Finding Cassidy (13 page)

The corners of Jason’s lips tipped up ever so slightly. “Like we need a bedroom.”

I grinned back. “My thought exactly.”

Dinner was late that night. By the time Dad got home from city hall, Mom got home from Grace Notes and my grandparents returned from sightseeing, it was almost seven. We ordered Chinese food, which arrived at the same time Quinn did. She was thrilled. Obviously she still loved Chinese food.

“When you log on, you have to identify yourself so people know you’re there.” Quinn took one last bite of kung pao vegetables, put the carton on the floor and rested the keyboard on her legs. We’d shoved two chairs together in front of my computer screen, and we were close enough that I could smell the baby-powder scent of her deodorant. She’d worn the same thing since grade six. It reminded me of laughter and sleepovers. “Your chat-room name is FlyinBird.” She
typed in my name. “That way when people answer, you’ll be Hi FlyinBird.” She grinned. “Cool, huh?”

Nodding, I chomped down a snow pea and stared at the computer screen. Somebody named Velcrobaby was chatting about her donor father.
And it’s soooo kewl to see how alike we R,
I read.
Same nose, same legs, and he’s Greek!!!!!!! which explains why I’ve always wanted 2 go there.

Good thing he doesn’t live in Hackensack,
joked someone named Traniguy.

Ha, ha,
said Velcrobaby.
That is so not
)))))!

Hi FlyinBird.
This from someone called PinkBunnie.

Quinn handed me the keyboard. “Go,” she said impatiently.

Hi,
I typed back.

So,
said PinkBunnie.
How was the dentist?

I looked at Quinn. She shrugged. “I had to make up some excuse for signing off so fast yesterday,” she said.

Fine,
I typed.

Velcrobaby answered.
U were gonna tell us about ur search 4 ur father.

I hesitated. Quinn jabbed me. “You want information, you gotta be prepared to share,” she said. “Besides, it’s anonymous.”

Anonymous.
I hated that word.
The clinic wouldn’t
tell me anything,
I typed.
The donor signed a confidentiality agreement. So did my mom.

That sucks.
PinkBunnie

Us sperm babies, we have no rights.
This came from someone called QTGYRL.
In Sweden and Austria, donor offspring have the right to trace their fathers. But in North America, it depends on the law in your state or province.

It’s 2 crummy 4 words.
Velcrobaby.

There are ways around that.
Traniguy.

How?
I typed.

Traniguy:
If the clinic kept records, your mom can petition for his name. She can get a lawyer and claim she signed under duress.

It worked for my mom,
said Velcrobaby.

My heart jumped.

Didn’t work for mine,
wrote someone called CatWonderClaw.

My heart fell.

But be prepared,
wrote Traniguy.
If the guy doesn’t want to be found and you manage to find him, he may not be happy.

Quinn clucked in disgust. “Maybe he should have thought of that seventeen years ago.”

“No kidding.” My self-righteous feeling quickly dissolved. “But what if he does get mad?”

“You’re not asking the guy to adopt you and buy
you a place in the Hamptons,” Quinn retorted. “You just want some information.”

Information I was entitled to.
I just want information,
I wrote.
What else can I try?

G
et copies of the original forms,
suggested Traniguy.
Sometimes you can find clues about where the guy lived or worked, or even relative names.

PinkBunnie:
And don’t give up if the names are blacked out, ‘cause this girl in Colorado took a blackedout form to a lab and got them to lift a ton of info from underneath. She traced the guy that way.

“Cool,” I murmured. “I never would have thought of that.”

Quinn grinned and grabbed two egg rolls from the takeout carton. “I told you this was a good idea
.”
She handed me one.

We munched companionably and watched the words flow across the screen.

The thing is,
wrote QTGYRL
, a long time ago some clinics mixed sperm up, kind of like a milkshake, so it was impossible to tell whose sperm hit the bullseye.

A milkshake? “Gross!”

Quinn wrinkled her nose. “No kidding.”

That’s why I’m fighting for the rights of donor offspring,
QTGYRL continued.
There’s a petition on my website. You should join us, FlyinBird.

I didn’t respond to that. Instead I wrote,
What about genetic history? Doesn’t the law say they have to keep those kinds of records?

Nope,
said QTGYRL.
The new clinics screen, but they didn’t always do that in the past.

I’m still searching for my father, and I’d like to find my halfsibs too,
said PinkBunnie.
It’ll be a place to belong. I don’t belong in my own family.

Most DI kids feel that way,
said Traniguy.
I know I did.

