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“I’m Chase,” he said.
I nodded and tried to smile. “My mistake.” I turned and left in a cacophony of monkey screams. The door didn’t shut all the way behind me. From inside, Ariel caught it and stuck her head out to talk to a guy sitting at the table outside.
“Break is up in ten. Also, your cousin just bent metal in front of me with one hand—one freaking hand. If that’s how he flirts, tell him it’s scary and that I get off at nine.” She paused, eyeing his hands. “Do you think you could...?” When he didn’t respond, she shook herself. “Forget it.”
I didn’t watch her leave, but the guy did with the kind of smile that said he’d be trying to bend metal with his hands in the very near future. The hairs on my arms stood on end as I watched him return his attention to his phone.
It wasn’t just the cleft chin or the sprinkling of red in his otherwise brown hair. It wasn’t the way his brow lifted higher on the left than the right in response to whatever he was reading on his phone, or the height he couldn’t conceal even sitting down. It was all of that and nothing. I knew him. Forty-seven percent shared DNA slammed into me, and I couldn’t find a breath to say even that tiny word of denial. I was twenty feet from my brother. My brother. He was my brother. I couldn’t doubt it for a single second more. Dad had had an affair. He’d cheated on Mom and had a kid—this kid—guy—the one who looked so much like Dad that I couldn’t blink, much less turn my head away from him.
I stopped beside his table, waiting for him to look up. “Brandon?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m Dana.”
Chapter 8 (#u6a963fff-0fd4-5720-87cf-eb6ead14ac17)
Brandon recovered from his initial confusion quickly, returning my bleak stare with a smile. “Oh, hey.” He stood up right away, considered extending his hand but moved his drink to his side of the table instead. “I didn’t realize you were going to come right away.” He indicated the chair across from him, but I couldn’t sit or even move. My skin prickled, waiting for him to see me and know, to make the connection the way I instantly had. But he didn’t. He sat there, still smiling Dad’s smile. “Like I said in the email, I don’t think I’ll be able to help your dad, but whatever you want to know.” He spread his hands. His smile started to slip the longer I stared at him. “Wow, I’m sorry. I guess this was kind of a big letdown.”
“Dennis Fields,” I said, my eyes unblinking. “We don’t know who his birth parents were, but that’s the name his first foster family gave him.”
Brandon slowly shook his head. “Doesn’t sound familiar.” He paused. “Are you okay? You look a little...”
I was shaking. I could feel the blood draining from my face, and there was a buzzing growing in my ears. I’d never fainted before in my life, but I knew I was seconds from blacking out. I gripped the back of the chair, locking my elbows to keep me upright.
“You wanna sit? I really think you should sit.” He moved to pull the chair out for me, and I lowered myself into it as he returned to his. Both our arms rose in tandem to rest on the metal bistro table. The movement was identical, and for a heartbeat, he froze too. Then he looked at my face, really looked at it. “Do I know you from somewhere?”
“Do you?” My blinking was now sporadic, and apart from my lips, my eyelids seemed to be the only part of me still capable of moving. I watched a pink flush creep up his neck, but then it stopped and started to recede.
“No, I guess not. I mean, how could I? Eighteen is a little young to be a grandfather.” He tried to laugh but saw how incapable I was of joining him and sobered. “I’m really sorry I’m not him.”
“It’s a mistake,” I said, my voice echoing in my head.
“Don’t worry about it,” Brandon said. “I’m sure those DNA places mess up all the time, right?”
Right. A screwup. A mistake, that’s all. Earlier I’d been confident I’d reach the same conclusion as soon as I saw Brandon—it was why I’d rushed over. But I knew—I knew—even if he didn’t, that there was no mistaking who he was.
Sitting, I was still shaking, but the dizzy light-headedness was dissipating. “I needed you to be someone else,” I whispered. “I don’t know what to do.” It felt like a huge confession to be making, especially to him.
“Well, hey, you’re welcome to take a look at my family tree, but honestly, I know you won’t find anything. The McCormick line is extremely well documented.”
But you’re not a McCormick, I thought. You’re a Fields, just like me. My hands covered my mouth, but they couldn’t contain the sudden full-body sob that choked free. Brandon drew back in his chair, as far as it would let him, but I couldn’t stop, and when Brandon came around to pat me on the back in an awkward gesture, I cried harder.
