“It's funny you should say that.” Her answer instantly convinced him. “What made you ask that?”
“I don't know. Just a feeling. The last time I saw you at the commission you nearly fainted. And it was just something you said yesterday that concerned me. I'm not sure that would be good news for you at this point. It would certainly lock you into your marriage with an abusive husband. Is that it then?” He looked disappointed but resigned as he asked her, and was surprised when she shook her head.
“No, I'm not pregnant. As a matter of fact, I'm unable to have children.” It was funny talking about things like that with him, but she felt incredibly comfortable with him. As she had with Greg when they met, but for different reasons, she felt completely at ease with Bill. And now that he knew about her situation with Jack, she trusted him implicitly with her secrets, and she knew instinctively that he wouldn't betray her.
“I'm sorry to hear that, Maddy,” he said at her admission to him, “I know that must be a great sorrow to you.”
“It is, or it was at least. But I don't have a right to complain. It happened by choice. I had my tubes tied, at Jack's request, when we got married. He didn't want more children.” Bill wanted to say that it was selfish of him, but he refrained from comment. “But something amazing happened yesterday,” she beamed at him over her glass of wine and it was hard for him to ignore how beautiful she was. She was like a ray of sunshine to him. For months he had been depressed over his wife's death, and he was still struggling with it. But every time he saw Maddy, he felt happy, and he cherished their friendship. He was flattered by the trust she put in him, and her openness in talking about things he suspected she talked to no one else about. And he wasn't mistaken.
“I can't stand the suspense,” he said as he waited. “What happened?”
“Well, I don't know if I should start at the beginning or the end.” She seemed to hesitate, and he laughed in anticipation. He could tell that it was something that had pleased her greatly.
“Start at the middle if you want, but just tell me!”
“All right, all right … maybe at the beginning. I'll try to do this quickly. When I was fifteen, I was already involved with Bobby Joe, whom I eventually married after graduation. He dumped me a couple of times, and one night I went to a party with another boy,” she hesitated then and frowned. Jack was right. Any way she told it, she sounded like a whore, and it was easy to figure out what Bill would think of her. She didn't want to make excuses to him, but as she looked at him, she was worried.
“What is it?”
“You're not going to think much of me when I tell you.” And it mattered to her. More than she had realized when she began her story, and she wondered if she should never have started.
“Let me be the judge of that. I think our friendship will survive it,” he said calmly.
“Your respect for me may not.” But she was willing to take the chance. She thought a lot of him and was willing to expose herself to him, in order to share this with him. “Anyway, I went out with someone else. And I shouldn't have, but I slept with him. He was very smooth, and handsome, and a nice kid. I wasn't in love with him, but I was lonely and confused, and flattered by his attention.”
“You don't have to defend it, Maddy,” he said softly, “it's okay. People do that. I'm a big boy, I can take it.” She smiled gratefully at him. It was a far cry from being called a slut and a whore, and poor white trash, by her husband.
“Thank you. That was confession number one. Confession number two is that I got pregnant. I was fifteen, and my father almost killed me for it. I didn't even figure it out till I was four months pregnant. I was young and pretty stupid, and it was too late to do anything about it. I was poor. I probably would have had to have it anyway, even if I'd figured it out sooner.”
“You had the baby?” He sounded startled, but not judgmental. There was a distinct difference, and she was acutely aware of it as she nodded.
“I had the baby. Although until yesterday, almost nobody knew that. I went to another town for five months, and I went to school there, and I had it. A little girl,” in spite of herself, tears filled her eyes as she said it. “I only saw her once, and they gave me a picture of her when I left the hospital. That's all I ever had of her, and eventually I even threw that away because I was afraid Jack would find it. I never told him. I put her up for adoption, and I went home, as though nothing had happened. Bobby Joe knew, but he didn't care, and we started going out again.”
“Was the baby's father involved at all?”
“No, I told him I was pregnant, but he didn't want any part of it. His parents owned a hardware store, and they thought we were trash, and I guess we were. They convinced him it was probably someone else's. I don't think he believed them, but he was too scared to go against them, and I hardly knew him. I called him when the baby was born, and he never returned my call. And three weeks later, he was killed in a head-on collision. I don't think he ever knew about the baby. I never knew who adopted her,” she went on a little breathlessly. Telling him was harder and more emotional than she had expected, and he took her hand in his own under the table, to give her courage. He still had no idea what was coming. He just thought it was something she felt she had to tell him. “In those days, adoption records were sealed, and there would have been no hope of finding out, so I never tried. I married Bobby Joe after I graduated, and eight years later, I left. We got divorced, and I married Jack. And I know it was wrong of me, but I never told him. I just couldn't. I was afraid he wouldn't love me if I told him,” she choked on her tears again, and the waiter waiting to take their order kept a discreet distance. “I never told him,” she repeated. “It was a piece of my past I never touched myself. I just couldn't bear to think about it.” There were tears in Bill's eyes as he listened. “And yesterday” she said, smiling through her tears, as they ran down her cheeks and she squeezed his hand, “she walked into my office.”
“Who?” He was afraid to say, although he could almost guess, but it seemed too extraordinary to be possible. Things like that only happened in books and movies.
“My daughter. Her name is Lizzie,” Maddy said proudly. “It took her three years to find me. The people who adopted her died within a year, and she wound up in a state orphanage in Knoxville, where I was living, and I never knew it. I thought she was happy then. I wish I'd known,” she said wistfully, but at least they had found each other now. That was all that mattered at this point. “She's been in foster homes for all these years, and she's nineteen years old now. She lives in Memphis. She goes to school and she works as a waitress, and she's just beautiful. Wait till you meet her!” Maddy said proudly. “We spent five hours together yesterday, and she went back to Memphis today, but I'm going to bring her back soon. I didn't say anything to her, but I'd like her to live here, if she wants to. I called her last night,” Maddy said, holding tightly to his hand, as her voice cracked completely, “she called me … Mom….” He squeezed her hand harder as she said it. It was an amazing story, and touched his heart.
“How on earth did she find you?” He was in awe of Maddy s honesty, and the outcome of the story. It was the proverbial happy ending.
“I'm not sure. She just kept looking. I think she went back to Gatlinburg, the town where she was born, to see if anyone remembered anything. She had my age on her birth certificate, and she went to the local schools, until she found a teacher who remembered. They told her my name was Madeleine Beaumont, and I guess they remembered. The amazing thing is that no one made the connection between that person and Maddy Hunter. But it's been nearly twenty years, and I guess there's not much similarity between the two. But she figured it out from watching me on the news. I've never talked publicly about my past much. There's not a lot to be proud of.” In fact, with Jack's help, she was profoundly ashamed of it.