I set her up in the farm manager’s mini-farm and she promptly began settling in, having her belongings shipped from the west coast. The male farm hands had no problem with her. Indeed, she was single and certainly eye candy, but hey recognized immediately that she knew what she was doing, and that earned her their loyalty and support. I couldn’t have been more thrilled. I began to take days off from time to time to see how she’d do when I wasn’t there, and often found she made better decisions than I might have.
It was no wonder my prowess had been compromised, however. Learning that my long-lost son had been living next door, yet clearly held such resentment was very hard on me. A mother’s instincts are not lessened by her children growing older. If anything, they’ve escaped the parameters of observation, and I found myself worrying all the more.
I hadn’t gotten any opportunity to talk to Liane at all. Now she would be a part of our family, and the lack of normalcy of our situation was disturbing. I tried to talk to Worth about it, but he seemed angry and withdrawn over the entire mess. I let him be. Pushing him always resulted in some sort of revolt among the LaViere men, both Worth and my son, “Hawk” included. It pained me that he had given up the connection to my family name, but it was his choice.
From a mother’s point of view, I understood why he felt abandoned. In the light of reality, he had been. A mother tends to forget the crime committed and remember only the punishment. After a time, it seems over-reactive and unjust. Bernie, although I knew he had loved Hawk in his own way, had made a poor substitute for a full set of parents. Well, the set of parents we should have been.
In retrospect, we should have never sent them out of the country. In doing so, he had magnified the crime, and there was no resolution short of imprisonment for Bernie, a man who knowingly kidnapped a minor under judge’s orders.
Would it have meant Hawk’s survival? Who could say? I knew it seemed the only solution at the moment, but in hindsight, dozens of possibilities could have been chosen.
God, the guilt wanted to eat me alive. I knew I hadn’t done my best job at being a parent. I had been horribly selfish. I had wanted things tied up with a neat bow so I could go back to my life. I had wanted to do the things that interested me and let someone else make the sacrifices of parenthood.
That’s when I realized the horrible truth. I had become my mother.
I was exactly like the woman I had resented and later despised. It had all come full circle. The realization stunned me, and I actually became ill for a few days. My head ached, and I felt as though I had the flu. I kept to our room, and although Worth kept insisting I see a doctor, I declined. I knew what was wrong with me. It was a big case of old-fashioned guilt. The only cure was to face it and deal with its reality — and to make sure that I changed my ways from that point forward.
I called Dad, and we talked at length about what happened. While he was thrilled that his grandson was back, I think he also felt guilt at what had taken place. He held himself accountable for Hawk, just as he had for Mother.
The world was made up of many people, and although Worth’s science broke them into types, I thought they were more like mutts. A little of one breed, or quality, and some of another. Some came out wonderfully, inheriting the best traits of the lineage while others seemed to take the garbage left over and had to do the best they could with that. Did that make one life worth more than another?
Those who inherited the good traits wanted to believe so. My mother was one of those, and now I realize, I probably was as well. We grew up having everything given to us and expected that would always happen. When life served up a different meal, we refused it; denied it had been given to us. We continued to live in our selfish fishbowl and believed that just because we willed it so, it was. Well, it wasn’t.
Nor could I continue to blame everything on the LaViere blood. While it was the easiest thing to do, wasn’t that once again putting myself into a selfish fishbowl? Wasn’t I disavowing that I’d contributed to his mess in some way? At the very least that my genetics had encouraged the selfish evil that dominated the LaViere heritage? After all, Worth’s father had committed the atrocities of deliberate murder, cheating, manipulation, abandonment, abuse, and control. Wasn’t Worth simply dealing with the aftermath of his father’s obliteration of the family name? Was Hawk dealing with our legacy in the same sense?
The answer came in a surprising form. I was still keeping to my room, spending hours before the window watching the farm operate under Lily’s steady hand and wondering how I could ever come to terms with the mess I’d created. Letty came up to say I had company, but I told her to say I was in bed, ill and didn’t want to see anyone. This someone didn’t take no for an answer and pushed around Letty to enter my room.
Aggravated, I looked up to see Liane.
She was almost wraithlike in her pale form but had a head of lustrous hair that decried any ill health. “I know you’re not up to company,” she said, “but I hoped you might make an exception for me. After all, we are to become family.” After a moment’s consideration, I nodded. Perhaps my salvation had just forced her way into my bedroom. I asked Letty to bring us up some tea and sandwiches and pointed to a pair of wingbacks that faced the big window overlooking the farm.
Liane sat down, neatly crossing her ankles and smoothing out the fabric of her skirt. She looked quite like a school girl in a simple A-line skirt, a white blouse with Peter Pan collar, and a soft blue cardigan sweater with pearl buttons. She wore small pearl studs in her earlobes and a serviceable watch on her wrist. She smelled like summer sunshine, and her complexion was untouched by makeup. I felt like the headmistress at a boarding school when I took the other chair. Letty appeared with a tray and set it up between us.
“Shall I pour?” Liane asked, and I nodded assent. I could afford to be generous in my control at times, and right then, I believed that was one occasion where it might be advantageous. I corrected my mental thought process at that point, realizing I was practicing old habits.
“You know,” she began, “pouring tea is an age-old custom that generally falls to the woman of the house. It was her ceremonial acknowledgement and quite the tool for superiority. She had the sole option of determining the order of presentation, how it was presented and even whether some member in the room might be excluded. I appreciate the subtlety of your allowing me to pour, and I want you to know that I will never attempt to replace you. Not in your family and certainly not in Hawk’s life.”
I flinched at the use of his new nickname but recognized it was only one of the many things I might take exception to over the upcoming years. Despite her respectful little tale, Liane was letting me know that my role was changing. I was no longer the mother to a young Ford. He was an adult now and Liane would be taking on much of my former responsibilities for him.