“I’m sorry,” I said, leaning away from his touch. I needed to leave, to get away from him and everything that reminded me of Dad. I pushed back my chair and stood.
“Don’t give up, okay? Just ’cause I’m a dead end, doesn’t mean the next one will be. I’m sure you’ll find what you’re looking for.”
“I don’t want to find anything else.” The words tore out of me, my throat trying to choke them back along with the sobs I was holding in. Brandon was right in front of me, and something made him move back, frowning just a little. His gaze moved slowly across my face. Taking in the slightly squared jaw and full bottom lip, the dark hair that sparked copper in the fading sunlight, just like his. And it stopped. In that moment, I wasn’t sure if I wanted him to see the connection or not. If he saw it, I wouldn’t be alone—and I had never felt more alone in my life—but then he’d feel like me too, stripped and cored and irrevocably severed from the thing that made me me: my family. It was gone—worse, it had never been.
I looked back at Brandon, not seeing the knife that cut me or the cliff I’d been hurled from. I saw my brother. I had no concept of what that word meant; I only knew instinctively that I didn’t want to hurt him.
He backed up again, swallowing. “You—”
I broke the stare, brought my gaze down to where he’d inadvertently kicked over my bag, spilling its contents everywhere. I dropped to my knees, grabbing keys and sunglasses, reaching for a tube of lip balm that was rolling away. Brandon knelt too, but he wasn’t handing me an errant pack of gum. The top of the paper I’d stuffed inside had unfolded, the DNA Detective logo clearly visible. “Don’t!” But it was too late. Brandon was already pulling it free from my bag, his eyes scanning. And then they stopped.
His name. Forty-seven percent shared DNA. Relationship prediction: father or son. It took half a second, and he could never go back, never not know. I felt just as alone watching him, seeing the page tremble in his hands, except worse, because I was the reason he knew.
“What is this?” he asked, but he knew. The way he’d looked at me... His eyes rose to meet mine. His lips kept pressing together, opening for a breath, then closing again when I didn’t answer. I didn’t want to say it, to make it more real than it already was. “You said grandfather.” His eyes were wide, like he was pleading with me. I was silently pleading with him just as much.
“I didn’t want to believe it either, but you...”
Brandon’s eyes narrowed at me.
It came out in a whisper. “You look like him.”
He shot to his feet. “Bull. Shit.”
I wanted his conviction so badly that I reached for him. “How can you be his son? My parents are happy. They’ve always been happy. I don’t understand how you—”
The muscles in his neck and arms were clenched tight, but he was making an effort to control himself. He didn’t yell. “You said grandfather.”
“I didn’t know how old you were. I hadn’t seen...you.”
“Then it’s a mistake.”
Except it wasn’t. Seeing him, I knew it wasn’t. We both did.
“My dad is... And my mom never...”
“Mine neither,” I said.
His movements were jerky as he crumpled the paper into a tight ball. “I’m not your brother, okay? I can’t be. It’s a mistake. I’m sure if you talk to your dad or the website, you can figure it out, but I’m not your guy, so...”
I tried to match the calm tone he was striving for, but I could hear the desperation strangling my voice. “My parents have been married for more than twenty years, but we’re not even a year apart in age, which means...” I couldn’t say it out loud. The idea that Dad had had an affair was unbearable.
“It’s not possible.” His lips were barely moving, but I heard him perfectly. “My father is Brandon McCormick Jr. His father was Brandon McCormick Sr. His father was David McCormick V. I can go back another ten generations if you want. I know their names and their families. Dennis Fields—” he practically spit Dad’s name “—is nothing to me.”
In that moment, he felt like nothing to me too. I wanted to cry for Mom and Selena. I wanted to cry for our family. I wanted to cry for everything that had been stripped away from me in an instant, for the brother I’d never known who was looking at me with fear-mingled contempt. “I’m sorry.”
“Are you? Is that why you showed up like this and tried to tell me my mom slept with your dad?”
“No.” Tears stung my eyes. “You weren’t supposed to be him. I was supposed to see you and know. I was supposed to be able to go home and not feel like my whole life has been a lie.”
He took a couple steps backward. I panicked and grabbed his arm.
