Here Without You

I should be angry, but instead, I feel conflicted and relieved. What. The. Hell?

So then I think – maybe it’s biological. I’m a man and I’ve reproduced. Maybe there’s a sort of chest-beating satisfaction at the root of this. How fucking lame and archaic – I mean shit, seriously? On the heels of that thought is the knowledge that this same kid has turned Brooke Cameron into an ardent defender of motherhood – her own, of course – not the institution itself. But still. There must be some primitive impulse to blame.

Six hours later, I’m meeting with Dad to decide what to do next. Dropping into a seat across from him, I wait while he finishes a client email. His home office looks the same as it always has – a near-duplicate of his high-rise headquarters, but I haven’t given it a detailed survey in years.

He doesn’t meet with clients here, of course, so there’s no need for posturing – tasteful artwork, perfectly aligned legal books, smiling family photos. Accordingly, the only artwork hanging on the walls consists of a couple of repulsively gruesome war paintings he inherited from his parents, who died when I was too young to retain a memory of them. The built-ins behind him house a disordered arrangement of California and Federal criminal-law volumes, penal codes (the titles of which made me snigger as a ten-year-old), and thick tomes housing Supreme Court precedents. I thank fate once again for making me an actor, though at times I wonder how far apart my dad’s career and my own actually are.

On his cupboard is an array of framed photos – all turned to face his desk, as though he glances at them occasionally, or can if he decides to. The largest is my favourite of my parents on their wedding day. Next to it is Mom holding me the day I was born – she, fresh-faced and beautiful, and me, nothing but a cranky face the size of a grapefruit, encased in a tube of blue blankets. Another shows Mom and me on my first day of kindergarten, my backpack more like a giant shell on my back. She smiles down at me, her hand on my head, and I’m all teeth and big blue eyes, laughing straight into the camera.

While Dad taps at the keyboard, I rise and pick up the pewter frame. Looking closer, I mentally compare this photo to the one of River. Only a year older than he is now, I look much bigger. My clothes are new and expensive – a mirror image of what hip adolescents wore at the time, though at five, I couldn’t possibly have known or cared. My expression is far from solemn. Even so, I see him in my features. I see him, if he was cared for. And happier.

I didn’t want this, any of it, but it’s like I’m stuck on a track, and the train is coming, and there’s nothing I can do but accept the inevitable and try to mitigate the collateral damage.

‘All done,’ Dad says, and I set the photo back in its place and take a seat in front of his desk, leaning forward, elbows on knees, hands clasped. Mirroring the sensation I got walking between Brooke’s box towers a few days ago, the walls are closing in.

‘I don’t expect you to answer what I’m about to say right away, though we haven’t got the time to linger over decisions. You’ve said that Ms Cameron intends to adopt the child –’

‘River.’

‘River. Right.’ His pen scratches across the pad. ‘Do you know whether she intends to continue to live in LA? Or move back to Texas?’

‘She’s moving into a two-bedroom condo near the one she’s in now. I assume that means she plans to be here most of the time, if not all of the time.’

Pursing his lips, he taps his pen, staring at his handwritten notes. ‘My initial reaction was hope that I could extricate you from this situation, because this isn’t something for which you can serve a few weeks of community service or pay a fine, and then it’s all over.’

He leans up and our eyes lock – his dark, like Dori’s, and I wonder how long it’s been since he’s looked at me so directly. ‘I’m not going to lecture you about protection – I think you know these things, and you probably knew them then, but not well enough to be consistent. If anyone should be lectured, it’s me. Christ, you weren’t even fifteen when this happened.’ He runs a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair, his jaw locked. ‘The fact remains, you fathered a child, even if you were a child yourself at the time – and instead of living with settled adoptive parents, he’s presently in foster care, and it’s very likely he’ll be living with your unstable ex-girlfriend soon, minutes away.’

‘What are you saying, Dad?’

‘I’m saying … that if you relinquish your rights to him now, you may live to regret it.’

Okay. This day is full of unanticipated responses. I nod once and stare at my hands as he continues.

‘When you were born, I was petrified that I’d be a horrible father. Your grandfather was a hard man and he taught me nothing of paternal tenderness. I guess in many ways my fear came true – I made it true. But I never turned my back on you. I don’t have to look at you right now and try to explain why I signed away my rights to you. Giving up a baby for adoption is a good thing, almost always, in cases like yours and Brooke’s. What’s happened to the – to River – is virtually unheard of. It couldn’t have been foreseen, and there’s little use asking why or how it happened. All that matters is what we choose to do about it now. What you choose to do about it now – because I won’t make this choice for you. But I’ll stand by you, no matter what you decide.’

I close my eyes and will the walls to shift further apart so I can breathe. ‘Assuming I don’t sign the relinquishment, what happens?’

