by:

MacKenzie Hodge has lived a life of secrets and lies. Chief among them is his, it, or her true gender? Now faced with an important decision, Mac has to decide what kind of future they want. Fortunately for Mac, there's a whole summer to decide.

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Author's Note:Here's Ch.6. First off, Ch.7 is sadly unfinished. I got a little caught up in life the past few weeks and haven't had much time to write. I hope to have it finished for next week though. Ok now that that unpleasantness is out of the way, I can happily say that this is a chapter that everyone has been asking me for. I hope everyone enjoys it :).

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Ch.6

“More coffee, Miss.”

“No thanks, Lance.”

Shit. I responded without thinking.

Lance Burke gave me a look. He stared at me for a few seconds, probably trying to see if he knew me. Of course, he did, we had English together. I’m such an idiot. But I was distracted. After dodging her countless text messages, I finally agreed to meet with Tess. She picked the place. It was one of the many upscale coffee houses on the East Side. Apparently, it was a favorite spot of hers, I just never expected to run into anyone else I knew. Thankfully Lance was the only one and I had a quick way to rectify my screw up.

“Do I know you?” he asked with narrowed eyes.

I pointed to his shirt. “Your name tag”.

I said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

He looked down, chuckled then walked away embarrassed.

Sorry, Lance.

I watched him until he was back behind the counter then I let out the breath I’d been holding. I was nervous enough as it was. Every person who walked by made me jump and every time the door opened, let’s just say I might need anti-anxiety medication when this is all over. I’m still not sure why I decided to do it. Maybe it was because I was tired of leading her on or , it was because I didn’t like lying to her. Maybe it was about me too. I was tired of lying and needed to tell someone the truth.

Tess was the best person I could think of.

After leaving Dr. Martin’s office yesterday, I did a lot of things.

Chief among them was thinking.

What she said and seeing Clara happy made me think about making my life happy too. It was strange because I never realized how miserable I’d been. It was the little things. Not having any real friends, lying to the ones I might consider friends. Lying at all actually. It was getting harder. Not the putting on boy clothes and hiding my body, that part was easy. It was getting harder waking up every morning, looking in the mirror and seeing the truth. Then lying to myself to make me feel better. The thing was, it wasn’t making me feel better. I was actually happier when I was not pretending.

Teaching my students, running in the park, hanging out with my little sister. Those were things I could do as me. The things at school, those things were weighing heavily on me. I think its the reason why I ultimately refused the summer internship. I would have loved to do it but I would have been miserable too. They were expecting Ken, a boy, who I was actually miserable being.

Being a boy made me hate life.

Dr. Martin had been right. I need to find myself.

The first step had to be to go through with my plan. This summer, Ken had to go away completely. If I wanted to truly be happy, I needed to be MacKenzie and only MacKenzie. That meant no more hiding. I needed to confess to the world. Ok so maybe not the world. One step at a time. Tess first. If she reacted in a good way then I’d decide what to do going forward.

The door chimed again.

My heart skipped a beat as I looked.

I sighed.

Another false alarm.

The couple who walked through the door meandered over to one of the empty tables near the window. I avoided picking one of those. I was still a little self-conscious about the way I looked. I wasn’t used to being out in public as a girl. My hoodie was off, I was wearing one of my new tees and a pair of jeans like yesterday. It felt weird. It also felt strangely liberating too. I actually smiled at myself in the mirror this morning as I brushed my hair. I couldn’t remember the last time I smiled. It helped that I went back to the salon yesterday too. I got squeezed in between appointments. I also managed to get the dumb girl who put my extensions in the other day.

I wanted to get them completely removed but she talked me out of it.

So we cut them instead. To just above my shoulders. Much better than the mid-back cut my mother had forced on me earlier in the week. It made me feel more like myself when I looked in the mirror too. That was the important part. This was all about me, a journey to be the person I want to be. Take that George Lucas.

“Ummm”.

Shit, the Return of the Lance.

I turned, looking up from the coffee I was still nursing.

I was too nervous to drink.

“I do know you, you're MacKenzie right?” he said, looking sheepish.

