Part 25 (1/2)
Robert didn't wake until noon. He hurriedly showered, dressed, called a cab, and arrived at the bank around one. In the lobby he asked to see Mr. McDylan.
Within minutes a man claiming to be George McDylan strolled out like a sleepwalker, his eyes huge, his skin pale. He looked wan, much older than Robert remembered, and much, much thinner. The man nodded, stuck out his hand, shook his weakly, and invited him back to his office.
George appeared amiable enough, though upset under his elan exterior. Robert knew he must be mad as h.e.l.l. If the situation had been reversed, he would've beaten the s.h.i.+t out of George and asked questions in the hospital. But George only asked where on earth he'd been. Which, under the circ.u.mstances, was virtually impossible to answer. Where? s.h.i.+t, George, I'm the first American to set foot in the Twilight Zone? ”I had to figure some things out.” G.o.d, but that sounded awful.
”Isn't that quaint? Of course, you've also been missing for-”
Robert held out his palm, shook his head. ”I know you think I'm a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, George, but please, please tell me where my daughter is. Tell me she's okay.”
George leaned forward. His face was getting red. ”Do you believe you can stroll into my office after seven years and inquire about your child? Half of us around here believed you and my daughter had a thing, that you'd agreed to meet her somewhere, to start a new-”
”What are you talking about?” asked Robert, sitting up, thinking, Could I possibly be asking a question you don't know the answer to?
”It was no secret you and Veronica were damaged goods, so don't act like a grieving widower.” They stared at each other a while, their eyes locked. George's chin quivered. ”I haven't seen my little girl for seven years, Mr. Lieber. Seven years. And you have the gall to apologize for years of uncertainty?”
George hadn't seen Mary for seven years? It was more than Robert could grab hold of. ”What happened, George? Where is she? Where are they?”
George stared at him a moment longer, then hid his face in his hands. He wept.
”You have no idea?”
George couldn't speak.
”You haven't even heard from her?”
George lowered his hands. His face was red, his eyes puffy. ”My wife isn't well,” he whispered. ”She's not well.”
They were silent for a few minutes. Robert scooted his chair back and stood. ”I can't account for my whereabouts. All I can tell you is I've been gone, and I have absolutely no idea where our daughters are.”
”She was pregnant, you know.”
”Mary.”
George nodded. ”She came home pregnant. It was a bad time for all of us, and then you went missing. Everyone looked for a couple of weeks, and Jenn stayed with us.”
Hearing it, Robert felt the emotion welling up. ”Was she okay-”
”Her mother had just pa.s.sed, you f.u.c.k. Then you vanished. How do you think she was? When Child Services began calling, Mary got upset. She and Jenn had been sleeping in the same bed, and Grady had-”
”Grady?”
”Her best friend.”
”The girl with the spiky hair?”
George nodded. ”They were coming to take your daughter, put her in foster care, and we and Mary went round and round about it. Then one morning, they were all gone.”
”Don't tell me that was the last you-”
”For seven years.”
It took most of the afternoon to pry it from him, but George finally offered a couple of guesses as to where they went. He believed that two girls would have settled in a place known to at least one of them.
For the first few days, he and his wife hadn't searched too hard. Mary was at a rebellious age, and they both felt that if they allowed her to find out how difficult the world could be, she would come crawling back. But she hadn't crawled back; she hadn't even called to relieve them of worry.
Around the two week mark, Freddie prevailed on him to begin searching in earnest. George started with all the relatives he knew, first the ones in-state, then a couple from as far away as Oregon. He got nowhere. No one on either side of the family had a clue. At this point, they filled out a missing persons report. They got nowhere with that either, and George researched the whereabouts of Grady's parents.
He found only one person bearing Grady's last name, a woman in Asheville, North Carolina, and he called her one afternoon. When he mentioned Grady, she broke down, began recounting she and her daughter's disastrous relations.h.i.+p, and how she hadn't heard from her in months, not since she'd disappeared from school. George had asked why she hadn't searched for her, and the woman told him how hard her daughter's heart was, and how it wouldn't have done any good.
In this manner years pa.s.sed.
From time to time, George wondered how his own daughter's heart could have become so hard, and whether or not he had failed to give her something along the way, something she'd needed desperately. He knew his wife thought much the same things, and often, but Freddie and he gradually grew farther apart. Now, they barely spoke.
Over the years he had made three sojourns to North Carolina, hoping to pick up a trail, but the trips had been next to useless. Still, he had always felt closer to his daughter while in that state. It was nothing he could explain, just a feeling that hit him stronger each time he made the trip. He wasn't a superst.i.tious man, but he confessed to Robert that he found the sensation eerie.
”If I had to make a bet,” George told him, ”I'd put my money on North Carolina.”
It seemed as good a place to start as any. Robert took a cab to Orlando, bought a ticket at the bus station, and waited at the terminal. It was a typical Florida day: a clear blue sky in the morning, a virtual lock to rain later in the day.
He fell asleep for a few hours, and when he awakened they were just crossing into South Carolina. He stared out the window, watching the steep change of grade, the gray sky flat overhead. He started thinking back to the cancer and his fear of death, but nothing compared to the stark, unyielding terror he felt over not knowing where his daughter was. And yet he felt every bit as scared to find her. If she was alright, she wouldn't be all that happy to see that he'd made a complete recovery. In her mind, he'd be the cheap f.u.c.king coward who'd skated out of town right on time, right after her mother had died, just in time to get out of dealing with anything at all. And who could blame her? He'd brought her into this world with a woman he had not loved, and, because of his selfishness and self absorption had been incapable of giving her the love, care, and devotion a child desperately needed.
There came a time, he knew now, when the hopes and dreams of youth faded away, and a man was left with the truth of what he has done and who he has become. There came a time when a man had to start telling the truth or keep on lying.
Robert Lieber resolved to tell his daughter the truth. All of it.
He began in a little town outside Asheville, and started with Grady's mother. She didn't know anything, but agreed to take him to everyone who'd ever known her daughter. The people were surprisingly pleasant, but none of them were much help.
During this time he stayed with Martha, Grady's mother. She seemed a nice woman, if sad. There seemed to be no leads.
Then on his second week in town, he caught a break. He was sitting on the porch, trying to read the morning paper. Shortly after Martha left for work, a girl Martha had led him to and who had sworn she had no clue about anything to do with Grady, visited him. When she pulled up in an old, rusted Camaro, she got out, s.h.i.+elded her eyes from the sun. ”Mr. Lieber? Can I talk to you?”
He folded the paper up, leaned forward. ”What's up, Carla?”
”You think your daughter's with her, right?”
”I hope she is. If she's not, then I really have no other lead to follow.”
”I couldn't tell you this in front of Martha, Mr. Lieber, but-”
”Oh, G.o.d, please, Carla, please tell me.”
”You see, Grady hates her mom, says she committed a sin of omission, so I know she wouldn't want her to know where she is. But I've felt bad, because you aren't a part of this place's drama. You're just trying to find your girl.”
Carla turned, walked under the shade of the oak tree bordering Martha's property. She stared at the ground. Robert held his breath.