The Stepmother's Secret Heir

Mama had my ear twisted up in her fist like she meant to tear it off my head.

Six months back she stood up in a courtroom and cried until her mascara ran, fighting for custody of me like her life depended on it. It didn't. The child support did.

Now the judge had signed. Now she had a new man. And now I was in the way. She drove me to my stepmother's house, dumped me on the front step, and left without looking back.

Years later I put the deed to a big house and the keys to a Mercedes into that stepmother's hands. My mama found out too late.

What she threw out on that front step was the only thing she ever had worth keeping. Chapter 1 Six months after the divorce, Dad married a pretty woman.

Mama wasn't about to be outdone. She found herself a man on his second goround. He took a drag off his cigarette and looked me over.

Blew the smoke out slow, right past my face. "I'll marry you," he said. "I'm not raising some other man's kid." One sentence. That's all it took to decide where I lived.

Overnight I turned into baggage. Mama called Dad and told him to come get me.

It turned into a fight before either of them got to the point. "I wanted her," Dad said. "You had to have her. Now you don't want her, and you want to hand her back?

Well, guess what. I don't want her either." Mama had the phone in one hand. The other one found the soft skin on the inside of my thigh and twisted. I howled.

She didn't even look down. "Randy Boyd, what kind of man are you?

Your own flesh and blood and you won't take her." He gave it right back to her, line for line. "Oh, you're not selfish? Then keep her!

Didn't you go find yourself a secondhand husband? Let him raise her!" "Why the hell should anybody else raise your daughter? I'm telling you right now.

You don't take her, I'll leave her somewhere. Whoever wants her can have her." Back and forth. Neither one of them giving an inch. Finally Dad ran out of road.

A sigh came through the phone. "It's not that I won't. My wife's pregnant. It might be a boy. Just keep her a while longer.

Once the baby's here I'll talk it over with her." Mama laughed, one hard note through her nose. "Dream on. I'll say it once.

I don't want this kid." She hung up and put her eyes on me. Staring wasn't enough. She kicked me. "This is your fault! If it wasn't for you I wouldn't be going through any of this.

I never should've—" She stopped. Looked at me again. Then started over, slower. "I never should've fought to get you back.

Should've known you'd be nothing but deadweight." "And don't you go blaming me. Blame your own bad luck.

You didn't come out a boy." It took me years to learn why she fought so hard for me in that courtroom. It was never about me. It was about the check that came with me.

The next morning she left me on Dad's front step. Dad came out on his way to work and found me sitting there. He froze for a good five seconds. Then he started calling her.

Over and over. She'd already blocked his number, every way he had to reach her. He ground his teeth. There was nobody left on the other end to grind them at.

In the end he set his jaw and walked me inside. He crouched down and kept his voice low. "You keep quiet. You make Cheryl unhappy, I'll put you out myself." I nodded.

I was scared to make any sound at all. "Put who out?" A voice came from the bedroom. Dad went stiff. I watched the nerves crawl up him. So the stepmother was the mean one.

I picked at my fingers and stared at my shoes and didn't dare look up. "Well? What's all this?" Her belly was huge, round as a melon.

But her voice was soft. "Babe . . . it's just, her mama's got some things going on. She's staying here a little while.

Just a little while, and then she'll come get her." He mumbled it. He couldn't get it out straight. "What do I look like, a daycare?

Nobody wants her, so they park her here?" "Three days. Two, if you want." Dad was doing his best. Mama's wedding was two days out. "Randy Boyd. What did you promise me?

The court gave her to your ex. So how does she end up dumped back here? I'm telling you right now. I am not raising somebody else's kid." Dad's voice dropped to nothing.

I didn't breathe. Chapter 2 Cheryl lifted one eyelid. "Three days," she said. "Not one day more." The tension went out of Dad's face all at once. "Yes. Yes.

I'll have her gone by then, I promise." He shoved me forward and thumped the top of my head. "Where are your manners?" My lips pressed shut. The heat climbed up my neck.

Not one word. Dad panicked. His hand came down flat on my head. "What's wrong with you? You gone mute?" My scalp stung. Cheryl's eyes came up. "Randy Boyd. Save the sob story.

One more word out of either of you and you can both get the hell out of my house right now." Dad shut his mouth. His eyes did the rest of the talking. They were aimed at me.

It wasn't that I wouldn't say it. I didn't know how. On the drive over, Mama warned me.

If I ever called that woman Mom, she was done with me. "You can call me Cheryl." She let a breath out through her nose. Whatever she thought of me, it wasn't much.

She didn't have to say a word. When she looked at you, she looked mean. No wonder Dad was scared of her. Mama said this woman was the reason our family broke apart.

That she was why Dad didn't want us. Mama said all stepmothers were wicked, and I shouldn't get close to her. I was little. I wasn't stupid. I knew what she meant.

I made myself say it. "Cheryl." She nodded like that settled it and went into the kitchen. Dad was late for work.

