The Other Brother (34 page)
"Hang on, Isaiah!"
"See you ... little brother .. " Smiling dreamily, Isaiah closed his eyes.
He was dead.
Gabriel wept. He wept for the mother he had never known, and the twin brother he'd known far too briefly and tragically.
Most of all, he wept for the terrible, cruel hand life had dealt them.
You always were the lucky one....
But to go on living with the truth seemed the worst luck of all.
Again, Isaiah was in total darkness, traveling toward an uncertain future.
He'd vowed to get revenge on his father, but his father had proven wilier than he had ever counted on. Bastard had stabbed him.
And then there had been Gabriel. His damned twin, caught in the middle of the mess, none of what had happened to either of them his fault.
Why hadn't he figured it out? He remembered how Mama would sometimes study the photos of Gabriel, well dressed and prosperous, that Isaiah would clip from business magazines. At the time, he'd assumed she was questioning why Isaiah had not managed to plot a similarly successful course in his own life. He'd never imagined the truth: she was looking at pictures of her other son.
Mama, I'm sorry, I failed.
A pinpoint of brightness appeared far ahead. As he rushed toward it, helpless to change direction or slow his speed, the light grew larger and brighter, expanding into a gigantic doorway.
Mama's face spun through his field of vision like a moon. Her sad, tired face. But then her lips turned up into a soft smile of approval and he wondered: had he truly failed?
Mama actually looked proud.
No, he thought. I did the best thing I could have done. It was better than killing Pops.
T.L. Reid would live the remainder of his life with the knowledge that he had murdered his own son.
Isaiah merged into the light and the fate that awaited him on the other side.
Twenty minutes later an ambulance and policemen arrived. Gabriel and Pops explained what had happened. The police did not arrest Pops. His claim-and Gabriel corroborated it-was self-defense.
Driving, Gabriel followed the ambulance from a distance. He half expected Isaiah to return miraculously from the dead, to burst from the back doors of the vehicle.
Nothing happened.
Isaiah Battle was gone forever.
Chapter 7 5
week later, they buried Isaiah in the family plot in a cemetery outside Atlanta. Gabriel, Pops, Mom, Nicole, and Dana were the only ones in attendance at the funeral.
After the burial they returned to the house of Gabriel's parents for dinner. It was a somber gathering; their conversation was subdued, as though they worried about disturbing someone who slept in a nearby room.
The death of a family member, even someone as misguided and troubled as Isaiah had been, had a sobering effect on all of them.
Gabriel, for his part, had been in a melancholy mood all week. Trying to piece together his shattered life. Trying to absorb the truth. Trying to move on.
Gabriel's telekinesis had gone into remission. He suspected, this time, that it would never return. He no longer glimpsed any spectral figures in mirrors either.
Without Isaiah, the other half of him, there was no need for such things.
After dinner Mom excused herself to go to the bathroom. Gabriel waited for her in the hallway outside the bathroom door. Mom emerged a few minutes later and looked at him with concern.
"What's wrong, baby?" she asked.
He had been waiting to discuss this subject with her again. Waiting for the opportunity, and waiting, most of all, until he was ready to talk about it. Now was the time.
"Pops told me everything, Mom," he said.
"I know." She sighed. "Come sit with me for a little bit, okay?"
They went upstairs to her private study. Mom removed a familiar volume from one of the bookshelves: a large, leather-bound photo album. Opening it, she sat on the sofa and patted the cushion beside her, inviting him to join her. After a moment's hesitation, he did.
Mom turned to his newborn-baby pictures. He was a honey-skinned baby with a smear of dark, curly hair.
"You were such an adorable baby," Mom said. "The first time I laid eyes on you, I fell in love. While I didn't agree with what your father had done, I realized you were a gift. I promised the Lord I would raise you as my own."
"I'm not angry with you," Gabriel said. "You'll always be Mom to me"
"But you have questions," Mom said.
"Yes," he said. "Like my birth certificate, for instance. You're listed as my mother, and my birthplace is listed as Grady hospital, here in Atlanta, not someplace in Chicago."
"Part of the agreement between me and your father," Mom said, "is that we would have to create a background that could stand up to scrutiny. Your father is a well-connected, successful businessman. A man like him can get any paperwork you need"
Gabriel had expected as much. Pops never had any problem using his status to pull strings.
"But didn't family and friends question it?" he asked. "I mean, one day you suddenly show up with a newborn baby. Someone had to ask you about me"
"Although your father and I met in college here in Atlanta, shortly after we married we moved back to Texas, where both of us are originally from, and where our families and closest friends resided. Well, soon after you were born, we decided that returning to Atlanta would diffuse the controversy and the prying questions. So we moved here almost immediately after we took custody of you. Things were better that way."
"Did you know about Isaiah, too?"
"Your father never told me the woman had twins. That's why I was so shocked when Isaiah arrived. I had no idea he existed."
"Then Pops lied to you for years, too"
"He could have done the righteous thing and given me the whole truth, yes," Mom said. Her face reflected years of repressed pain.
"I risked my life to save him." Gabriel clenched his hand into a fist. "But he's been lying to all of us from the beginning. This is all his fault."
Mom placed her hand atop his, loosened his fist with soothing rubs. "Your father is a complex man. Full of contradictions. You were correct to go there to help him. He needed you then, and he needs you now, more than you realize."
"What does he need me for? I'm starting to really doubt that I need him at all."
"Our children are our conscience," Mom said. "They remind us of the values we're supposed to hold dear. Sometimes we fail but so long as our children are in our lives, we never forget our responsibility to them and ourselves."
"I'm not sure I understand that, Mom, but thanks for the words of wisdom anyway."
"You'll understand once you have your own children," she said. "Now, hold on one moment, lest I make a liar of myself."
Mom walked across the room and opened a file cabinet. She took out a manila folder and gave it to him.
It contained an obituary for Naomi Battle.
"I must counsel you to do the proper thing," Mom said. "Pay your respects to your birth mother, Gabriel."
Clasping the folder to his side, Gabriel left his mother's study and went downstairs.
He located his father in the grand salon. His back facing Gabriel, Pops stood silently at the large window, sipping cognac.
Ever since the events at the cabin, the past couple of times Gabriel had seen his father at home, a glass of liquor was always within his reach, and Gabriel wondered if his father had resolved to heal himself-or kill himself-through the bottle.
Your father is a complex man. Full of contradictions.
Pops turned, noted Gabriel's presence. He nodded slightly.
Gabriel nodded, too.
He loved his father. He hated his father.
But through it all, T.L. Reid was still his father. And he always would be.
A week later, Gabriel and Dana took a flight to Chicago. They visited Mt. Olive Cemetery, on the Southside.
Kneeling, Gabriel placed a bouquet of fresh carnations on his mother's grave. He lowered his head.
"Thank you," he said softly to the mother he had never known.
In October, Gabriel and Dana wed.
Although they already had been together for three years, when they married, they discovered new depths in their love for each other. Gabriel found unexpected strength and security in loving someone, unconditionally, and knowing in his heart that she felt the same about him-with no lies and illusions clouding the air between them.
At home late one evening, about a year into their marriage, Dana sat next to Gabriel on the sofa and told him, with tears glittering in her eyes, that she was pregnant. Jubilant, he swept her off her feet and carried her across the room, making such a joyful ruckus that their new dog, Nia, a rambunctious yellow Labrador, regarded them as if they had lost their minds.
The following summer, nine months after Dana's announcement and a surprisingly easy labor, Dana gave birth.
To twin girls.
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