Shit.

Wow, someone who actually knows my real name. Color me surprised and slightly impressed.

"Its Mac actually."

Double Shit.

Why did I tell him that?

“You’re in my English class right?”

Triple Shit.

So, truth or lie time.

To hell with it.

“Oh right,” I said, pretending to act embarrassed. “as soon as I said your name I thought I recognized you but I wasn’t sure. So how’s your summer been so far?”

“Work”.

That must suck.

“I’m on vacation from my family.”

“How does that work?”

I shrugged. “They went away, I stayed home.”

We shared a laugh. It was strange really. I knew Lance, if only in passing. He was one of those AV kids but not a nerd. I don’t think that term really existed in high school anymore. I mean in order to stay on sports teams, jocks had to be smart too. So calling a smart person a “nerd” or a “geek” just didn’t really apply anymore. Lance was one of the smarter ones though. Top of our class or close to it. He was pretty popular too. He had a lot of friends, was part of quite a few social circles. He also had his camera. He never went anywhere without it. Usually one of the AV kids got to follow the Seniors around for a year, documenting them.

This year that kid was Lance.

“So how’d the video go?”

He looked surprised and brightened when he spoke: “Really good. It was a pretty big hit at graduation.”

Graduation was held on the Saturday after school let out.

Then prom fell on that Sunday.

The last two school functions that the Seniors had to participate in.

Something to look forward to next year that’s for sure.

“Hey, Lance!” shouted someone from behind us. “Stop flirting and get back to work!”

We both blushed.

Lance apologized and disappeared again.

Thank God.

Not that he was a bad person, I just wasn’t used to the attention.

I was a bit scared of it too.

To say Lance surprised me was an understatement. I’d been in the same school with him for three years now. We didn’t move in the same social circles but we had classes together. We flitted about one another all the time. It was hard not to run into him, what with him being everywhere with that camera. The strange thing was, he never really seemed to bother with me before. Yet, here he was talking to me out of the blue like that? It made no sense and it confused the hell out of me.

Did he suspect?

Was that why he was talking to me? Was he going to go blabbing to all his friends now?

When school started was everyone going to be laughing at me?

I felt sick to my stomach.

I could feel the bile rising up my throat. Snapping around, I spotted two ways to go. Running outside and puking on the sidewalk was disgusting so I jumped to my feet and made a mad dash for the bathroom. Thankfully no one was there to witness my embarrassment. I charged headfirst into one of the stalls but by the time I got there, the nauseous feeling was gone. I did dry heave over the bowl a few times though. I felt like kicking myself for being such an idiot. Damn it. I was overreacting. Lance was a decent guy and I think he thought I was a girl. Hell, I am a girl. I was just being paranoid too. Call it nerves. Today was a pretty nerve-wracking day for me after all. I mean it's not every day that you expose your biggest secret to someone. Someone who could make your life a living hell if she wanted. I mean I was about to put it all on the line here. Tess seemed like a pretty nice person but for all I know she could be a vicious bitch too.

Shit.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, which is not the smartest thing to do with your head this close to a toilet bowl. Cursing and nearly gagging, I quickly left the stall. I took another moment, another short breath before wandering over to the sink. I looked in the mirror as I washed my hands. The girl staring back at me was a wreck. Her hair was a mess, there were bags under her eyes from a restless sleep the night before and her lip gloss was smeared. Yes, lip gloss. I thought it would sell the whole girl thing. Now that I looked I felt ridiculous. I felt like a joke too. Or like I was pretending to be a girl?

I groaned.

What the hell was wrong with me?

First, I’m pretending to be a boy.

Now its a girl?

I need to make up my damn mind.

I shut off the water and started to step away from the mirror when I changed my mind. Turning on the sink again, I vigorously started scrubbing the lip gloss off my lips. I can be a girl without it. Satisfied I smiled only to groan at my hair. Thankfully Mom bought me some hair ties the other day. Those little elastic things. I never thought I would need them until now. It was a good thing I grabbed a few just in case. Pulling my hair back, I made a nice, tight ponytail. With the shorter hair, it looked pretty gender neutral. I still looked like mess but now I at least looked like a presentable mess.