I wasn’t alone!

Register ur DNA,
said Velcrobaby.
So far I’ve found 19 half-siblings.

I practically choked on a beansprout. “Nineteen,” I finally managed to whisper. I could have that many half-siblings out there, too.

“DNA,” Quinn whispered back.

“Why are we whispering?”

“No clue.” Her too-loud voice was followed by high-pitched laughter.

Registering is so easy,
said CatWonder-Claw.

The only time I’d heard of DNA being used was in murder trials. And, in spite of my fury toward my parents, I didn’t plan on murdering them any time soon. I finished my egg roll, wiped my fingers on a napkin.

It’s a great way to find siblings and see similarities.
Traniguy.

And to avoid sleeping with your half-brother. As long as he’s registered too. Too bad mine wasn’t.
CatWonderClaw.

No way.

Quinn shot me a quick, incredulous glance. “Holy crap, is that disgusting or what?”

“It’s worse than disgusting.” Horrified, we both stared at the screen.

How did you find out?
PinkBunnie.

I knew I was a DI kid but he didn’t,
said CatWonderClaw.
When we got engaged my mom was worried, so she talked to his mom and it turned out they’d used the same Florida clinic.

My heart hammered in my chest.

Velcrobaby:
Ur luckee u didn’t get pregnant.

Jason used a condom. I wasn’t pregnant.

And he wasn’t my half-brother, either.

He wasn’t.

But Brynna’s words scrolled across my mental hard drive.
You guys look so much alike. You’d make beautiful babies together.
The hammering in my chest multiplied.

I’d’ve been luckier if his family had told him the truth years ago,
said CatWonderClaw.
Or if our mothers had used different clinics.

I remembered what Jason had said just the day before:
I couldn’t pick my old man out of a crowd.

A cold chill gripped me.

It wasn’t possible.

Oh yes, it was.

If I’d learned one thing lately, it was this: anything was possible. Even the unthinkable. And this certainly qualified. Jason didn’t remember his father. He’d practically told me that. But it was what he hadn’t told me that gave me the heebie-jeebies. He hadn’t told me the last time he’d seen his real father.

Maybe because he hadn’t been able to.

PinkBunnie:
You guys are kidding me, right?

CatWonderClaw:
Don’t I wish.

It happens.
Traniguy.

Suddenly finding my real father seemed less important than finding out Jason was
not
my half-brother.

“You should get your DNA on file,” Quinn said as she stared at the screen. “All you have to do is get your cheek scraped or give them hair samples or something.”

The words printed out on the screen in front of me.

DNA’s such a bother.

Not really.

Don’t take chances. What could be worse than falling in love with a half-sibling?

I stifled a groan.

Quinn stared at me. “What’s wrong?”

“My stomach hurts,” I mumbled. True enough. It was quaking at about eight on the Richter scale. It couldn’t be possible.
He has eyes just like yours.
Brynna had said that, too. “I don’t feel good.”

“Maybe you ate too much.”

I tried to answer, but the words on the screen silenced me.

It’s kinda creepy knowing you’ve slept with your halfsib,
said CatWonderClaw.

“Oh God,” I breathed. “Sign me off, okay?” I crawled over to the bed and collapsed.

Quinn logged off. “Should I get your mom?”

“No.” Before I could stop myself, I blurted, “I slept with Jason. Yesterday. For the first time.”

Quinn didn’t look surprised or disgusted or anything else I might have expected. She perched on the edge of the bed. “And this is a problem why?”

I couldn’t tell her. I lowered my eyes. It was too revolting for words.

“Didn’t you use anything?”

My head snapped back up. “Of course, we used something. I’m not stupid.”

She frowned. “Well, then, what?”

I still couldn’t voice my fears. I just stared at her, horrified by the thoughts racing through my head.

It didn’t take Quinn long to clue in. Her eyes widened. “You don’t think Jason is…” Her face twisted in disgust. “Your half-brother?”

Nodding, I grabbed my pillow and clutched it to my stomach.

“No way!”

I filled her in on the details of Jason’s family and the fact that he couldn’t remember his real father. I pointed out the obvious—that Jason and I looked similar. I wanted Quinn to tell me I was being stupid, to come up with a million reasons why it was impossible.

But she didn’t. “You have to tell him,” she said. “Give him a chance to prove it’s not true.”

I squeezed my pillow. “Jason hates all this donor stuff. He thinks I’m making way too big a deal out of it. He says it’s stupid to search for my real father. He thinks I’m overreacting.”

