They were in the country? Jason and the kids? With Elizabeth and Tom?
“Why?” Maribeth asked.
“Christ, I don’t know. Because he wants it to be a sanctuary from the stress of daily life.”
“No. Why are Jason and the kids up there? With you?”
“Oh. Because tomorrow’s Christmas,” Elizabeth replied, as if that explained anything.
“But . . . why?” Maribeth repeated.
“They’ve been coming up a lot, on weekends. And they came for Thanksgiving,” she said.
Maribeth let that sink in. Jason and the twins. With Elizabeth. Weekends. Thanksgiving.
Elizabeth continued: “So we thought we’d have a quiet Christmas together, just family, except you’re not here, though your mother thinks you are.”
“Wait. What? My mother’s still in New York?”
“God, no. Jason knew she’d completely freak if she knew what you’d done so he told her you’d come up here on a retreat and she should go back to Florida. She thinks you’re still here. That Jason and the twins see you on weekends but that you’re not talking to anyone else. I call her with updates. Now she’s talking about trying her own retreat. Her friend Herb has done one, apparently.”
“You and Jason did that?”
“We colluded.” She chuckled softly. “That’s been the one fun part in all this.”
And with that, Maribeth started to understand. And when she did, she started to cry.
“Oh, darling,” Elizabeth said. “Please don’t cry. I didn’t mean that. It’s been great spending time with the twins. And they’re doing fine. Really. Jason fired that flakey babysitter and hired this great new lady who they love. And he’s with them a lot and Niff comes in the evenings and a bunch of your twins parenting friends have pitched in. And I’m here. I know I should’ve been here more before, and I’m so sorry that I wasn’t. But I’m here now, so you have to believe me when I say that O and L are okay. They have that twins thing where they rely on each other. They miss you. God, do they miss you—we all do—but Jason shows them a nightly video of you and they draw you pictures for when you get back. They know you’re coming back. Please don’t be sad.”
But Maribeth wasn’t crying because she was sad. She was remembering the night of her engagement party, when she’d envisioned herself and Elizabeth and Jason as the steady bases of her three-legged stool. Sturdy enough to hold her. To hold, it now seemed, her whole family.
So this was how it was. People entered your life. Some would stay. Some would not. Some would drift but would return to you. Like Elizabeth. Like Jason. And now, like Maribeth, herself, who had left, just as her own mother had, but who would return, as her own mother could not.
And that’s when she knew it was time. To return to Jason. To Oscar and Liv. To her life, though she had no idea what that life looked like anymore. Everything about it felt inchoate. Like a scar still healing. Or perhaps like a story still being written.
HE MUST HAVE been back in cell coverage. Because this time Jason picked up on the first ring. And there it was, that voice, the one she’d fallen in love with more than twenty-five years ago, the one she had never stopped loving.
“Jase,” she said. “It’s me.”
“Lois,” he managed before the voice broke wide open. And then all she could hear were the shuddering gasps of her husband’s silent crying.
“It’s okay,” she told him. “There was no heart attack. I’m fine.”
He still didn’t speak. In the background, she heard the boppy sound of the They Might Be Giants CD they played to keep the twins happy on long drives.
“Jason, listen. I’m coming home. Elizabeth’s already on her way to pick me up. I’ll be back tonight.”
“Daddy, why are we stopping?” Oscar’s little voice traveled through the line bright and clear. “Who are you talking to?”
And then it was her daughter who she heard. “Mommy?” Liv asked. As if it was the most normal thing in the world for Maribeth to be calling. “Is that Mommy?”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Years ago, when this book first began to percolate, I mentioned my nascent idea to a cardiologist I was seeing for a stress test. He agreed to help. Several years later, when I had written a draft, Dr. Stephen Weiss picked up the phone at his medical practice one night and made good on his promise. I was also lucky enough to meet Dr. Kirsten Healy, a cardiologist and a busy working mother of two young girls, who was able to weigh in on both the medical and the emotional aspects of Maribeth’s predicament. Additional thanks to Dr. Lucy N. Painter and Dr. Mukesh Prasad for technical assistance and generosity.