‘Three choices. One, you simply refuse to sign it, making the adoption more difficult for Brooke, but likely resulting in an eventual relinquishment by default. Two, join Brooke’s bid to adopt and request joint custody. Three, file for full custody. Considering the fact that you were fifteen when he was born, she knew you were the father, and no one saw fit to inform your legal guardians, a case could be made that you never legally relinquished your rights. She signed her rights away, with full parental consent. You signed nothing, and neither did we.’

Brooke will be furious no matter which of those I choose. I’m going to drive Dori away as soon as I spill this to her. And I could destroy my mother’s fragile sobriety.

‘What about Mom? What will this do to her?’

His mouth forms a grim line, and he’s silent for a moment. ‘I’ve grappled with that all day. I don’t know, Reid. She’s been going to meetings every day. She’s doing well. Better than I’ve seen her in a decade. But you and I know that upheavals like this …’

I drop my head in my hands, pulled in a million directions. ‘I know.’

Ever the attorney, he says, ‘I’ll have to consider how to best disclose it to her. That will be mine to handle, however. You have enough on your plate.’

17

BROOKE

My discussion with Janelle goes as predicted – she has a gradually mushrooming shit-fit, insisting that I should have told her about River long before now.

‘Why?’ I ask, sitting on the tan leather sofa across from her desk. Boasting an impressive view of Hollywood, Janelle’s new corner office is located several floors up from her original shoebox-sized cube with its parking-lot view.

‘So I could be prepared for things like this!’ she exclaims.

I roll my eyes. ‘And how exactly would you have prepared for this? I gave him up for adoption when I was sixteen, and never expected to see him again. If I couldn’t have “prepared” for this, how the hell would you?’

‘Fine.’ She spits her go-to I’ve-had-it-up-to-here word at me. ‘But I still think you should have told me.’

I offer an indolent one-shoulder shrug, which she hates. ‘Janelle, if you don’t know by now that there’s a load of crap you don’t know about me and never will – then we’ve got an even bigger problem.’

If the pen she’s holding was any thinner, she’d be holding two busted pen halves and a face full of ink. Her jaw clenches and she smiles tightly. ‘Is there anything else you do plan to tell me?’

Here we go – the reason for my in-person visit. ‘Well. Yes.’

Her eyes widen. ‘You look sheepish. I’ve never seen you look like this. I don’t like it. What –’ I watch as her quick brain connects the dots and her face pales. ‘Oh, no. Paper Oceans – you’re still going to do it, right? Brooke. Brooke – I’m too young and healthy to die of a heart attack, even if I want to!’

‘I’m sorry, Janelle. I just don’t see how I can.’

Her blanched face refills with pink from the bottom up, like someone is topping it off. ‘B-but you said Get me an audition for something powerful. You said Something like Monster, but where I don’t have to look ugly like Charlize. And I did it! I did it, Brooke. You were so upset when that Castleberry twit got the role. When she busted her ass – literally, hah-hah! – on that slope, it was like a miracle. You don’t turn down miracles in this business, Brooke!’

‘I can’t leave him. I can’t leave the process.’ I hold up a hand to forestall the comment forming on her tongue. ‘I’m not going to screw this up, Janelle.’

Like a boulder tumbling down a hill, nothing stops her. ‘But screwing up your career is no big deal?’ Her eyes bug and I hope she meant what she said about being too healthy to have a heart attack. ‘Can’t we just – we’ll get you an au pair! We’ll send them with you. Angelina hauls her brood all over the globe!’

Instantly sceptical – sure I’d read something about at-home and filming swap-offs – I ask, ‘She does?’

‘Hell, I don’t know – probably. Who cares – because you can!’

‘Um, no, I can’t. I’ll have just got placement of him. I can’t run off to Australia with him before the adoption is final.’

She’s so google-eyed that it makes my eyes water to look at her. ‘Look. Brooke. We haven’t heard from the studio yet – maybe something in your circumstances will change, and we won’t have to turn it down …’

‘Like – maybe the court will tell me I’d be the most screwed-up mother he could have, and toss me out on my ass?’

‘I don’t mean that …’

I narrow my gaze on her. ‘Have they called you yet? Because if you do anything even remotely resembling an attempt to keep him from me just so I will do Paper Oceans, I will fire you so fast you’ll be embers.’

She blinks multiple times and then darts her eyes away, tugging at her suit jacket and harrumphing. ‘I’m supposed to call someone back tomorrow, actually, and of course I wouldn’t do … that … to you.’

Seeing Janelle in person was definitely the right move.

‘I know you wouldn’t, Janelle.’ I smile sweetly, my tone conciliatory, with a touch of my native drawl. ‘I didn’t mean to accuse you. I know you would never do anything to hurt me.’