“Wait, please. I didn’t know. I came because I needed it not to be true. You’re the only other person who knows, and I—Please don’t go.” I forced myself to release him. I had to calm down, to think. “I can’t go back home and forget you aren’t...who you are. I can’t look at my dad and pretend he didn’t have an affair.” The word hurt to say. “I don’t even know if he knows you exist.” Brandon hadn’t moved, but he was pulling farther away, shutting down with each thing I said. I started nodding before I spoke. “Okay, okay,” I said. “Everything—” my chin quivered “—hurts. Talking, breathing.” Looking at him. “I’m going. I’ll come back when—”
“No.”
I started, both at the word and the flat tone. “Then I’ll message you.”
“No. Don’t come here. Don’t message me. Don’t anything.”
“But...you’re my brother.”
His hard-won composure threatened to snap, but he didn’t deny it.
“Okay,” I said. Neither of us moved. “Will you...when you’re ready?”
He looked at the crumpled paper still clutched in his fist. “No. It doesn’t matter.”
My eyes bulged as I leaned forward. “It doesn’t matter? How can you say that?” The fear and anger I understood—they were both still roiling under my skin—but indifference played no part in my emotions, and I didn’t believe it did for him either. “How can you look at your mom and not scream?”
“I don’t have to,” he said. “She’s dead.”
Chapter 9 (#u6a963fff-0fd4-5720-87cf-eb6ead14ac17)
Brandon didn’t look back as he went inside, and I walked slowly to my car, only to stop in the act of unlocking my door. Where was I supposed to go? Back home so I could watch my parents cuddle on the couch? I couldn’t make Brandon exhume a past that was truly buried in his case, but neither could I ignore what had already been dug up.
I dropped my forehead on the hood and let the sunbaked heat from the metal seep into me, but it couldn’t thaw the ice inside. I couldn’t face Dad or Mom. I looked at my phone, but I couldn’t call Selena and do to her what I’d inadvertently done to Brandon, my brother. That word crashed horrifically into my heart. I had a brother. I could almost have been happy about that, except it meant Dad had committed adultery. He’d cheated on Mom.
I didn’t understand it. How could he have cheated on Mom? How could he have had another child? How could they still be together, happy? Did he know about Brandon? Did anyone? Had Dad loved Brandon’s mom? Had he planned on leaving Mom for her? Did he know she’d died? When did she die? Brandon was as devastated by the DNA test results as I was, but who else knew? Just his mom? Her husband? Dad? Mom? Did Selena know? I dismissed that thought immediately. She would never have helped me test Dad if she thought it might lead to this.
I turned around and gazed at the darkening sky. At home we’d be getting ready for dinner. Mom cooked occasionally, but Dad usually ran the kitchen. Lasagna, I decided. He made that every week, and we were due. There’d be a salad and maybe ice cream after that. My eyes flooded, blurring the sky overhead.
“Hey, Dana, wait up.”
My head snapped straight and I saw the guy from Jungle Juice—Chase, the wrong McCormick. He’d ditched his uniform polo shirt, revealing a plain white T beneath it. He didn’t look pissed, like he was coming to add to his cousin’s stay-away warning. Instead he glanced at the tall foam cup in his hand before jogging toward me. He slowed when he saw my face, but he didn’t stop. I was very obviously crying, so I didn’t rush to wipe the tears from my cheeks as he drew nearer. What did it matter if he saw me cry? What did any of it matter?
“This seemed like a good idea from across the parking lot.”
“What?” I asked, only half seeing Chase and not caring even that much. He held out his cup and an unopened straw.
“Might help the low blood sugar.”
I looked at the drink, then at him.
“You looked like you were ready to pass out when you left,” he said, not lowering the drink. “Take it—make one of us feel better.”
I took the cup and automatically ripped off the straw’s wrapper before I jabbed it in to take a sip. The drink was fruity and cold, adding to the numbness I felt inside. My gaze went past Chase to Jungle Juice. Brandon was hidden inside. My breath hitched.
“So did you find who you were looking for?”
“No.” What I’d found was so much worse. My eyes pricked again. “I was supposed to be meeting my grandfather for the first time. Turns out I got some bad information.”
“Oh, wow. That sucks.”
