Chapter Thirty-Six
Thirty-Six
The moment Stella asked about Max’s past, it was like something inside him cracked open and he didn’t know how to close it back up.
Max’s parents had put both him and Miles in therapy when they were kids to deal with the trauma of losing their mother so suddenly and then being adopted and brought to a new country, all within a month.
Thanks to that, he felt mostly well adjusted and didn’t spend too much time dwelling on his past, because he didn’t see the point in it.
What happened happened, and now he was here with his brother and they had a good life. There was no point in getting caught up in what could’ve been or what their life was like before.
However, as he sat across from Stella at dinner, waiting for their drinks to arrive, the silence between them growing, Max struggled to find a way to start telling her what had happened.
He flinched when he felt Stella’s hand cover his. She jerked her hand back.
“Sorry,” she said.
Max took her hand, turning it over in his, and lacing their fingers together.
“No, I’m sorry,” he said. “I got lost in my head for a bit there.”
Stella smiled, although her face was lined with concern.
“I shouldn’t have brought up your adoption,” she said. “It was so random, and I don’t even know why I asked. You don’t have to tell me anything you’re not ready to share, Max. We’ve only known each other for a few weeks.”
“Has it really only been that long?”
“I think so.” Stella tilted her head, seeming to do some calculations in her head. “We met on Valentine’s Day, and it’s not March fourteenth yet, so it’s only been a few weeks.”
“I feel like I’ve known you longer than that,” he said.
Stella smiled genuinely then. “I do, too.”
“Are you two ready to order?”
The waiter had returned and set down their drinks in front of them. Max and Stella ordered their food and waited until the waiter was out of earshot before resuming their conversation, although they both attempted to speak at the same time.
“I don’t—”
“What if we—”
They both stopped and laughed.
“You go first,” Max said, waving his free hand toward her.
Stella shook her head. “Nope, you go.”
“Alright,” he said. “I was going to say I don’t know where to start. How much do you want to know?”
“However much you want to share,” Stella said. “Or how little. I’ll just listen.”
She rubbed her thumb over the back of his hand, soothing him, and he was grateful for her touch.
Max inhaled deeply, straightening in his chair.
“Okay, well, I should start by saying that this isn’t the happiest story, although maybe that goes without saying since I ended up here,” he said.
Stella only nodded and squeezed his hand, and it felt like she was saying, “I’m with you.”
“It was just me, my mom, and Miles together in DR,” he said.
“My dad was a fisherman, and he died soon after Miles was born, out on the water. I’m not sure about the rest of our family.
I vaguely remember there being cousins, or kids we used to play with.
But after my mom passed, no one stepped up to take us.
It’s possible they simply couldn’t afford to. I’m not sure.”
“Have you ever tried to look and see if you could find any other family?” Stella asked, breaking her silence.
“No,” he said. “I know Miles was toying with the idea of doing DNA testing at one point, but if he ever did or if he found anything, he never shared it with me.”
Stella only nodded and waited for him to continue.
“Anyway, it was just the three of us,” he said.
“We lived in San Pedro de Macorís, right by the beach. My mother worked as a maid in a resort that was more inland and as a cook in one of the little restaurants in our neighborhood. Our house was small, and Miles and I shared a room, but it was good. I remember that it was good.”
Max’s voice caught on the words, and he had to swallow past a lump in his throat to keep going. Stella didn’t speak but stood and moved her chair so she was on his right instead of directly across from him. Taking his hand again, she rested it in her lap, waiting for him to find the words.
“I’m sure things weren’t perfect,” he continued. “My mother was like me. Dark skin and dark eyes. I remember asking her once if we were Haitian because some kid said we were, even though at best he was maybe a shade or two lighter than me.”
“What did she say?” Stella asked.
Max chuckled. “She said maybe we were, somewhere far down the line. She said that we all shared the island, and the only thing that separated Haiti from the Dominican Republic was a line in the sand. All she knew was that she was born and raised Dominicana, she spoke Spanish not Creole, and no color of her skin would change that.”
Stella squeezed his hand. “That’s a really good answer.”
“Yeah, I thought so.” He closed his eyes.
“You know what’s crazy? I can remember playing on the beach, the smell of the ocean, and my mother’s mofongo.
But sometimes I can’t remember her face.
I have a few pictures, but conjuring her face in my head is hard sometimes.
I don’t know why I can remember some things so clearly, but her face seems to always be slipping farther and farther away. ”
“I think our senses can be weird like that,” Stella said. “Smells and tastes linger more in our minds than what we see. Or at least I think I read that somewhere. Don’t quote me.”
Their food arrived then, and they paused their conversation. Once the waiter disappeared again, Max continued.
“She was never sick,” he said. “My mom, I mean. She didn’t seem sick. But one day she just collapsed. One second she was in the kitchen making breakfast, and the next I couldn’t see her. It was like she disappeared. I didn’t even hear her fall.”
This time Stella wrapped her arms around him.
Max could feel the eyes of the other patrons and the staff on them, but he didn’t care.
He accepted her embrace, pulling her into his arms as he swallowed the tears that threatened to fall.
Hugs were fine, but he wasn’t about to have an emotional breakdown in the middle of some Italian restaurant in Brooklyn.
When he finally let Stella go, he pushed out the rest of the story, ready to be done with it.
“She had a heart attack,” he said. “Later, when we were in high school, my parents explained to us that she’d died from undetected congenital heart disease.
There had been something wrong with her aortic valve since she was born, but no one knew so she’d never been treated or monitored.
My parents had both of us tested soon after our adoption to make sure we didn’t have it, too.
“We don’t,” Max quickly added at the look of concern on Stella’s face. “I’m fine. But it is genetic, so it’s something I’ll have to look for if I ever have kids.”
“I’m so sorry, Max,” Stella said.
“Thanks,” he said. “It was a long time ago, but…thanks.”
Stella nodded. “I kind of wish I hadn’t brought all this up. I feel like I really killed the vibe.”
“Don’t be,” he said. He leaned over and tugged a stray braid behind her ear, pulling her close to him.
“I don’t know if I ever would’ve told you if you hadn’t asked,” he said. “And I want you to know everything about me. Not just the hot, nerdy-guy parts.”
Stella raised her brows. “Who called you hot?”
“So many people,” he said. “I’m pretty sure my sixth-grade teacher took one look at me and said, ‘What a hot young man that is.’ ”
“Sixth grade? I think that’s illegal.”
Max shrugged. “She was only stating the obvious.”
Stella gave him the most incredulous look, but when he kissed her, she ended up laughing against his lips.
“You’re so ridiculous,” she said when he pulled back.
“Maybe, but you love it.”
Her face grew serious, and Max worried he had somehow said the wrong thing, but then she said, “Yeah, I guess I do.”