Finally satisfied, I left the bathroom.

I paused a foot from the door.

Tess was finally here.

She was sitting at one of the tables near the window, looking around. She was dressed to impress---a ruffled flower skirt, airy summer blouse and open toe heeled sandals. Hey, I might not like girly clothes but I know them all pretty well. Its one of the disadvantages of having an ex-supermodel for a mother. You could almost say that fashion is in my blood, whether I liked it or not. It also didn’t help that said mother was constantly trying to shove said fashion in your face. Not that she was trying to force me to dress like Tess but she would buy outfits like that for Claudia then stress how it might be fun to have both her daughters dress that way. She tried to guilt me into it but it never worked.

Taking a deep breath, I slowly started making my way over.

All last night I thought of several ways to tell her.

Some more disastrous than others.

In the end, I decided with something simple.

“Hey,” I said, stopping at the table.

Tess wasn’t looking at me at first but as soon as she turned to look, she smiled. It wasn’t one of recognition, more like one you gave someone to be polite. She didn’t recognize me. I think it was the hair. It was also probably the fact that she never saw me with my hood down. I made certain to keep it up in school whenever I could. Our school didn’t really have any strict dress code policies they enforced. Hoodies and hats were ok as long as they didn’t have any drug paraphernalia on them. Tess and I had very few classes together and whenever I saw her at my locker, my hood was always up.

“Tess, it's me.”

She stared, her eyes narrowed as to give me a better look.

Then I saw it.

Recognition.

“Kenny?”

I nodded. “Can I sit?”

She gave me a slow but confused nod.

I sat in the chair opposite her.

She leaned in close and whispered. “What’s going on? Why are you dressed like a girl?”

Dressed like that?

I looked down and sighed. I forgot I was wearing this.

I’d been wearing the same clothes and hoodie for as long as I could remember. The hoodie my most prized possession. It was one of the only things I had from my father, my real father. He left it behind apparently. Mom had wanted to throw it out shortly after but when I found it, I wouldn’t let her. Jax enforced my need to keep it. When I was little, I used to wear it around the house all the time. Back then it had been too big. It was still slightly too big for me. It was also pretty worn and ratty now. It might sound silly but when a ratty football hoodie was the only thing that connected you to a man you never knew, it was the most precious thing in the world to you.

Mom got me more hoodies though.

They weren’t bad and they fit a lot better but they were definitely designed for girls.

I was wearing one now.

I was also wearing a pair of my newer, more form-fitting jeans.

Looking at me, there was no way to deny I was a girl.

I bit my lip and answered softly. “Because I am a girl.”

Tess gasped. “You mean you’re one of those transgender people?”

I sighed and shook my head.

That would have been easier.

“No” I said slowly. “I wasn’t born a boy, thinking I was in the wrong body.”

Now she was confused.

I was about to say more when Lance appeared.

Great.

“Hey guys,” he said, cheery. “You ready to order now, Tess?”

She didn’t miss a beat. “I’ll have a Caramel Macchiato.”

Ugh, she was one of those girls.

Lance scribbled it on his pad and turned to me. “You ok, Mac? You rushed off so quick...”

Concern, actual concern.

“I’m fine,” I said quickly, hoping it was enough to get rid of him.

Lance nodded and took the hint, leaving us along again.

“Who’s Mac?” asked Tess.

I rolled my eyes. “I’m Mac. You know short for MacKenzie.”

I was right. She really did think my name was Ken or Kenny.

Tess was still confused. “Then who’s Ken?”

“I’m Ken too.”

“I’m confused.”

And I wanted to drown myself in the largest cup of coffee in the world. This conversation was not going at all the way I planned.

“Ken is short for MacKenzie,” I said, hoping to clarify. “Just like Mac or Mackie or Kenzie.”

Wow, I never really realized how many ways I could shorten my own name.

Weird.

“And you’re not a boy?”

“Right.”