Kristin Thompson of the Children’s Home of Pittsburgh graciously, and patiently, walked me through the specifics of Pittsburgh and Pennsylvania adoption law and the particulars of birth-parent searches. She also provided essential notes as a native Pittsburgher. As did Siobhan Vivian, who took time out of her busy writing and parenting schedule to school me in the multitudinous wonders of the city and take me on a tour.
Stephen Melzer informed me exactly what would happen if a tax return went unfiled (no immediate handcuffs!) and how a person might withdraw huge sums of money from her savings account (rather easily). Joe Dalton made sure I got the specifics of archiving correct (data migration!). Sarah Patzwahl may be about forty years younger than Janice, but she nevertheless employed the kickboard just as frequently when teaching me to swim and, in doing so, inspired not just a character but an obsession. Thank you also to Courtney Sheinmel for early encouragement. To Eshani Agrawal for reading so quickly and astutely. To Karen Forman for the eagle-eyed proofing. To Stephanie Perkins for weighing in with her as-always fantastic notes. To Robin Wasserman for title suggestions. To Deb Shapiro for strategic brilliance. To Emily Mahon for the beautiful jacket. To Courtney Stevens for sharing a bit of her own blue-whale size heart. And to Tori Hill for, once again, being the elf in the night.
My three-legged stool has so many bases it works better as metaphor than furniture. When I run away, or as we call it, “take a work trip” (no, really), I rely on many people to fill in the gaps, including the amazing Beth Ann Kurahara and our neighborhood compound (in geographical, not alphabetical, order): the Wilsons, the Clarkes, the Iannicellis, and the Brost-Wangs.
I also rely daily on the intelligence, humor, and honesty of my dearest friends: Tamara Glenny, Marjorie Ingall, Kathy Kline, Isabel Kyriacou, E. Lockhart, and Tamar Schamhart. And bonus points to my beloved Libba Bray, who listened to me read about half this book out loud, out of order. Bless her heart.
Speaking of people on whose intelligence, humor, and honesty I rely: Michael Bourret encourages me to be vulnerable on the page and bold off of it. Thank you also to Lauren Abramo, Erin Young, and the whole team at Dystel & Goderich, as well to Caspian Dennis and Dana Spector.
It is cliché to claim a publisher feels like family, but in the case of Algonquin Books, it feels true—not my family, perhaps, but a family business that I’m a part of. Thank you Jackie Burke, Steve Godwin, Brunson Hoole, Debra Linn, Annie Mazes, Michael McKenzie, Lauren Moseley, Craig Popelars, Kendra Poster, Elisabeth Scharlatt, Ina Stern, and Anne Winslow for welcoming me to the table. And thank you to Amy Gash, an editor whose bionic memory for detail, deep insight for character, and sleeves-up love of process is matched only by her sense of humor. As my gift, Amy, please note the absence of italics in these acknowledgments.
And finally, on to family. A warm blanket thank-you to all the Forman/Tucker/Schamharts, with a special callout to Ruth Forman. My mother had her first bypass surgery at forty-eight, and though this book is dedicated to my daughters, it was inspired by her.
As for my daughters, Willa and Denbele, and their father, Nick, my husband and partner for so many years now: You are the people I run toward.
GAYLE FORMAN is a journalist and an award-winning author whose many young adult novels include I Was Here, Just One Day, and If I Stay, which was also a major motion picture. She lives in Brooklyn w
ith her family. Her website is www.gayleforman.com. (Author photo by Stomping Ground Photo.)
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Published by
Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
Post Office Box 2225
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a division of
Workman Publishing
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© 2016 by Gayle Forman.
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. While, as in all fiction, the literary perceptions and insights are based on experience, all names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
eISBN 978-1-61620-648-2
Gayle Forman, Leave Me
(Series: # )
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