers from Charlotte, Raleigh, Greensboro, Wilmington, and Asheville. I saw Daniel across the room, and he winked at me.
I stood with Gladys. "So, what should I call you now? Grandma Gladys?"
She shot me a look I had seen too many times before; I had crossed the line. "Mother will do. I don't want this getting out; I bluffed Vernon with taking it public. Valerie doesn't need everyone in this city knowing what happened."
"You're right. Thank you for what you did for her," I hesitated, trying to get the rest of the words out, "and for me."
She only nodded, staring at the lectern as Vernon came to the microphone. He explained that the stress of his campaign for political office and the toll that stress took on his family was more than he was willing to give. He would sacrifice his ambitions for the good of his wife, children, and grandchildren. I spotted Mark behind his father. If Vernon only knew that his bastard son had literally fucked his perfect, golden boy, favorite son. But that was my secret and Mark's guilt to live with. And it was guilt that had broken Mark. He kept his head lowered throughout Vernon 's speech; Kathleen stood by Mark's side with her arm locked through his. The only emotion I felt for Mark was pity. Camera flashes recorded the end of an era.
The next day, Vernon 's resignation from the board of Harris Construction was less public, but the same sacrifice had been made "for family."
"YEAH, I'M PACKING right now," I explained to Emma on the phone. "I have a flight out tomorrow."
"Want me to meet you at the airport? No, wait," Emma clicked her fingernails on the phone's mouthpiece, "I have to be in Sausalito for a catalog shoot. Well, I will see you when I see you. Will you be glad to get home?"
I sat on the bed among folded clothes and a half-packed suitcase and considered her question. "I don't know." The answer surprised me. Did I really want to go back to California? Ruby had begged me to stay, and so had Valerie. Gladys and I had become more at ease; she had actually hugged me when Vernon announced the end of his campaign. Mark was a lost cause, but Daniel wasn't. What did I have in California but a roommate and a cat? "Emma, I think I'm going to postpone the return trip again."
She sighed deep into the receiver. "I knew this would happen. It's that Daniel guy, isn't it?"
"No, not totally," I said. "Things have leveled out; my family is still totally fucked up, but not as bad as before I got here."
"Sounds like they need you," she teased. "You want me to box up your stuff and send it to… Where are you?"
" Charlotte, North Carolina," I reminded her, and then added, "home."