The Truth About Tara

Jack nodded at the sketch. “That isn’t Tara.”

The waitress took another look before she put the paper back down. “I’m a little farsighted, but that sure looks like her to me.”

Jack thought of all the other false leads that his sister was chasing down. “Turns out lots of people look like this woman.”

The waitress tilted her head. “Is that the reason you’re on the Eastern Shore? Because you’re searching for the woman in the photo?”

“Not even close.” Jack folded the paper and put it back into his pocket. The waitress regarded him expectantly, waiting for him to expand on his reply.

It wouldn’t hurt to tell her at least part of the truth, Jack thought.

He dredged up his favorite line from the inspirational poem he’d hung in his locker after his first shoulder surgery, the one about sticking to the fight when you’re hardest hit.

“I’m here because I still believe in myself,” he said.

The orthopedist in Owensboro had written him off, but Jack hadn’t lasted almost ten years in the minor leagues by giving up when the going got tough.

Quitting had never been an option before.

It wasn’t now, either.

* * *

LAUGHTER AND EXUBERANT shouts rang out from the field adjacent to Wawpaney Elementary. Sixteen kindergartners, eight to a side, swarmed around the soccer ball. Tara referred to the phenomenon as the clump. No matter how many times she explained spacing to the children, they abandoned the knowledge in favor of running to where the action was.

Tara watched from the sideline, leaving the whistle hanging from the lanyard around her neck. With summer vacation only hours away, she decided in favor of fun and exercise over the fine points of playing soccer. She opted against telling them to tone it down, too. They probably wouldn’t be able to, anyway.

Especially Bryan, who did everything with gusto. He was only five, just a few years older than Hayley Cooper had been when she’d been snatched from the mall, yet he had a stronger personality than most adults.

All of the children were distinct.

Dwayne could run faster than his classmates. Ashley was more interested in the flight of a shorebird than the game. Jorge was half a head shorter than everybody else but made up for it by trying the hardest.

Observing the children made what the stranger had suggested this morning even more preposterous. Surely any one of her students would know if they’d been taken against their will from a shopping mall only two short years before. They’d know if their mother wasn’t really their mother—even if, like Tara, they’d never seen a baby photo of themselves.

“Tara!” Mary Dee Larson, the kindergarten teacher who was Tara’s best friend on the staff, approached from the direction of the sprawling brick school. She wasn’t any taller than five foot two, but her short, quick steps ate up the ground. Tara had avoided her since earlier that morning when Mary Dee alerted her that she expected to get the scoop on the hot guy she’d seen Tara talking to. Mary Dee wouldn’t interrupt Tara’s PE class to talk men, though. She wouldn’t be walking so fast, either.

“Your mom’s waiting for you in the school office.” Mary Dee was slightly out of breath, concern pinching her sharp features. “She says it’s an emergency.”

Tara’s heart sped up. Her mother called and left urgent messages at least once or twice a week. However, she rarely stopped by the school. “Did she say what kind of emergency?”

Mary Dee shook her head, rustling her silky black hair. “I didn’t ask. I just volunteered to come get you and keep an eye on your class.”

“Thanks.” Tara took off at a jog, her head emptying of the questions about her childhood she’d intended to ask her mother. They seemed unimportant now.

She burst through the double doors and hurried along the wide empty hall, the soles of her tennis shoes squeaking on the tile floor. A colorful Enjoy Your Summer! banner hung on the wall outside the office. Beside it stood Tara’s mother.

She was dressed in the same flowing print dress she’d worn that morning to her job at the bakery. With flyaway long blond hair she couldn’t manage to tame, her mom never looked quite pulled together. She seemed even less so now, with her lipstick worn off and her hands fluttering.

“Tara, honey!” Her mother rushed forward to meet Tara, the skirt of her dress flowing behind her. Though she’d spoken only two words, her North Carolina drawl came through loud and clear. In her wedged sandals, she was still a good four inches shorter than Tara. “I know you’re busy, but I just had to come on over here and see you.”

Her mom seemed physically fine, eliminating one of Tara’s worries. On the heels of it came another.

“Did something happen to Danny?” Tara asked, referring to the ten-year-old who was her mother’s latest foster child. Her mom had hooked up with the program the same year Tara went off to college, which was already a dozen years ago.

“Why ever would you think something like that?” Her mother sounded truly stumped. “Danny’s fine as can be.”

Tara felt her pulse rate slow down. “Then what is it?”

Her mother tapped her index finger against her lips, the way she did when she was thinking about how to phrase something. What would Mom consider an emergency? Tara wondered.

“Wait a minute. Why aren’t you at work?”

“Would you believe Mr. Calvert said no when I asked for time off this summer to be around for Danny?” her mother asked, her tone conversational. “What could I do but quit?”

Tara let out a surprised, involuntary breath. “But you loved that job.”

“I liked it,” her mother corrected. “I never will put work before family. Danny needs me, the same way you did when you were younger.”

While Tara was growing up, her mother had switched jobs as often as some women changed hairstyles. Her mom had once walked away from the reception desk of a dental office because she couldn’t get permission to leave early to attend Tara’s high school volleyball game. Another time she’d quit her job at the grocery store to go on a school field trip to the National Wildlife Refuge.

Tara swallowed a sigh. “I wish you’d talked it over with me first. I already told you I could help out with Danny this summer.”

“Then what I did wasn’t so awful, now was it?” Her mother grabbed Tara’s upper arm and squeezed. Finally, Tara thought. Her mother was ready to reveal the reason she’d come to the school. “It’s about that summer day camp where I want to send Danny.”

“The one in Cape Charles that’s just starting out?”

“That’s the one.” Her mother clapped her hands. “I volunteered to help and got a break on Danny’s tuition!”

Tara would bet anything there was more to the story. If all her mother had to report was good news, she would have waited until Tara arrived home from school.

“What aren’t you telling me?” Tara asked.

Her mom sucked in a breath through her teeth. “I volunteered you, too.”

“You what?”

“Before you say anything else, hear me out.” Her mother talked so fast her words tripped over each other. “You know how hard it is to find a camp for children like Danny. This one’s a gift from God, being that it’s new and fifteen miles away in Cape Charles. There are only ten children signed up, but they still need lots of volunteer counselors. With your background, why, you’re perfect. So I filled out the paperwork for both of us.”

Tara could have predicted the next answer, but asked the question, anyway. “When is this camp?”

“It starts Monday and goes for two weeks. But you don’t have to be there all day, every day.” Her mother worried her bottom lip with her teeth. “Orientation’s at seven o’clock tonight. Now you see why I had to rush on over here and tell you?”

Tara sighed. “You could have told me before today.”

“I know, honey. I should have,” her mom said. “I was so excited for Danny when I heard about the camp that I didn’t think. And you will be able to get time off here and there to do all those other things you do.”

Tara worked at some businesses in the summer on an as-needed basis to help out friends and keep busy, but in order to volunteer at the camp she’d have to cancel the kayaking trip she’d impulsively booked. But then, Tara hadn’t shared her plans with her mother yet.