Quinn rolled her eyes. “Your whole world has been turned upside down. You’re entitled to overreact.”

“But if I tell him we might be half-siblings, he’ll totally freak.”

Quinn was silent.

“What would you do in my position?” I asked. “If you’d slept with Dean and you were in my exact position, what would you do?”

“I’d tell him,” Quinn said promptly. “And if he didn’t understand, I’d break up with him.”

I resisted the urge to throw my pillow at her. “You’re as self-righteous as ever.”

She had the grace to turn pink. “Okay, so maybe I wouldn’t break up with him.” She hesitated, tugged on her hair, considered. “But I wouldn’t stop my search. Somehow I’d need to prove we weren’t related.”

“How?”

She grimaced. “I don’t know.”

“I’m babysitting Pete next weekend,” I said. “I’ll snoop around and see what I can find out.”

Hawks strike when people aren’t looking, flying at 200 miles an hour, grabbing vicktems in big, huge claws and ripping them to death.

Cassidy MacLaughlin, Grade Four Science Project

A
re you sure that’s all there is?” Disappointed, I viewed the thin scattering of pictures on Pete’s kitchen table. There were eighteen images, and almost all of them were of Pete and Jason. It was enough to do the Mother’s Day craft for Pete’s mom but not enough to stop the tsunami of fear bubbling inside my head.

“That’s all Jason could find.” Pete leaned across the white table, grabbed a clown photograph and waved it in my face. “I remember this. My hair was really itchy under all that clown hair.” He giggled.

I checked the time on the clock. Jason would be
home soon. Between pizza and go-carting and needing to be at my house for dinner, the day had whizzed by. So had the last week. Jason had been out of commission for days. I’d gone flat out to catch up at school. I still hadn’t talked to Frank. Mom still hadn’t called the clinic. Things were not easy between us.

“Doesn’t your mom have other pictures?” I probed. “In a special spot somewhere?” Mother’s Day was over three weeks away, but it was a brilliant excuse to pull out pictures and do a collage.

Pete wrinkled his nose, gazed off into the distance. “She has this special box under her bed.” His face brightened. “Where she keeps school pictures and report cards and stuff like that.” He jumped off the chair and headed down the dark hall. “Let’s go look.”

The smell of stale coffee, cigarettes and cheap perfume hit me when Pete opened the door to Mrs. Perdue’s bedroom. An icky creepiness crept down my spine; Mrs. Perdue wouldn’t like this. I followed Pete inside. Ignoring the messy piles of clothes, books and overflowing ashtrays, I headed straight for the three photos standing on the bureau. Pete flicked up the fake-lace duvet cover and dove under the bed.

I stared at the pictures: Mrs. Perdue as a teenager (impossible, but true); a slightly older Mrs. Perdue
wearing a huge, floppy hat and standing arm in arm with a man; and Mrs. Perdue with a young Jason, an infant Pete and yet another man.

Two men I didn’t recognize. My heart yo-yo’d out of control. One of them
had
to be Jason’s father.

“Got it,” Pete yelled triumphantly as he emerged from under the bed holding a long, flat box.

“Good for you!” I pointed to the floppy-hat picture. “Who’s this guy?”

“My uncle David. He died before I was born,” he added matter-of-factly.

My heart slowed just a little.

“How about him?” I pointed to the second man in the group shot.

Pete giggled. “That’s our dad, silly! And that’s me, and that’s Jason and that’s Mom.”

My heart slowed to a slug crawl. I hadn’t recognized Pete’s father. I picked up the box and followed Pete back to the kitchen. “Is your dad Jason’s dad, too?” I wasn’t sure how much Pete knew. Even though I desperately needed information, I didn’t want to spill family secrets.

“Yep.” Pete scrambled onto a chair. “Only Jason had another dad a way long time ago, but he went away and my dad became his dad, so we have the same dad and the same mom.”

Pete knew.
Thank you, God.

I brushed the dust from the lid and opened the box. “Where’s Jason’s real—I mean, first dad?”

Pete pawed through a random collection of school papers and records and class photos. “Dunno.” He lifted a photo and smiled. “This was my kindergarten class. That was my bestest year ever.” His smile slipped; his brown eyes turned round and serious. “School’s gone into the toilet since then.”

I made sympathetic noises. “Aren’t there any pictures?” I probed. “Of Jason’s first father? Or of Jason when he was a baby?”

“Pro’ly not. Mom says she’s too busy living life to record it.”

