Look Again

Chapter Eighty-eight

After Connie had gone home, Ellen piled the last of the broken floorboards on her back porch because reporters were still camped out front. She stepped back inside the kitchen, shut the door against the cold, and closed the window, breathing in deeply. The gasoline smell was gone, but the subfloor was a mess. Removing the top boards had only exposed the older floor beneath, and she hadn't been able to pull out all the nails. They popped up here and there, making an obstacle course for Oreo Figaro, who walked gingerly to his food dish.

Ellen crossed to the refrigerator, careful not to step on a nail or a cat, and opened the door. She was about to reach for a bottle of water when her hand stopped in midair. Staring her in the face was the Pyrex bowl of lime green Jell-O, with a shiny cavern dug in the middle.

It's good, Mommy!

She grabbed the water bottle and slammed the door closed, determined to get through the rest of the day. The house had fallen quiet, a hollow echo of how she felt. She checked the clock on the wall, 2:25. Odd that Marcelo hadn't called, and she had yet to call her father. She left the room with the water, twisted off the cap, and took a slug, then went into the living room, hearing only the sound of her footsteps on the floor. She found her purse and dug inside for her BlackBerry, but it wasn't there. She must've dropped it in Marcelo's car.

She looked up, aggravated, and through the windows she could see a commotion on the sidewalk. Reporters and photographers clustered around a taxi pulling up in front of the house, and in the next second, emerging from the crowd was her father.

Dad?

Ellen ran to the door as he waved off the press, taking the arm of an attractive woman in a chic white wool coat, probably his new wife, whose name Ellen had almost forgotten.

"Honey, what the hell?" her father asked, stepping inside, his hazel eyes round with disbelief. He stamped snow from his loafers. "This is crazy!"

"I know, it's awful." Ellen introduced herself and extended her hand to his wife. "Barbara, right?"

"Hello, Ellen." Barbara smiled with genuine warmth, her lipstick fresh and her teeth white and even. She was petite with smallish features, tasteful makeup, and highlighted hair coiffed to her chin. "Sorry we have to meet in these circumstances."

"Why didn't you call?" her father interrupted. "Thank God for the Internet, or we wouldn't have known a damn thing."

"It just got so crazy, all of it."

"We're in the hotel, and I went online to check the scores, and there's my daughter's picture and my grandson's gone! We got on the next plane."

"Why don't you go sit down, and I'll explain everything." Ellen gestured them toward the couch, but her father waved her off, agitated and acting oddly like a much older man.

"We came straight from the airport. I've been calling your cell."

"Sorry, I left it in a car." Ellen had to catch them up but she wasn't going to begin with Marcelo. "It's been difficult, Dad."

"I can imagine," Barbara said with obvious concern, but her father was distracted to the point of disorientation.

"So where's Will?" He looked around the living room, his head wobbling slightly. "Is he really not here?"

"He's really not here." Ellen stayed calm, only because he was so upset. She'd never seen him so shaken, so out of control.

"That can't be. Do the cops have him or what?"

"He's with his father, and they're already talking to shrinks and pediatricians, so I'm praying he'll be okay."

"Where is he? Where'd they take him?"

"He's in a hotel in town."

"I want to see him." Her father set his jaw, the soft jowls bracketing his mouth like a bulldog's.

"We can't, Dad."

"What do you mean, we can't?" Her father's eyes flared. "He's my only grandchild. He's my grandson."

"If we try to see him, they'll get a restraining order. I'm hoping that if we work with them, then we can-"

"That can't be legal! Grandparents have rights!" Her father's face reddened with emotion. "I'm calling a lawyer. I won't put up with this. Nobody takes my grandchild away from me!"

"I have a lawyer, Dad. He says what they're doing is legal."

"Then you didn't get yourself a good enough mouthpiece." Her father jabbed his finger toward her chest, but Barbara put her hand on his jacket sleeve.

"Don, don't yell at her. We talked about this. You know what she's been through."

"But they can't take him away!" Her father threw up his hands, his expression caught between bewilderment and pain. "I go away for one minute and when I come home, my grandson is gone? How can this be legal?"

"Dad, relax." Ellen stepped forward. "Sit down, have a cup of coffee, and I'll tell you the story. You'll understand the situation better."

"I understand the situation just fine!" Her father whirled around, his finger pointing again. "I remember when you came to see me, you thought that kid in the picture was W. So I got it wrong. Ya happy, now?"

"What?" Ellen asked, stricken.

"Don!" Barbara shouted, so loudly that he stood stunned for a moment. "Shut up. Right now." She faced him head-on, despite her tiny frame. "I can't believe what I'm seeing. I can't believe this is the man I just married. I know you're a better man than this."

"Wha?" her father said, but accusation had left his tone.

"This isn't about you, or even W." Barbara raised a manicured hand. "This is about your daughter, your only daughter. Start focusing on the child you have, instead of the one you don't."

"But she shouldn'ta said anything. She shoulda just shut up!"

Ellen felt slapped, and Barbara's mouth dropped open.

"Don, she did what any good mother would do. She did what was right for her child, even though it cost her."

Ellen recovered, listening. Barbara had given the clearest and best statement of why she'd followed up on that damn white card. She'd never thought of it exactly that way.

Her father's gaze shifted from Barbara to Ellen, suddenly very sad. He raked his thin hair with trembling fingers. "I'm sorry, El. I didn't mean it."

"I know, Dad."

"It's just that Will was my' chance."

"What do you mean?" Ellen asked, mystified, and tears came to her father's eyes. The only other time she'd seen him cry was at her mother's funeral, and the sight caught her by the throat.

"He was my chance, El. My second chance."

Ellen touched his arm, sensing what he'd say before he said it. She gave him a big hug, and he eased into her arms, with a little moan.

"Everything I did wrong with you, I was gonna do right with him. I wanted to make it up to you. To your mother."

Ellen thought her heart would break, and in the next minute, her eyes brimmed with tears, and she found herself crying like a baby in her father's arms.

"I'm so sorry, honey," he whispered as Ellen sobbed and breathed in his expensive aftershave, and she drew real comfort from his embrace in a way she never had before. The deepest pain in her heart eased just a little, and she let herself feel how very powerful is something so simple, yet so profound, as a father's love.

And she thanked God he was alive.