She smiles. “Small towns do have a way of keeping tabs, but I’d prefer to hear your version of events as well as anything pertinent to help your case.”
I lean back in my chair. “Then I might need a coffee after all.”
Ashlee opens a drawer and pulls out a bottle of whiskey. “Coffee with a kick?”
A shocked laugh bursts out of me. If it weren’t official before, I kind of love my lawyer. “I’ve got to pick up Jo in a bit, so I better stick to caffeine. But you might need that drink.”
Most of a coffee (me) and a whiskey (Ashlee) later, I finish my soap opera of a life story. “What do you think? Should we call Maury or Dr. Phil?” I brush my bangs out of my eyes and set my empty mug down on the desk.
“That’s definitely some drama. I’m sorry for what you’ve been through,” Ashlee says with a sad shake of her head.
The overview is that my sister started drinking and using drugs at thirteen, ran away at fourteen, came back, and left again at sixteen. She showed up on Mama’s porch two years later with an infant. Rachel disappeared again almost as fast. I skipped my college graduation, gave up my post-college dreams, and moved back home to help Mama raise Jo. Then Mama was diagnosed with early onset dementia, which left me in charge of my niece and my mother.
“You’re a writer, right?” When I nod, Ashlee gives me a kind smile. “Maybe you should think about a memoir.”
I’m not sure if she’s kidding or not, but the last thing I want to do is write my life story. Plus, I’m not that kind of writer. I had planned to be a travel writer, penning pieces focused around cultural geography and human interest. Thanks to a professor’s recommendation, I landed the kind of lucky job no one gets right out of college writing for a magazine. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but even that was worth giving up for Jo.
Now, I’m a freelancer, writing illustrious pieces of Buzzfeed journalism such as “The Hottest Leading Men in ’80s Movies Ranked by Mustache” and “What Jurassic World Dinosaur You Are Based on Enneagram Type.” It would be quite the leap to go to long-form, book content.
Even if I wanted to write it, no one wants the story of a twenty-seven-year-old woman scraping by in a small town while raising her niece. There is no action or adventure and definitely no romance. My two best friends, Winnie and Val, who aren’t sidekicks so much as the other members of the Three Musketeers. As of right now, a happy ending is questionable.
What can I say? My pessimism ate my optimism for breakfast.
“I think I’d need to change the ending to sell it.” I tap a finger on my chin. “Come to think of it, maybe I’d change the middle and the beginning too.”
Ashlee laughs softly. “I’ve heard a lot of stories over the years. Each is unique, but they carry a few common threads. One of them is that we humans can either be very kind or very cruel to each other, as well as to ourselves.”
Beautiful, whip-smart, and insightfully sensitive? Ashlee Belle really deserves better than our tiny, dying town.
I take a sip of my coffee, which has cooled considerably. How long was I talking? I really should have given Ashlee the short version of my story since I’m paying her by the hour. And her hours are not cheap.
“Do you think we could make a case for abandonment?” I ask, not wanting to mention the many google searches I’ve done on this subject the last few days. “Didn’t Rachel essentially give up her parental rights when she left Jo?”
Seems logical to me. Leave your child for five years without so much as a phone call—BOOM. You have abdicated your throne of parenthood. Thanks for playing. Goodbye.
Ashlee’s smile is tight. “Unfortunately, it’s not automatic. There is a whole process to terminate parental rights. You are the sole managing conservator, correct?”
“Yes.”
Ashlee takes a moment to weigh out her next words, which makes worry start spreading through me like a fast-acting fungus. “Can I ask why you didn’t ever file to adopt Jo?” She asks the question delicately, but all the tact in the world couldn’t make it land softly.
“I should have,” I tell her with a helpless shrug.
I wanted to—I still want to. The whole thing is just … complicated. When Mama started going downhill, I found and filed all the forms online to transfer the conservatorship to me, feeling like I deserved a merit badge on my vest of adulthood. But apparently, I should have taken things a few steps further to protect Jo. I never thought Rachel would seek custody.
There is not a chapter in any parenting book addressing my complex situation, so I had to wing it. I’m sure I’ve made and will continue to make a lot of mistakes. From the start, I had Jo call me Aunt Lindy. I was just a kid myself, only twenty-two, and the idea of being anyone’s mom freaked me out. I never lied about Rachel and Jo knows as much as a brilliant and precocious five-year-old has any business knowing.
She may not call me Mom, but Jo is like a daughter to me. She is everything. Something shifted deep inside me the very first moment I held her. She stared up at me, clutching my pinky in her tiny fist, and that was it. As far as I’m concerned, Jo has been mine since that moment, just as I’ve been hers.
“Without support or good counsel, the process can be overwhelming,” Ashlee says.
And expensive, though that’s not the reason I never took that final step. Honestly, I’m not exactly sure why I started hyperventilating every time I considered officially filing to adopt Jo.
My old therapist had some suggestions. Namely that after everything I’ve been through, I have commitment issues. It would be shocking if I didn’t. My dad left right after Rachel was born and died a few years later in a car wreck. Rachel left again and again. Mama may not have had a choice, but in a way, her dementia means she left me too.