Page 40 of Kiwi Gold
Drake had looked one step from combat since I’d turned up here with Laila. Now, his body language changed entirely. He said, “Laila.Jenta mi.Something I need to tell you. I …”
The doors behind him opened as they’d been doing all along, a stream of people in and out on this Friday evening. Now, though, Lexi charged through them and over to us and said, “Lachlan, are you ever coming inside? We need to tell Mumnow,because Sperm Daddy’s due any minute.”
I could’ve laughed at the look on Drake’s face. Horrified, I think was the word. I half thought he was going to bolt. Who knows what would’ve happened if Laila hadn’t been here. Fatherhood won out, though, because he said, “I’m, uh …” A long, long pause. “Him,” he finally came up with.
Lexi said, “You are? Well … cool.” She stuck her hands in the back pockets of her jeans and tossed her short, shaggy, straight ginger hair a bit. She had the palest hair of all of them, a sort of blonde/red thing not far off from Drake’s. She was trying to be blasé about this, though I couldn’t see how you’d manage it. She said, “So Lachlan already knew? You could’ve told us, Lachlan.”
“No,” I said. “Found out like you did. Just now.”
“Wait,” Laila said slowly. “Wait.”
Lexi looked at her with too much interest, and I thought,This is why I don’t bring dates around my sisters. Especially notfirstdates, and I’ve never had one like this,and instead of waiting for what she’d say, I talked instead. “My sister, Lexi,” I said. “My date, Laila. Laila Ashford.” I paused, and then said deliberately, “Laila Drake. Torsten Drake’s daughter. And Torsten Drake himself. Your … birth father. And it’s a good thing I’m here with you to tell Mum, because you may not know this, but Torsten Drake was Dad’s best friend. Until he wasn’t.”
* * *
Laila
Wait.Wait.
I waited, but received absolutely no clarity. Too many relationships, and the one thing overshadowing them all. The big thing.
My dad had been asperm donor?Lachlan’s sisters were hischildren?
Wait, that wasn’t the big thing.
My dad had been asperm donor?
Dad said, “One thing at a time.”
“You’re right,” Lachlan said. “I need to go warn Mum, and you need to talk to Laila. Let’s go, Lexi.”
Dad frowned at him, and I thought I knew why. Baba—my dad—was the one who decided, who got things sorted. But he wasn’t the one with that kind of mana in this family. Lachlan was. Except that my dad was … the dad.
If I’d had a seat to sink into, I’d have done it. Lachlan told me, “If you need me, text me, and I’ll be out straightaway.” My dad glowered at him, and I thought I knew why this time, too.
This part? It was about me.
Dad waited until Lachlan and Lexi were gone, the girl turning to look back at him, possibly hardly believing her luck. My dad was big, strong, endlessly competent, and utterly reassuring. He was Dad material all the way.
To hisother four daughters.
He said, “I know it looks bad. But listen.”
We were still outside the brewpub, and, worse, outside the brewpub’s huge windows. Dad’s … daughters … could probably see us having this conversation. I did my best to pull my focus back.
He said,“Jenta mi.Listen to me.”My daughter,that meant, in Norwegian. My special name with him, but I wasn’t the only one anymore. And still, he was doing what he always had, starting with the day he’d told me my mother was dead. Focusing my attention on him, and then reassuring me that he’d always love me, and he’d always be there.
Even though our parentswouldn’talways be there, and I knew it.
He was still talking. “You’re my daughter. Nothing’s changed.”
I tried to smile. “‘Being jealous or envious of others will rot your heart. Ask Allah to increase His blessings on them and watch your heart blossom instead.’” A favorite saying of Mama’s. “I’ll try, anyway,” I finished, because I was no kind of saint, and my heart was perfectly capable of harboring blame and bitterness.
He didn’t smile. “I need to go in there and meet them, but I need to tell you first. I didn’t feel like I had a choice. Texas, grad school, all of it—I was drowning. I was so far from giving your mum the life she’d known, the life I’d promised her. And then there was you. I had a scholarship and loans, and they weren’t enough. So I sold my plasma.” Another breath. “And my sperm. Not once. As often as I could do it. I’d have sold something else, everything else, but there was nothing left to sell.”
I said, “Did Mama know, when you did it?”
“No.”The word was almost an explosion. “How could I tell her? I was …” He stopped, and I thought,You were ashamed. And you’d promised to live a Muslim life for her.
