Athena

56. Road Trip

Holy shit.

This is way too much fuckery for me to process. I can't wrap my mind around the suddenness of these bombshells. My brain turns to mush.

"I don't know what to think," I whisper hoarsely.

My dad looks concerned and confused. "What do you mean?"

I don't know if I trust this woman who claims to be my great aunt.

Grimacing, I ask, "How did... Nascha Benally... even find you?"

Her name feels foreign on my tongue even though we share blood. Allegedly. 

"I think she was working with a private investigator."

Sounds shady. "A private investigator?"

"That's what Nascha told me," my dad admits. "Honestly, I don't know much about the behind-the-scene details. I only spoke to her on the phone for, maybe, twenty minutes or so. But I think we should go meet Nascha. Face to face. And hear more from her side of the story."

The steady, unbothered tone of his voice sounds as though we're trying to schedule a lunch date and not a meeting with a long-lost relative who might let him wash his hands of me. A tide of outrage and mortification threaten to overwhelm my emotions.

I can't believe my dad is so ready to ship me off to a complete stranger!

Tightly, I demand, "Are you sure I'm related to this woman? You know that Mom grew up in foster homes. She never knew her family. What if Nascha is a liar?"

"Well," he mumbles in a way that doesn't instill any confidence in me whatsoever, "anything is possible, I guess. But I think she might be the real deal. After I got off the phone with Nascha, she emailed me copies of your grandmother's birth certificate and your mom's birth certificate. The documents look legit to me."

With a somber expression, I request, "I want to see them."

My dad takes out his phone and taps his way through his inbox to pull up two different email attachments from n.benally@hotmail.com. They're certificates of live birth.

I scan the first document with a quickening pulse.

Name?

Apparently, my grandma's name was Doli Benally.

Place of birth?

She was born in Chinle, Arizona at the Chinle Comprehensive Health Care Facility.

As my eyes dance across the text, every detail that's revealed on this document hits me hard. My heart wrenches with regret. If only my mom was still around. If only I could pass this precious information on to her. My mom had always wanted to learn more about her mom. About her roots. About all of the family and traditions that had been lost to her when she entered the foster care system.

I switch over to inspect the second birth certificate. My mom's birth certificate. I've never seen it before but I know the basics of her profile, like, her full legal name, birth date, and place of birth.

Name?

Heidi James.

Place of birth?

Lakewood, New Jersey.

Mother's name?

Doli Benally.

Father's name?

Winston James.

Damn.

My dad wasn't wrong. These facts on my mom's certificate seem to check out. Nascha's documents do appear official. I start considering the possibility that this stranger might be my biological relative. As my paranoia relaxes by a fraction, several pressing questions form in my head: Why did my grandma and grandpa give up my mom to foster care? Where was my grandma now? Was she still alive? Why did Nascha want me to live with her? Did she have good intentions? Or shady ones?