Page 28 of The Hampton Beach Café 3

"What? Why!?"

She should have stayed silent, she judged from the narrowing of Kennedy's eyes.

"Because I had to stay," she said, her voice wavering. "I had to stay home because my forty-two-year-old mom was pregnant and she had...complications. Complications and no one to look after her because my dad left when he found out."

The smell of gin and lime hit her nose as Frances lifted a shaking glass to her lips. She tried to swallow the bitter concoction but it caught in her throat and she coughed hard against it. She didn't know what Kennedy was about to say, but she was starting to understand.

"When?" she asked in a strangled voice. "When did he leave?"

Kennedy leaned back in her chair, slouching for the first time since they had been reacquainted.

"Almost exactly a month after yours did."

They stared at each other silently for several long moments.

"But that doesn't explain why you hated me in high school..."

Kennedy scoffed, swiping her Pina Colada off the table and taking another huge sip.

"You think that was the first time?" she asked sharply. "My dad went on a 'long business trip' when I was twelve. I was a lot of things in high school but I was never stupid. I knew why he left. Then when he came back six months later and asked me if anyone had been visiting the house while he was gone, I said no because I wanted him to come back. I lied."

"You lied?" she echoed.

"Lied," Kennedy confirmed. "Your father was always popping by, helping out, fixing things. Then when my dad came back, it stopped. For a while."

Every word Kennedy said hit her like a punch in the gut. The nausea was building again and she wasn't sure that she would make it outside to throw up in the street but she was sure she wouldn't make it to the bathroom on the other side of the packed restaurant.

"I hated you because I thought you were like me, that you knew…" Kennedy said, "…your father broke up my family, and as much as I wanted to hate William too, when he was born I just couldn't. Mom never got over any of it. I gave up on college, the plans I'd made, and dreams I'd had. Instead, I loved William and raised him. I made sure he got into whatever school he wanted, and part of me was hurt when he chose Yale, but I got over it. He's getting to live the life I had stolen from me. I've never had kids of my own. Your father took that from me, too."

Frances really did think she was going to be sick, but what made it worse was that as much as she wanted to deny it and defend her dad, some part of her knew that it was the truth. Kennedy stood, finishing off her Pina Colada. With a loud bang, she put the glass down, turned, and left without saying another word to Frances.

The timings all added up, the frequent business trips when she was younger, the black eye story just before he left, all of it. Did she even still want to find him? Thinking about the apparently blank letters he had sent her that she'd never seen, the journals documenting her mom's hunt for him that spanned over a decade, and the abrupt halt in her obsession. Frances knew that even though she had some answers, there was a lot more that she didn't know, and that she needed to find out.