Hollywood's Secret Baby

We’re standing there, silently facing each other until Cory looks around. A wistful smile pulls at the corner of his lips. “You know where you’ve brought us?”

I follow his cue and look around. In my fury, I’ve marched us down to the end of the strip mall, in front of what is now a Thai Massage shop. But back when we were kids, it was the comic book store where we spent many weekends and most of our allowance.

“Too bad the place is gone,” Cory says.

“They closed up a few years after you left,” I say, thankful for the distraction. I feel like I’m coming down from some hellish drug high.

Cory turns back to me from looking inside the window of the closed up massage parlor. He takes my hand in his, and I don’t pull away.

“I didn’t sleep a wink that night. Did you know that?” he asks. “All I could think about was that we’d had sex. And all the things that means. I was worried you wouldn’t want to be friends anymore. I also dared to dream that we could be boyfriend-girlfriend. I thought about the places we could go on dates together. Hoped we could get into the same university. Wondered where we might go from there. Then my phone rang at like five. It was my mom saying I had to get home right away. She didn’t explain, so I didn’t think anything of it besides that she was going to yell at me for sleeping over. If I’d known I wasn’t going to have a chance to talk to you again, I would have come into your room. I would have told you how much you mean to me. I’m sorry it took me so long to get back to you.”

“I know,” I say and squeeze his fingers. “I just wish it didn’t take so long.”

“Me too. But now that I’m back, we can pick up where we left off. So what do you say? Will you come back to Los Angeles with me?”

I bite my lips, because this is it. This is the moment. Cory has to know, and there’s no way I can keep it from him if I say yes, which is what my heart is screaming for.

So, with a tremor in my voice, I say, “That depends. Can I bring someone else along?”

Cory’s breath hitches. His hands slide from mine. “You have someone?”

My smile is sad and my tears are hopeful. “Lizzie.”

“Oh,” Cory says, nodding his head. He’s trying to rationalize this new information. “I didn’t know you were like that. So then, Lizzie’s like your girlfriend?”

“Lizzie’s my daughter,” I say before correcting myself. “Lizzie’s our daughter.”

Chapter 7

“Our daughter.”

Cory repeats the two words, familiar when alone but heart-stopping when put together for the first time. He doesn’t frame them as a question, but as a fact that he’s still struggling to comprehend. But this is not one of those mathematical equations with all those symbols and squiggles that only rocket scientists and physicists seem to understand. It’s a baby that came about in the same way that babies have appeared on this earth for millions of years.

“The night of the prom,” I say helpfully, though he should not need this extra push.

“But it was over and done with like that,” he says, snapping his fingers.

“That was apparently enough.”

Cory opens his mouth to ask something, but he slams it shut before any sounds can get out. But it’s not hard to predict why he’s hesitating.

“She’s yours,” I say in the soft tone one might use when trying to keep a skittish dog from running off. “We can get a DNA test if you want, but unless we’re talking about divine conception, there’s no one else it could be. You were my first, and for years after, only one.”

His head is nodding, but I’m not sure anything is actually going on behind those vacant eyes. It’s like looking at a computer that’s crashed and won’t respond to anything, no matter how hard I mash on the keyboard.

Finally, he asks, “You said her name was Lizzie?”

“Elizabeth Leigh Summers. She took my surname. And she goes by Lizzie. Don’t even think of calling her Elizabeth. She hates it. Says it makes her sound like some shriveled up queen from a thousand years ago.”

Cory falls back, and for half a second, I’m afraid he’s fainted. But he’s very much still conscious, only now he’s squatting, his head in his hands.

I may have broken him.

“And she’s healthy?”

“She’s allergic to cats, which she hates, because all she ever talks about is getting one. But besides that, she’s perfect. Get’s As in all her classes. Just won second prize in the science fair at her school. She did hers on DC electricity versus AC electricity, which I’m pretty sure she understands better than I do.” After squatting down in front of Cory, I place a hand on his shoulder. “I know if you’d known about her you would have come rushing back. But I could never get in touch. After a few years, I convinced myself you were dead.”

Cory looks up at this. “Is that what you told her? That her father is dead?”