Disappointment scalded the back of my throat. So much for finding a photograph. There had to be another way to prove Jason had a real, in-the-flesh father. “Have you met Jason’s first dad?”

“Nope.” His head was bent; his words were muffled. “Jason doesn’t remember him, either. I asked. But he said it didn’t matter ‘cause we had a dad we could share and that was better.”

Great. Another dead end.

Pete surfaced with a small red box. “Here’s where Mom keeps special things like birth certificates and stuff. Wanna see?” He opened it before I could answer.
“This is mine.” He held up a small square of white paper with pale blue writing. “Jason’s is here, too.” He dug around and pulled up a similar square.

I gave it a cursory glance.

Name:
Perdue, Jason Elijah

Birth Date:
June 19, 1988

It was like mine. And like mine, it didn’t have the names of parents. “Do you guys have passports?” I rifled through the box. Passports listed parents and next of kin. Yeah, so that kind of thing could be faked—I mean, mine listed Frank as my father—but it would have been
something.

“What’s a passport?”

And that pretty much answered that. I stifled a sigh. “I don’t think there’s anything here we can use,” I told Pete. For sure, there was nothing I could use.

As I slid Jason’s birth certificate into the box, my eyes fell on line three. Birth Place.

North Vancouver.

The last time I’d checked, North Vancouver was right beside West Vancouver, which was home to the infamous Cypress Hills Fertility Clinic.

“Holy shit.”

Pete chortled. “You said ‘shit,’ you said ‘shit’!”

Jason hadn’t told me he’d been born in North Vancouver.

But then, I hadn’t asked.

Until now it hadn’t mattered.

“Is holy shit the same as bullshit, or is holy shit the kind of shit you find in a church and bullshit is the kind of shit you find on farms?”

“Don’t say ‘shit,’ Pete.”

“You said it again.” More laughter.

There was only one way to make sure Jason wasn’t my half-sibling. Through DNA testing.

It was the only choice. I had to convince Jason.

Pete and I were watching TV when Jason came in with the familiar green and gold Finnelli’s bag tucked under his arm.

“Raspberry bombs!” Pete launched himself off the couch.

“Hey, how’s it going?” Jason leaned over to kiss me.

Half-brooother.
Like, no thanks. I turned my head. His kiss landed somewhere near my ear. Jason frowned; I pointed at Pete.

“Who cares?” He grabbed me, pulled me close. “It’s been days since I’ve seen you, never mind done this.” His mouth was warm and open, his lips coaxing. I responded instinctively, the way I always did, sliding under the bewitching Jason-spell. But then shame
flooded me. Feeling squirmy, I pulled back and fought the urge to wipe my hand across my mouth.

Thankfully, Pete demanded attention right then. He dragged Jason over to show him the collage we’d made.

Somehow I managed to act normal for the next hour or so. We snuggled on the couch, ate bakery leftovers and watched a video with Pete. It was like old times, except usually Jason and I couldn’t wait to get Pete to bed. Instead I fed Pete as many raspberry bombs as I could, hoping the sugar would keep him too hopped up to sleep.

Unfortunately, the kid was dead to the world by ten.

By eleven, Jason and I ran out of small talk and he was, well, proving my point that parents were stupid if they thought keeping us out of the bedroom was going to stop us from having sex. Because Jason, clearly, didn’t care where he did it. As long as he did it.

Sliding out from under his arm for about the twentieth time, I grabbed the remote and flicked madly from channel to channel. “Oh look,
Mrs. Doubtfire.
That was a great movie, don’cha think?”

He slid his hand under my shirt. I jumped like he’d lit a match under there.

He stared at me. “What is
wrong
with you?”

I wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I just have a lot on my mind, you know, with school and Frank and stuff.” And your dad, too.
Our dad, maybe.

“You need to relax.”

Before he could touch me again, I jumped up and paced. Or at least I tried to. But Jason’s living room was small and cluttered, and after three or four passes in front of the coffee table I sat back down and hunched into the corner, as far as possible from Jason. “The thing is…” I cleared my throat. “The thing is…I know you don’t like talking about it, but something’s come up…about my real father…and it…it could change our relationship.”

There. I’d said it. Sort of.

Jason narrowed his eyes, but not before I caught the flicker of annoyance. “How?”

How? If he was pissed off now, he’d be royally pissed in about thirty seconds. “Pete and I were talking about your father and—”

“He started talking, or you started asking questions?”

A flush crawled up my neck. “A bit of both, I guess. But Pete says you don’t remember meeting him.” I paused. “Did you ever meet him? Your real father?”