He called through the doorway. "Babe, anything you need doing, make her do it." Cheryl was busy with something in there. She didn't look up. "Wouldn't dare.

Next thing you know I'm the wicked stepmother." Dad pushed me over to the kitchen door and dropped his voice. "You be good.

Or you're gone tonight." Then, out loud: "Babe, heading out." That warning was the last thing he gave me before he left.

After he was gone I stood in the front hall and didn't move. "What are you standing there for?

Get in here and help." Cheryl was in the kitchen doorway with a plate in her hand, out of patience already. I said okay and hurried in. She'd made pancakes.

A whole stack of them, and a pan of scrambled eggs. Enough for two people. Steam was still coming off the top one. I swallowed without meaning to. She caught me at it. "Eat!

What are you looking at me for? Do I got something on my face?" I was so hungry my stomach had gone quiet hours ago. I grabbed one and got it into my mouth.

Halfway through I stopped. I looked up at her. "Why'd you quit?" The tears came before I could get out of the way. They dropped, one at a time, onto the plate. "Cheryl . . .

I don't eat much. And I can work. Could you please not send me away . . ." Cheryl went still. She set her fork down on her plate.

Her eyebrows pulled together. "Don't you start that with me. You're just like your daddy." But I watched something go out of her face. "Now I can't eat.

You cry like that, I can't eat." She pushed the plate back in front of me. "Finish it.

We don't waste food in this house." I must have looked lost, because she kept going. "I don't keep freeloaders in this house. It doesn't matter how sweet you talk.

You don't behave, I'll have your daddy come get you the same day." I nodded fast. "I'll be good. I'll be good." She let out a small sigh and said something under her breath.

Lord have mercy. I didn't know what that meant. All I knew was Dad had settled it with her. Three days. The third night, he was coming to take me away.

Chapter 3 She stood over me until both plates were clean. Two people's worth of food, gone. When I finished I got up and cleared the dishes without being asked.

Cheryl watched me do it. She didn't say anything. She went back to bed to catch up on her sleep. I found a rag and went through that house top to bottom. I did the toilet lid too.

She came out yawning. Then her eyes came all the way open. "You do all this?" I nodded. Her eyebrows dropped. "Who told you to do that?" My head went down.

Here it comes. "I'm sorry . . . I . . . I just wanted you to be happy." That's what Mama always told me. I was a girl. Girls are supposed to work. Maybe I hadn't done enough.

Maybe that's why Cheryl was mad. Then she took my hand and folded it up inside both of hers. "Good God. Your mama had you doing this?" I nodded.

At home, working was the only time Mama ever said I'd done good. "Her own mother.

A baby this size, doing work like that." She pulled me over to the space heater in the corner and sat me down in front of it.

The heat came off it onto my face, warm the same way her hand had been warm. At supper she kept loading up my plate. It was a mountain before I'd touched any of it. "Eat!

How are you gonna have the strength to work for me if you don't eat?" I about put my whole face in it. Cheryl could cook. That night I heard them fighting through the wall.

Dad's voice was in it at first. Then it got smaller and smaller, until there was only hers, going and going. I caught send her back. I caught baggage.

I pulled the blanket over my head. So it was happening anyway. In the morning there was a second blanket on top of me. A thick one.

Cheryl was sitting by the space heater with her hands going. Pink yarn. A little sweater. I sat up and she looked over. "Breakfast is on the stove. Go get it.

Then you're coming out with me." Something dropped in my chest. "Where?" She didn't look up. "Where do you think?" I came apart.

I rolled out of the blankets and got hold of her pant leg. "Cheryl, I'll be good . . . don't send me away, I'll eat one time a day, I can help you with the baby when he comes, please don't send me away . . ." Mama wasn't going to take me.

Not ever. She'd told me. If your daddy won't have you, you go into foster care. I didn't want to go into foster care. Cheryl snorted.

She got a hand under my arm and stood me up. "What are you crying for?

I was going to take you to the mall and buy you some clothes." I was a mess by then, snot and all. "I don't want clothes, I won't spend your money, I don't want to go, I'll be good . . ." Her face shut. "You don't go, I'll have your daddy come get you." "Whose child walks around this filthy?" I looked down at my coat, gone black at the cuffs, and my pants with the shine worn into the knees.

I closed my mouth. She bought me three outfits. One of them was a dress. The prettiest thing I'd ever had on me. Then she took me home and washed my hair. The water ran black.

It ran black three times before it ran clear. "There. Now you look like a little girl." She put me in the dress and did my hair up in braids.

She stood back and smiled at what she'd made. I grinned until my face hurt. Maybe stepmothers weren't so wicked after all. But lying down that night, I counted it out on my fingers.

Three days. It was almost up. Was Dad coming to take me away? Chapter 4 That night Dad and Cheryl went at it about me again. This time I heard every word.

Her voice was coming apart in the middle of it. "What kind of mother does that? You didn't see it. That hair was one solid knot. She was black to the elbows.