Then I saw it, the look of hurt in her eyes. The last thing I wanted to see. I considered her a friend, well at least I hoped I did. I also hoped she might consider me one too. Now that I saw that look though, I knew that hope was impossible.

She stood up. “I think I should go.”

Shit.

She started to leave before I could stop her.

Double shit.

Tess was fast, faster than I gave her credit for. She was out the door before I could even push my chair in. She was already hailing a cab too. Damn it. I rushed toward the door, hoping to catch her. When I got outside, she was crying. I made her cry. It was the last thing in the world I wanted to do.

“Tess wait.”

She turned to me, tears flowing freely. “Was this some kind of sick game to you. Get the cheerleader to fall in love with the lesbo.”

She thinks I’m gay?

“What no!” I said defensively. “If you give me a chance, I’ll explain everything.”

A cab pulled up to curb.

Tess glared. “Well, I’m waiting.”

“Not here” I said, grabbing her arm gently.

We were too exposed out here on the street. I didn’t want to tell the whole city my secret after all.

“We’ll go to my place,” I said quickly, steering her toward the yellow car.

She didn’t protest.

I opened the door for her and we both clamored inside. I rattled off the directions to the driver and sat quietly next to my “date”.

Well, this could have been better.

With traffic, the ride from the coffee bistro to home took the better part of twenty minutes. Twenty minutes of total silence. At least Tess had stopped crying. I’m not sure I enjoyed what it was replaced with though. She sat the whole time with her arms crossed, looking out the window. I guess I deserved that much. Here she thought she was going on a date with a boy she liked and now, well now I’m not sure what she thought. I tried talking to her but she wouldn’t even look at me. I deserved that too. I should have been honest with her from the beginning. Sure I didn’t owe it to her but it was the right thing to do.

“Here you are ladies,” said the driver as the cab stopped.

Tess finally spoke. “You live here?”

Was she disgusted or surprised?

Like I said before, the neighborhood needed some work. It wasn’t a bad place to live but it was a place that most people wouldn’t have suspected. We were a mixed race family after all. To be brutally honest, Mom and I were probably the only white people on the whole block. Most of the neighbors didn’t care. I say most because there were a few who caused problems from time to time. Usually, I just kept my head low and avoided them. I was friendly when I needed to be and for the most part, they let us be.

A place like this to Tess though, I couldn’t really read her.

We got out of the cab, I paid the driver and turned toward her. She wrinkled her nose, pretending to smell a smell that wasn’t there. I’ll admit it, she was a snob. I knew that before. The way she dressed, who she dated. The fact that she showed any interest in the pretend me was surprising. Tess’s parents were lawyers, they lived in the richer part of town. Coming here probably felt like slumming to her. She was a mystery though too. So was Brian in that respect. They were both very well off and yet they chose to go to a public school like me? It was surprising, to say the least. Mind you, it was a more upscale public high school but it wasn’t private. They weren’t the only wealthy students there either. I knew why I went there but I was confused as to why she did.

I started toward our building, Tess at my heels.

“This is your apartment?”

She looked around, probably expecting to get mugged.

Her bag was worth more than quite a few paychecks around here.

I rolled my eyes. “Not my apartment, my house.”

She nodded, probably thinking she offended,me.

I approached the door, typing in the code.

“You don’t buzz in?” she asked, shocked.

,I laughed. “Don’t need too, we own the building."

That surprised her.

Good.

“Wait, what?” she asked as I opened the door.

We stepped into the foyer and her jaw actually dropped. It was pretty comical.

The outside of the building didn’t compare to the inside.

It was like the TARDIS.

Except it was fancier on the inside than the out.

Tess was looking around in awe. “Your mother teaches kindergarten right?”

I nodded. “And my stepfather owns a gym”.

I couldn’t help but smile.

Tess’s mind was blown. Good. She needed to learn a little humility. Maybe then she wouldn’t judge things based on how they look. Like me. Like my neighborhood. Like my house.

“No offense but how in the hell can your family afford this!”

I laughed but didn’t say a thing.

