Happy Holidays!
Today I'm thrilled to bring you an offering of fiction.
Meg Perry, author of the Jamie Brodie mystery series has contributed a wee bit of a story called "Paternity" which crosses the worlds of Jamie Brodie with that of Adrien English. Grab yourself a nice hot cuppa and duck down behind your cubicle for a few enjoyable minutes of holiday cheer.
Paternity
Young Research Library, UCLA
The end of each
term in an academic library is an idyllic time...for the librarians. Students
are furiously writing final papers and studying for exams, fueled by vast
quantities of caffeine and panic. Instructors are buried to their elbows in
those papers and exams, up against the university’s deadline for turning in
grades, bitching to whomever will listen about how much student writing sucks.
At the library
reference desk, however, a sense of peace reigns. The students’ research is
done; they couldn’t write those final papers otherwise. Faculty are too busy
grading papers to work on their own writing and research.
We librarians
still cover our reference shifts, though; right up until the library closes for
the holidays. Just in case.
It was December.
There were two days left in fall quarter. It was nearing 2:00 when the kid
approached the desk. Clinton Kenneally had already come, bestowed upon us his
word of the day (levivah, meaning a
fried potato pancake served on Hanukkah), and gone. I was scooted back from the
desk, my feet propped on the garbage can, reading an advance copy of Oscar Wilde and Classical Antiquity.
Beside me, Liz Nguyen was on her phone, in a five-way text conversation with
her mom, aunt, and cousins about Christmas dinner.
The kid - young
man - that appeared before us seemed to be agitated, yet also came across as
oddly defiant. He was older than an undergraduate. He was tall and blond, with
wispy facial hair. His deep tan didn’t fit with his overall presentation, which
was that of a roadie for an impoverished garage band. He was wearing baggy
black pants, a green t-shirt with a peace symbol, a ratty gray hoodie, and John
Lennon glasses complete with blue lenses.
He looked vaguely
familiar. That wasn’t surprising. If he was a UCLA student, he’d probably
visited the reference desk before.
His straggly hair
was flopping into his eyes, and he kept pushing it out of the way. He planted
himself in front of us, looking back and forth between Liz and me, his
expression a mixture of anguish and challenge.
Liz dropped her
phone into her lap; I lowered my feet from the garbage can and swung around to
face front. Liz said, “Hi. Can we help you?”
“You have to help me.”
Liz had been in a
snarky mood all day. I saw her tip her head to respond in a manner that might
not be entirely empathetic, and
jumped in before she could. “That’s what we’re here for. What can we do for
you?”
“I need
information about paternity testing.”
Okay, that wasn’t a query we’d heard before,
here in the graduate social sciences library. I said, “Did you know that we
have a medical library on campus? They might…”
“No.” He gripped the edge of our desk,
his knuckles white. “I need information for laypeople. I need to be able to understand it. But it has to be peer
reviewed.”
So he knew what
peer review was. He must be a graduate student. I said, “Why don’t you sit
down?”
He glared at me.
“Can you help me or not?” His voice
cracked on the word not.
I figured the guy
either needed a hug or a whack in the head. I tried to project an air of calm
and serenity. “Yes, and I’m going to, but it’ll take a few minutes. Why don’t
you sit down? You’ll be more comfortable.” As would I.
He dropped
heavily into the chair across from me. I wiggled my mouse to activate the
screen and re-entered my credentials. “I’m Jamie, and this is Liz. What’s your
name?”
“Angus.” He
started gnawing on the knuckle of his left forefinger.
I adopted my
finest Highland accent. “Aye, it’s a good Scottish name, that.”
He blinked at me.
“What?”
“Never mind.” I
turned to the king of general-subject databases, Academic Search Complete, and
typed paternity testing.
Apropos of
nothing, it seemed, Angus asked me, “Do you have a girlfriend?”
“Uh - no.” I held
up my left hand. “Married to a man.”
Liz said, “Me,
too.”
Angus muttered,
“Shit,” and fell silent.
I scanned through
the results that the database had produced. “Jeez. One study - and it’s from
China. What the hell is wrong with Academic Search Complete?”
Liz said, “Dunno.
Try CINAHL.”
“What??”
She made a “tsk”
sound and turned to her own computer. “You didn’t take a class in medical
research?”
“No, I didn’t.