How does a baby end up with a mother like that . . ." "That poor baby . . ." I reached up and touched my own hair in the dark. It was clean. It had been clean since that afternoon.

Three days, and then three more. Every day I was scared it was a dream. That I'd wake up and be back out on the step. Cheryl didn't quit buying me things.

I said no, quiet, and she waved it off. "This is a loan. You're paying me back someday." Dad noticed she'd stopped talking about sending me away. He let her do what she wanted.

Three months went by. Her belly kept getting bigger. She couldn't sleep. She'd be up walking in the middle of the night. I slept on the couch.

I'd see her out there by herself, sitting on the little stool, then up again, one hand braced on her back, going the length of the living room and back.

She took her shoes off so she wouldn't wake me. "Did I wake you?" She kept it to a whisper when she saw me turn over.

I pushed the blanket back and went over and worked at her shoulders with both hands. "Floor's cold. Put your shoes on." She snapped it, still whispering.

Her eyes were doing something else. By then I had her figured out. Sharp tongue, soft heart. Everything out of her mouth was a threat. Everything she actually did was for me.

Her due date got close. She got jumpy. Her people started coming by. Every one of them took a look at me and frowned. Every one of them told her to send me back.

Her mother was the worst of them. "Cheryl Ann. Is that baby eating your brains? You're about to be somebody's mother yourself and here you are raising another woman's child.

Are you stupid?" "You know there's no worse job in this world than stepmother? Do it right, nobody thanks you.

Do it wrong, they'll say you beat her." "The court gave that child to her mother. What business is she of yours?" Cheryl laughed it off and gave her nothing to work with.

Her mother got a finger into her forehead and pushed. "Don't say I didn't warn you. Somebody else's kid is going to bite the hand that feeds it.

You'll see." Cheryl grinned and burrowed into her. "I hear you, Mama." "You little brat.

You send her back, or don't you ever call me Mama again." Then Cheryl reached over and pulled me in. "Birdie. Say hi to your Nana." "Hi, Nana." I said it small.

Her mother rolled her eyes. Her voice came down a notch. "Who are you calling Nana?" Cheryl patted her shoulder. "Well, she called you it.

You just got yourself a granddaughter for free, Mama. Least you could do is act like it." Nana's face stayed exactly where it was.

She dug in her pocket, came out with a folded twenty, and slapped it against Cheryl's arm. "The things I do for you." "Birdie. Your Nana's giving you this.

Take it." Cheryl lit up like a kid over it. I envied her for it. Grown as she was, she still had a mother to act like a baby in front of. Not me.

I was a kid whose mother put her out. That night when nobody was around, I gave the twenty to Cheryl. She laughed and put a hand on my braids. "That's yours.

Your Nana gave it to you. You keep it." I put it under my pillow and slept like nothing in the world could get me. It was the first money I'd ever had that was mine.

Something woke me in the middle of the night. Somebody talking low.

Cheryl was out on the back porch with one hand on her back, turned away from the house, phone against her ear. "Mama, stop. Don't say that again.

If she ever hears you . . ." The rest of it didn't come out. The doctor had said any day now. Any hour. Once he was born, there'd be a kid in this house that was actually hers.

Then she turned around. Slow, one hand still on her back. She looked in through the door. Chapter 5 Cheryl went into the hospital to wait out the last of it. Dad got busy.

One day I heard him out on the back porch. His voice had an edge on it. "Roxanne. You're coming to get this kid." And there it was.

My mama's voice, after all that time. "Why is she mine? I kept her for you all that time. I never even asked you for grocery money!" "You call that keeping her?

I'm not going to get into it with you. You kept her alive. That's all you did." He was right. After the divorce I moved into a rundown rental with Mama. Some days there was food.

Most days there wasn't. She never worked a day she was married to him. Whatever the divorce gave her, she put into the slots. It didn't take long. It was all gone.

She didn't go looking for a job. She sat there every month waiting on Dad's child support like it was a paycheck. Once she got in front of a machine, nothing else existed.

If she remembered, she brought me back something to eat. If she didn't, I ate once every two or three days. The hunger made me stupid.

Whatever was in that apartment went in my mouth. The worst it ever got, I ate a whole case of potatoes raw. The landlady downstairs started bringing plates up.

If she hadn't, I'd have starved to death on that floor. "Randy Boyd, don't think I can't see right through you. Your wife's about to pop, that's all this is.

What, you got a new one, so you're done with the old one? Well, you're not putting her on me." His jaw locked. "Roxanne. You're the one who wanted her.

You keep this up, I'll take you to court." "Go ahead and sue me! You're her father too, in case you forgot. And I'll tell you something else. I'm pregnant. Take her or don't.

Throw her out for all I care. I'm not having her." "Or beat her to death and be done with it. Then the two of us can quit going around and around about it." Dad stopped.

Whatever he'd had lined up was gone. Nothing came out of him at all