“Could you tell me who you believe signed your name to those adoption papers?”
I set the paper down on the table and looked over at Penelope. She wasn’t the only one who’d lost something in all of this. She wasn’t the only one who would be forced to make a few difficult decisions as we continued to fight this out. She wasn’t the only victim of someone else’s lies.
“My mother.”
*****
The judge left the courtroom a few minutes later, promising to have a decision in fifteen minutes. I got up and walked to the side of the room, tugging my cellphone out of my pocket.
“Did you know?” I demanded the moment the line was answered on the other end.
“Know what?”
“I saw the papers. I saw the signature.”
“Harry…”
“Did you know it was Mom who signed my rights away?”
Libby hesitated and I felt betrayal wash over me like a heavy, oily mess. She had known.
“How long?”
“I didn’t know for sure. But when you told me about JT, I remembered something Mom had said just after Daddy’s funeral. Something about how glad she was that you didn’t have any complications, or else she and I might have been lost. It seemed odd at the time and I tried to ask her about it, but she refused to elaborate.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because there was no point. I had no proof. And you were so ready to blame Daddy—“
“You should have told me, Libby. I had a right to know.”
“And now you do. Does it change the situation? Does it make it any better or any worse for JT or his sister? It doesn’t, Harrison. The only thing it changes is that you can’t keep blaming Daddy for every little thing that went wrong in your life.”
“Fuck you, Libby.”
I disconnected the call and thought seriously about throwing the phone against the wall. I couldn’t believe my mother would do this to me. My beautiful, innocent mother. Was she ever as innocent in all of my father’s schemes as I had always assumed? Or was she the mastermind behind them all? What else had she done to control me, to change the course of my life? What else had she hidden from me?
“I want to tell him.”
I turned, bitter words on the tip of my tongue until I found myself face to face with Penelope.
“No matter how this turns out, it’s clear that you have no intention of backing off. So I want to be the one to tell JT the truth.”
“Of course,” I said.
“He doesn’t know yet. I was going to take him out of school, but I didn’t want to disrupt things any more than I had to.”
“I quit my job there. I thought it might make things easier.”
A cloud crossed her face, but she didn’t give it voice. She looked away briefly, chewing on that bottom lip in a way that made me want to pull her close to me, that made me want to replace her teeth with my own. I leaned back against the cool wall and cleared my throat, trying to clear my mind of my thoughts.
“I only want what’s best for JT,” she said softly.
“So do I.”
“Then how can you—“
She stopped before she finished her thought. She nodded a little crazily, her hair falling over her face. I slid my hands in my pockets to keep from reaching over and brushing her hair away, from freeing her beautiful face for my gaze.
“I never meant for it to go this way, Penelope. I hope you know that.”
“I don’t. But it turns out I knew very little about you.”
“We can change that.”
She shook her head. “I think it’s too late for niceties.”
A door crashed to a close, announcing the judge’s return. Penelope strode off, the tension back in her shoulders.
I walked back to the table where my lawyer waited and watched the ceremony of the court play itself out once again. We took our seats and the judge leaned forward, his eyes moving first to Penelope, then to me.
“This is a highly unusual case,” he began. “Normally when an adoption is found to be invalid, the child is immediately returned to the custody of the biological parents. However, the child in question here is fifteen. For that reason, I think it would be best to proceed with a little more caution. Therefore, I am issuing an injunction against the custody order.”
Penelope hissed, a relieved sigh slipping from her pursed lips.
“However,” the judge continued as he glanced at her, “I am ordering that the biological father be allowed visitation with the child. And I want all parties back in this courtroom next week, along with the child, so that I can get a better picture of the situation.”
Visitation. What the hell did that mean?
My lawyer grabbed my wrist, clearly sensing my need for clarification. The judge got up and walked away as Penelope’s lawyer whispered furiously in her ear. My lawyer leaned close to do the same.