Instead I led her toward the stairs. Tess let some of the tension leave her body as she followed. We slowly climbed the stairs to the second floor. She kept looking around, her eyes getting bigger and bigger. I guess I never realized how odd things appeared. I didn’t have many guests after all. On the outside the house looked one way, on the inside another. Like I said before my parents didn’t flaunt it but it's not like we lived like paupers either. We had a lot of stuff. State of the art appliances, nice furniture, some fancy reprints on the walls. The kind of things one might suspect in a fancy Upper East side loft. Not the kind of things you would expect to find here.

“You want a drink?” I asked, wandering into the kitchen.

Tess shook her head but followed. She sat down on one of tall, island stools.

“You’re rich?”

I sighed. I took a can of Sprite out of the fridge and popped it before speaking. “Is that all people think about? Money?”

“Sorry,” she said and actually sounded like meant it. “Its just...well...you don’t seem like Brian that’s all.”

I laughed. “I’ll take that as a compliment and you’re right, I’m not like Brian” I waved my hand over my body. “He’s a guy, I’m not.”

Tess was scrutinizing me with her eyes again. “You said you were going to explain that.”

I nodded. I took a sip before I began. I told her everything. It didn’t take nearly as long as I thought it might but I didn’t leave anything out. I never really thought about how easy it was to sum up my life. I also couldn’t help but think how strange it all seemed. It was no wonder she was so reluctant to believe me or that she was angry. Suddenly pretending to be a boy felt like lying about being a boy. The hate and tears she showed before, I was starting to feel them as I spoke. What the hell kind of person am I? Shit. I was horrible. I kept the lie going and not for other people but for myself.

When I finished, Tess was silent.

Then she stood up. I flinched, ready for the slap I knew was coming. Instead, she hugged me. I flinched but not for a bad reason. I never expected a reaction like that. I was hoping she would understand, that she might be able to at least forgive me. I never actually suspected she would hug me, that she might be showing sympathy for me? In one quick moment, the shallow and snobbish Tess was gone, replaced by this compassionate and caring one? The thing was, I couldn’t tell which one was real and which was the lie?

“You are the bravest person I’ve ever known.”

What?!?

She broke the hug then crossed her arms.

“I’m still mad at you for lying though” she said, then giggled. “And I should have known you know.”

“Known what?”

She was still giggling. ‘I tried to get Brian to listen to Tara with me. He said it was chick music. For a while I thought you were gay...”

“Boys listen to Tara!’ I said, defensively.

I’m not sure why I was being so defensive about it though. I was, after all, not a boy.

Then I laughed too.

Tess gave me a look. “Oh wow, a girl’s laugh and that voice!”

Shit.

I’d been speaking normally to her without realizing it.

I stuck my tongue out at her.

She dropped back down on the stool. “So this whole time you’ve been pretending to be a boy?’ I nodded, she sighed. “Since you were eleven years old, all this time?”

I shrugged. “Not the whole time. During vacations, I promised my mother I would be a girl. Its just in school, it felt weird. I’ve been a boy all my life. I just didn’t want to show up one day wearing a school girl outfit and cause a riot.”

Mom’s school---the one I went to in elementary and middle school---had uniforms. The boys were pretty ordinary, pants, white long sleeve shirts, blazers. The girls wore the blazers too but they had skirts as well with knee-high socks and buckle shoes. I didn’t want to go one day dressed like a boy then return a few days later, wearing a skirt. It scared me. Not just because I thought kids were going to pick on me or try to kick my ass. No, it was more because it was something final. At the time I wasn’t ready to accept the truth and I think I carried that with me throughout my school career.

“I just thought I needed to be who everyone thought I was.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way but that’s just plain stupid.”

“What?”

She continued. “Who cares what others think? Everyone is different, its what makes people unique. Be who you want to be not who you think people want you to be. You want to be a boy, be a boy. You want to be a girl, be a girl. Don’t let society tell you who you are!”

Wow.

I never thought I’d hear Tess say something like that.

