The Last of the Stanfields(56)

“Oh, no . . .” she groaned. “Elby, don’t you dare fall in love with this guy!”

“Hang on. First off, he’s not my type. Second, I don’t trust him one bit. Not yet.”

“First off, I don’t believe you. Second, you trust everyone. So, for the last time, do not get involved, at least not until we’ve got to the bottom of this whole mess.”

Maggie made me promise to call every day to keep her up to speed, and she in return promised not to say anything to Michel. After we hung up, it took a long time for me to fall asleep. I tossed and turned late into the night.



When I went downstairs the next morning, George-Harrison was already there, waiting for me in the hotel lobby. The dining area in the hotel looked especially grim, so I hopped into George-Harrison’s pickup and we went out for breakfast.

“What type of carpenter are you?” I asked to break the ice.

“Type? It’s not like there are that many to choose from.”

“Sure there are. Some build houses, some make furniture, or maybe . . .”

“When you talk about building houses, it’s more construction than carpentry . . . You know, maybe I just don’t have a father at all.”

“What’s that got to do with carpentry?”

“Nothing, absolutely nothing. But I stayed up all night thinking about my mother’s letter. She calls your mom ‘my love.’ What if my father was an anonymous donor—or not anonymous, who’s to say?—and the tragedy they keep mentioning was me being born?”

“Tragedy might be pushing it. Tragically dramatic, maybe. And while it’s true that you’re . . . easy enough on the eyes, a ‘treasure’ that must be brought back into the light? Don’t flatter yourself.”

I burst out laughing at my own joke and instantly felt bad about it. The whole thing seemed to really bother him. At the next red light, George-Harrison turned to face me, his face pale and serious.

“It doesn’t bother you at all to think of our mothers being . . . so close?”

“How ‘close’ they were doesn’t seem to be what’s eating at you, since you’re so carefully avoiding saying what you really mean. And if the thought of them as more than friends bugs you so much, maybe you need to think about why that is. Not to mention . . . it might not even be true! By the time your mum wrote that letter . . . she was already, you know . . .”

“Batshit crazy?”

“You really have to finish all my sentences? Look, after a certain age, communicating gets harder. And between love and friendship, things can get mixed up. Let’s play your theory out, and you’ll see it doesn’t fit. Imagine our mothers were in love and decided to have a child together through an anonymous donor. Your mum gets pregnant—and mine just abandons her?”

“What is it about this that doesn’t fit?” he asked, as a car honked behind us.

“Hey, step on it, will you? Don’t you hear the beeping behind you? I know men are no good at multitasking, but listening and driving at the same time isn’t exactly brain surgery. Even my dad can pull that off, and no one’s more easily distracted than him.”

George-Harrison stepped on the accelerator and crossed the junction, then quickly pulled over to the side of the road.

“How old are you?” I asked him.

“Thirty-five.”

“Date of birth?”

“July 4, 1981.”

“Well, then—there you have it. Your theory doesn’t work. My mother was already back in England when your mother got pregnant with you, by my calculations.”

“Men are no good at multitasking, huh? What else do you have against men?”

“Are you planning on parking, or are we just going sit here with the engine on?”

“We’re parked, right in front of the place where we’re having breakfast. Come on. A cup of coffee would do you a world of good.”



Without glancing at the menu, George-Harrison ordered eggs Benedict with extra toast, extra bacon, and a large orange juice. Something about that made me smile. I stuck with just tea, figuring I could scavenge some toast. There was no earthly way he would actually clean his plate.

“Since it turns out that I’m not the tragic mistake my mother was referring to,” he said, with a crooked grin, “just what do you think she meant? I’m guessing your mother never mentioned—”

“My mother never talked about that period of her life, and we knew better than to ask questions. She was an orphan and there was a lot of pain in her past. We tried to tread lightly, out of respect. Or, to tell you the truth, maybe it was more out of fear than respect.”

“Fear of what?”

“Of . . . pulling back the curtain and finding something else there.”

“Like what? I don’t understand.”

“Something other than her children. And how about you? What do you know of your mother’s past?”

“I know she was born in Oklahoma, that her dad was a mechanic and her mother was a housewife. My grandfather was as tough as nails, and a bit stingy when it came to affection. Mom told me that he would never hug or touch any of his kids, using all the grease and grit on his hands as an excuse, not wanting to get dirt on them. The only thing tougher than him was growing up in Oklahoma. Maybe people didn’t really know how to . . . show their feelings to their kids that well back in those days. Mom took off to New York when she was still young, her head buzzing with all the books she’d read as a kid. She made it sound like books were the best part of her childhood. She got a job as a secretary at a publishing house and went to night school for journalism at NYU. I know she applied to every newspaper up and down the East Coast and got work as an archivist. Then she left the United States and started a new life in Montreal—right around the time she had me.”