There was something about him being a complete stranger that made it harder to lie, so I didn’t. “It really does.” I brushed away the last of my tears. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do anymore.” I was frozen, stuck. I couldn’t go back, and without Brandon’s help, I couldn’t go forward. I couldn’t even leave the parking lot.
Chase’s gaze lingered on me, like he was considering something. I must have looked pretty unstable. “I’m fine. I just needed a minute to...” I stopped. I couldn’t sell fine with my red eyes and damp cheeks. “Thank you for the smoothie—that was nice of you. I will be fine. You don’t have to stay or anything.”
He glanced down at the keys he withdrew from his pocket. “I didn’t have the greatest day either, and I was thinking about doing something—” he huffed out a sound somewhere between a laugh and a breath “—the opposite of crying in a parking lot.” His gaze rose to mine and held. “You should come with me.”
That was the last thing I’d expected him to say. I stared at him, and then an unguarded laugh overtook me. “I can’t believe you just said that.”
“Which part?”
I shook my head slightly. “All of it.” I couldn’t get my brain to work right after that conversation with Brandon. And in that moment, I didn’t really want it to. “You’re serious?”
His answer was immediate. “Yeah.”
“Where?”
He smiled.
* * *
I parked my car beside Chase’s, sent a text to Mom that I was hanging out with Jessalyn, got out and looked at the location I’d followed him to.
We’d driven no more than ten miles from Jungle Juice to an area that looked like it might have once been a nice neighborhood but had long since deteriorated due to neglect. The highlights consisted of a strip mall, empty save for a single payday-advance place, and a seemingly abandoned gas station on the corner covered in graffiti. Chase and I were in the parking lot of a six-story tan brick building flanked on either side by empty lots overgrown with weeds so tall they would have reached my waist.
There wasn’t a single person in sight and I hadn’t seen a car drive past since we pulled up. It wasn’t full dark out yet, or I’d have already been back in my car. As it was, I kept my phone in my hand and my car between me and Chase, just in case.
“What is this?”
“This,” he said, “is the Desert Breeze apartment building, and it’s scheduled for demolition in two weeks.” He nodded his chin toward a white sign covered in warnings like Condemned and Do Not Enter in big bold letters and stared at the building like he was seeing a lot more than I was.
“What exactly are we supposed to be doing here?”
“I used to live here a long time ago. It’s empty and they’re blowing it up, so it doesn’t matter, but this was the last place I saw my dad before he took off, and smashing it is the closest I’ll ever get to—” He inhaled through his nose, paused, then looked at me. “I figured you might need to break something too.” Then he sighed. “I didn’t really think this through. I don’t have anything to use to even break a window.”
I let my gaze drift back to the building, taking in the caution tape and the boarded-up windows. I slipped my phone back into my pocket, then headed to the trunk of my car. I popped it open and pulled out a wooden baseball bat.
Chase watched me the whole time, not smiling exactly, but something close to it. “You keep a bat in your trunk?”
“I keep multiple bats in my trunk.” I offered him the wooden bat. “This one’s for you.” Then I pulled out another. “So which window looks good?”
Getting in didn’t turn out to be a problem. There was a garden-level unit with large—for me and possibly somewhat tight for Chase—windows that were no match for my bat. At that first tinkling sound of breaking glass, I felt shockingly alive, and even more shockingly detached from anything having to do with my family.
After kicking out the remaining shards, Chase slipped through the broken window first. As I’d guessed, it was a tight fit around his shoulders, and he did get cut a little on one arm, but when he looked back at me, I followed him without hesitating. I didn’t get sliced—unlike him, I wasn’t built like a superhero—but the feel of Chase’s hands on either side of my waist helping me down was unexpectedly jarring on the bare skin below my slightly bunched up shirt. His hands didn’t linger, though, and neither did my sudden awareness of him.
There was no power, which meant no lights, so we used our phones to see. The glass crunched under our feet as we crossed the dark room and entered the hall. Chase led us up four flights of stairs and down another hall until we stood in front of a door that no longer had a number on it.
“This was yours.” I wasn’t asking a question, just saying something to break him out of his stare.
“Yeah.” He reached for the doorknob, but it didn’t turn.
“Good thing we don’t need a key, huh?” I tapped the door with my bat, reminding Chase of the one he held in his hand.