After her rousing declaration, Tess fell silent. We both did. The awkwardness set in, neither one of us sure what to say or do. I hadn’t really planned things out beyond this point to be honest. I told her the truth and honestly, I expected her to leave. I never expected her to be cool with it. I didn’t really know how to hang out with people. The last time I had any friends over was about seven years ago. We usually went to my room to play video games or watched TV. Things most boys did. I never had any girl friends. I didn’t even know what girls did with one another when they hung out.

“So what does your Dad think about all this?” she asked after several moments of silence.

That was a weird question.

“Jax is pretty cool about it actually.”

She gave me a look. “Not Jax, your other father.”

My other...Oh.

“I don’t know, I’ve never met him.”

I think it sounded sadder than it should have because the next thing I knew she was hugging me again.

“That sucks” she said when she pulled away, teary-eyed. “And I know the feeling.”

‘You never met your dad either?”

She wiped her eyes. “He’s gone, died before I was born. My parents met in Korea, Dad was stationed there. He died in a training exercise, there was a malfunction and the helicopter went down, everyone on board was KIA. Mom tried coping but it wasn’t easy. Dad’s sister---my aunt Julie---stepped in. She brought me to the US, adopted me shortly afterward.”

She started crying. This time I found myself hugging her. She cried for a bit and I did my best to comfort her. It was weird. I’d never comforted anyone like this before, it was nice.

She finally stopped crying, wiping her eyes again. “It wasn’t all bad though. Mom and I talk now, almost every day. She lives not too far away actually. She had some family here in the states. We have a good relationship. I love her just as much as I do my parents and my sisters. I love my father too but I would give anything to be held in the arms of my real father, just once.”

I started to tear up.

Shit.

Now she was hugging me.

What a pair we were.

When I was done with my crying, Tess had a look. She bit her lip, clearly contemplating something. When she spoke, I knew she was up to something. “You should find him!”

“What?”

“Your father,” she said excitedly. “I mean if my father was alive, I’d give anything to be able to see him. You should go look for your dad!”

"I don’t think that’s such a good...”

"Hear me out,” she said, interrupting me. “I know this may sound pushy of me and if I overstep, slap me. The thing is, you have a chance. You said so yourself, this summer is all about exploring and trying to find yourself. You’re closing a chapter in your life right?”

I couldn’t disagree so I nodded.

"Well, your Dad is part of that right?”

Shit.

I bit my lip this time. “I don’t know where he is. Hell I don’t even know who he is!”

Tess looked surprised. So I quickly filled her in on my sordid birth and all that. I left out the part about Mom’s past. I respected my mother’s privacy enough not to let that secret slip.

"That’s perfect!” she said, excitedly.

"What is?”

I was confused.

“We know where to look first!”

Huh.

She saw the dumb look I was giving and sighed. “You’re hopeless. Did your mother have a boyfriend at the time?”

Shit.

Well, she was Caroline Russel. She probably had a lot.

Though now that I thought about it….damn I was an idiot. I’d always wondered about my father for years. I kept asking and Mom refused to say. How was it that I never thought to check if she had any boyfriends back then? Tess was a damn genius. It was almost as if Fate itself put her in my life, maybe for this very reason. Ok so maybe I’m over thinking that bit but without her, I never would have thought of that. Without her, I never would have even thought about Dad. I mean sure I thought about him, probably every day. Hell, I wore his damn hoodie. It was just a thing though. Something of his that I had. Like an old sentimental keepsake of a person long gone. The thing was, Dad was out there somewhere. At least in theory. I mean I could be getting my hopes up for nothing though too. Could I end up with a tragic situation just like Tess?

The thing was, though, if I didn’t look, I’d never know.

“Let’s do it!”

“Seriously?”

I nodded, Tess squealed, jumping up and down like an idiot. She grabbed my hands, trying to pull me into her excitement. I didn’t squeal but I found myself bouncing around like an idiot too. What can I say, it was strangely contagious.

When we were finally done being morons, Tess put on her serious face.

“Ok so where do we start looking?”

“Not here,” I said with a sigh.

