Somewhere Out There(20)
Her mom reached inside the box and broke a piece off of one of the scones, then popped it inside her mouth. “Mmm,” she murmured. “Fantastic. I love the almonds.”
“Thanks,” Natalie said, trying to find the right way to bring up the subject they needed to discuss. But first, she spent a while making small talk with her mom, inquiring about her volunteer work at the food bank and the European vacation she and Natalie’s father were planning in the spring.
“And how are my gorgeous grandbabies?” her mother asked after they’d each finished eating a scone and decided to move to the more comfortable overstuffed couches in the family room.
“They’re good, too,” Natalie said. They settled into opposite ends of the same couch, and Natalie looked at her mom, who appeared about as relaxed as Natalie had ever seen her, and decided there was no sense waiting any longer. She dove into why she was there. “Hailey actually has a project for school that reminded me of one I had to do, too.”
“Really?” her mom said. “What is she doing?”
“Our family tree.” The muscles in her mother’s face froze, as Natalie suspected they would, but she forged ahead anyway. “I know this is a touchy subject, but it reminded me of how I wanted to include my birth mother on mine and you didn’t want me to. It made me think that it’s time for me to at least know her name.” She paused. “Kyle and I talked about it, and he thinks my knowing more about her might be a good idea, too.” Her mom loved Kyle like he was her own son; Natalie brought him into the conversation because she wanted her mother to see that this idea wasn’t just coming from her. She had her husband’s full support.
Her mother pressed her thin lips together and looked out the large picture window, so Natalie did, too. The rain from the previous night had dissipated before dawn, and strong winds had blown away the steel-wool clouds. Now, the sky was an intense, brilliant shade of blue, as though the storm had scrubbed it clean.
After a minute of silence, Natalie spoke. “Mom?” she said. “What do you think?”
“Why,” her mother asked, “do you think this would be a good idea?” Her voice was quiet but tense, and her fingers were linked tightly together in her lap.
“Because she’s the only blood relative I have, other than the kids.” Her mother closed her eyes and jerked her chin upward, as though Natalie had hit her. “Mom, please. I’m not trying to hurt you. I just think if I want to know my birth mother’s name, I should be able to.” Natalie grabbed a throw pillow and hugged it to her chest. “Honestly, I feel like I should already know it.”
“You only want to know her name?”
Natalie shook her head. “I want to see my adoption file. I want to know more about where I came from.”
Her mother’s blue eyes glossed with tears. “You came from your dad and me. We raised you. We took care of you. Aren’t we enough?”
Natalie gritted her teeth. “Of course you’re enough. That’s not the issue.”
“Then what is? Tell me how I’m not supposed to feel like I haven’t been a good enough mother to you when you want to go off and find another one?”
“Jesus, Mom.” Natalie released the pillow she held, letting it fall to the floor.
Her mother stared hard at the fallen pillow. Natalie sighed, reaching down to return it to its rightful spot on the couch. Some things never changed. In her parent’s house, if you dropped something, you picked it back up.
“Thank you,” her mom said, looking at Natalie again.
“You’re welcome,” Natalie said. A deep pinpoint pain began to pound below her right eye. Oddly enough, her sinuses were often the barometers of her emotional state—the more stressed she became, the more they swelled. Her doctor told her it was likely an autoimmune response, her body’s reaction to too much adrenaline. She pinched the bridge of her nose, trying to relieve the pressure, not knowing why she had thought this conversation would be any different than the others she and her mother had had about this subject. They always ended this way, her mother in tears and Natalie with the kind of headache that comes from banging your head against an impenetrable maternal brick wall.
“It would be harder,” Natalie finally said, “but you know I can look for her without your help. I could hire a private investigator.” She and Kyle had discussed that possibility the night before, in case her mother refused to cooperate. Now, Natalie kept her voice gentle, filled with as much compassion as it could hold. “But I came to you first, because I didn’t want to hide anything. I wanted you to know that this isn’t about you or Dad.” She felt a barb of tears in her throat, and she had to swallow them down before she went on. “You are my mother. You will always be my mother. The one who held me and took care of me and made sure I had everything I could ever possibly need. You and Daddy both did that. And I’m not looking to replace you. You could never lose me . . . you have me. I’m already yours.”
Her mother’s chin trembled, and before Natalie could say anything else, her mom stood up and without a word, strode out of the room.
“Shit,” Natalie muttered, pushing on the sore spot of her cheekbone with her thumb. She didn’t know why she’d even bothered coming. She should have just found her birth mom on her own and told her mother about it after the fact. After Natalie could show her mother that the other woman wasn’t any kind of threat—she was simply a part of Natalie’s history, a history she was entitled to know.