Impatiently, Jason flicked his hair off his forehead. “What does this have to do with me and you? How is our relationship going to change?”

He hadn’t answered my question.
I took a deep breath. “What if…what if…we’re related or something?” It was like dropping a giant monster I’d been hauling around on my shoulders. The pressure on me was less, but it was out in the open now, where it could hurt both of us.

“Pardon?”

“What if…you know…what if you were conceived this…way, too. We look alike. What if we’re kind of like related or something?”

His laugh startled me. “You’re kidding, right?”

My silence was my answer. The amusement faded from his face. A muscle twitched in the back of his jaw. “That’s ridiculous,” he said flatly.

I was finished with the subtle approach. The monster was in front of us—it was time to wrestle it to the ground. “No, it’s not. We look alike. People are always saying that. You were born in North Vancouver, which is close to the fertility clinic. You don’t remember your father. You don’t even have a
picture
of him. And you know what they say—it’s easy to be attracted to someone just like you.”

“There’s
no way
we’re related. You think I’d want to jump my
own sister’s
bones? That’s disgusting!”

“Ssssh.” Jason was practically yelling; I glanced nervously to the doorway, half expecting Pete to be
there. I didn’t want him waking up and hearing this.

“Never mind ssssshhh. I’ll yell if I want to.” Jason stormed over and shut the living-room door. “Cass, this whole thing is turning you into a major nutcase. We are not related. My mother never would have done something like that.”

My heart did a runaway dance at the twist of revulsion on his lips. “What do you mean?”

“I mean she…just wouldn’t.” It was his turn to search for words, to avoid my eyes. “It’s just not…not the thing normal people do. It’s…weird.”

I struggled for breath. “Are you saying my parents are weird?
I’m
weird?”

“No!” He reached for me but I shrank against the couch. “I mean, you’re acting weird and I wish you’d lighten up and put this out of your mind once in a while, but it doesn’t change the way I feel about you. That’s not it at all.”

“Then what is it?”

A thin line of pink appeared at the top of Jason’s cheekbones. “Your parents are rich, Cassidy. My mother doesn’t have a lot of money. Even if she’d wanted to, she’d never have paid for…that.”

That.
I was conceived because of
that.
The word had a certain flat bleakness to it.

“But what if your dad did it?” I said. “What if he needed
money and he was a donor and your mom didn’t even know?” It was a longshot, but my life had turned into one huge longshot. This could be another one.

Jason opened his mouth to speak, but the phone rang then, splitting through the weighty, uncomfortable silence with its shrill rip. He picked up. It was his mother.

I sat there for a minute listening to one side of the conversation, and then I fled.

Jason wouldn’t even consider the
possibility
that we had the same father, but he hadn’t presented me with any proof otherwise. For my own peace of mind, I had to find it myself. I went into the main bathroom first, rummaging through the drawers and cupboards for a toothbrush or a comb. I wanted something with Jason’s hair or saliva on it. Sure, it wouldn’t be very fresh, but it would be something. Unfortunately, I found lots of things belonging to Pete and Mrs. Perdue, but nothing of Jason’s.

Of course. His bathroom was in the basement.

I tiptoed downstairs, hesitating only briefly at the threshold of Jason’s room. I’d promised not to go inside, but promises could be broken under extenuating circumstances.

And these circumstances were more extenuating than anything I’d ever seen.

I checked his pillow first, praying that Jason had shed a hair or two. No luck. Then I fled into the bathroom and reached for the first thing I could lay my hands on—his hairbrush.

I stood there for a minute, staring down at it, seeing the strands of hair, some still with white follicles attached. One of them would tell me if Jason and I were half-siblings. Fingers shaking, I carefully plucked out three. Just as I realized I had no envelope to put them in, a voice thundered through the crack in the door.

“What the hell are you doing?”

Jason! The brush toppled, then clattered on the bathroom floor. “You scared me,” I managed to say. “I didn’t hear you.”

He shoved the door all the way open and pointed to the strands of hair I clutched in my right hand. “What’s that?”

“Your hair.” I slid past him. “I’m not supposed to be in here, remember?” Legs shaking, I walked up the stairs, through the kitchen and into the living room. Jason followed. Thoughts raced, gerbil-like, through my mind. What to tell him? How to explain? Facts or fiction? The truth or a tale?

Jason didn’t sit. He leaned in the doorway all scowls and crossed arms. I needed something underneath
me, some kind of support, because it was time to state my case. So I sat.

“Our relationship has always been based on honesty, right?”

He nodded.