Mom wasn’t the type to keep things like that. She wasn’t exactly sentimental, especially about that time in her life. Sure she kept her old modeling portfolios but everything else from that life was long gone. After my kidnapping and the media frenzy that followed, Mom was done for good. She burned all her bridges, figuratively and literally. Scrapbooks, old pictures, clothes...all of it went into the fireplace. Anything that was Caroline Russel went up in smoke. I’m not sure why she kept Dad’s hoodie to be honest. A small part of me hoped and wished it was because she truly loved him?

“Your mother doesn’t have any old pictures?”

I shook my head. “She burned everything!”

“Why?”

Shit.

I’m sorry Mom but I have no choice.

I grabbed Tess’s shoulders, squeezing them gently. “What I’m about to tell you must stay between us, do you promise?”

She nodded.

“Say it!”

She gave me a strange look but nodded again. “I promise!”

Shit.

“I know where we might be able to find pics of my Mom” I sighed as I said it. “Everyone does. You see Mom is a bit famous.”

Tess’s eyes got big. She opened her mouth then closed it. Then she squinted, studying me. She looked around the room. There was a family photo on the fireplace mantle. Tess wandered over, getting close to scrutinize my mother. She stared for a long time. I watched and waited. When she finally turned around, I saw the smile. I think it took her a few minutes to process it but now I knew.

She figured out who Mom was.

It was hard not too.

Though it had been nearly twenty years, Mom hadn’t changed all that much.

Tess gave me an open mouth look.

“Your mother is Caroline Russell!" she said it softly but stared from me to the pic then back again.

“You promised not to say anything, remember!”

Tess stared at me again, the wheels in her head turning. “If she’s Caroline then that makes you….OMG, you’re Baby M!!!”

There it was.

My dreaded past.

Like the Lindbergh Baby before me, I was a bit notorious. My mother had been lucky though, she got me back. That didn’t stop the media from their circus though. I was quickly labeled Baby M. They all knew my name of course but that’s about all they really knew. After I was born, Mom fell off the radar. She kept herself fairly private. Then she disappeared altogether. She and I became a bit of a weird Urban Legend together. I’d seen the posts on social media and the numerous websites. Everyone always wanted to know what happened to Caroline Russell and her famous Baby M.

Now Tess knew the truth.

She was sitting on a literal gold mine.

“Tess” I said, tearing up again. “You can’t tell anyone, please!”

She was, hugging me again.

“Your secret is safe with me, I swear.”

She held me for a while but when I was done crying, Tess was smiling again.

“This is perfect though” she said, pulling out her phone. “Your Mom was very super famous. Her face was literally everywhere!”

She was furiously typing away.

“She was seen with a lot of guys” Tess continued.

“Don’t remind me' I said with a groan.

"One more than others though,” she said with a final smile as she stopped typing.

She turned her phone to face me.

I saw a pic of Mom from back in the day. She was still as beautiful as ever. She was laughing and smiling. She still did that but she looked really happy in that pic. I turned away from her for a second to look at the guy she was with. He was tall and handsome.

More importantly he was blonde.

Oh shit.

“Who, is he?”

Tess turned her phone back around. She started typing again but only for a second. She turned it around to face me again. The man in the previous pic was there again but older. He was wearing a very sharp and expensive business suit now. He was also in a fancy looking board room. It was a publicity photo of some sort. My attention stayed on him for a moment than on the large logo behind him: a W surrounded by a circle. I knew that logo, it was everywhere these days.

Only an idiot wouldn’t know it.

Wellington.

“This my dear girl,” she said with some satisfaction. “Is the Patrick Wellington, CEO and billionaire owner of Wellington Pharmaceutical.”

Son of a bitch.

“Mom dated him!”

Tess nodded. “According to Google, for quite a while. They broke up about...well right before you were born. There are some internet theories, the dates actually add up….”

She was still talking but I tuned her out.

The dates added up.

Shit.

Could this Patrick guy be my father???

Author’s note: As I’m sure all of you know, comments are life blood to an author. I’m not begging or demanding, but I certainly would appreciate anything you have to say (or ask). It doesn’t have to be long and involved, just give me your reaction to the story. Thanks in advance...EOF