Why would I? Why would you?” Liz was
a political science subject specialist; my area was history.
“So I’d know
where to find health information for my own use, duh. What do you do when you
want to look up something about your asthma?”
“I ask Karen
Lewis to do it.” Karen worked at the Biomedical Library. “Why…”
Angus smacked the
desk, making me jump. “Are you helping me or not?”
Liz frowned at
him. “Yes, I’m helping you. Cool your
jets.”
The phrase
produced a burst of cackling laughter from Angus. I was starting to wonder if
he was in a manic phase. “Cool your jets?
How old are you?”
Liz slowly lifted
her hands from the keyboard, crossed her arms, and cast her “evil eye”
expression onto Angus. “You are an incredibly
rude young man. For your information, that is a phrase that I picked up from my
parents.”
Angus quailed in
the force of Liz’s fierce scowl, demonstrating that he retained some shred of sanity and
self-preservation. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. It’s just…” He took a deep breath.
“Yesterday, I found out that my girlfriend is pregnant.”
I said, “Um -
congratulations?”
Angus slumped in
his seat. “My life is a fucking disaster.”
Liz asked, “Is
the baby yours?”
He snorted.
“You’re one to talk about rude.”
I needed to end
this confrontation before it deteriorated. “She didn’t mean it that way. We’re
just trying to help, right, Liz?”
Liz was still
frowning at Angus, her arms still tightly crossed. “Yeah. Sure.”
I said, “You
asked about paternity testing, so…”
Angus removed his
glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I don’t care
if it’s not mine. I want to marry her. I’ll raise the baby as my own. But
Natalie...she’s crazy right now. And
her family hates me.”
Sounded like the
definition of a fucking disaster to me, all right. I said, “I have a couple of
articles here about the legal and social ramifications of paternity testing.
I’ll print them for you. Liz, you’re checking CINAHL, right?”
“Right.” She
turned back to her computer with one last baleful glance at Angus.
I sent the
articles to the printer under the desk. “If her family knows the baby’s yours,
maybe their attitude toward you will improve.”
“Yeah, right.”
Angus was gnawing his knuckle again. “Her stepmother won’t say my name. Calls
me that boy. Her father’s never even
spoken to me. Her stepbrother is my boss, and he’ll probably fire me as soon as
the holidays are over. Although he said he wouldn’t.”
Being married to
a psychologist, I was steeped in the belief that airing your problems had the
power to improve your outlook. I decided to keep the conversation going. “Where
do you work?”
“Cloak and Dagger
Books. It’s a…”
Aha. That’s where I recognized him from. I
said, “A mystery bookstore in Pasadena. I’ve been there several times. I think
I’ve seen you there.”
Angus looked
warily hopeful. “Yeah? Do you know Adrien?”
“Only to say
hello to when I’m in the shop. He seems like a decent guy.”
“He is. Most of
the time. But his boyfriend kind of hates me, too.”
“Why?”
He winced. “He -
um - arrested me once.”
Oh. That would certainly color
one’s perceptions. I was deciding how to respond to that when Liz said, “CINAHL
wasn’t an improvement. But there’s an article here on the ethics of paternity
testing. I’ll print it.”
I said, “And I’ll
print this Chinese study for you, too.”
The printer
whirred, spitting out pages. Angus appeared to be even more morose than when
he’d arrived. I said, “There’s another benefit to paternity testing. If the
baby is yours, the other guy can’t appear at some point in the future and
demand parental rights or custody.”
Angus sat up
straighter. “Yes. That’s mostly why I
want the test. Warren is a scumbag loser asshole.
He cheated on her. He wants her to
have an abortion. I don’t want him to
have any contact with my kid.”
I asked, “Don’t
take this the wrong way, but...how sure are you that the baby’s yours?”
He shrugged. “I’m
not. Natalie says it could be either of us. I told you, she’s crazy emotional.”
Liz said,
“Discovering that you’re pregnant can do that. Take it easy with her.”
“I’m trying.”
I stacked the
articles and stapled each one. “There you go. If you have any questions after
you read them… Are you a UCLA student?” Maybe he could avail himself of the
campus counseling services.
“I was. I - uh -
kinda got off track.”
Not surprising,
with the whole arrest thing. I said, “You’re girlfriend’s going to need to see
a doctor. If you have any questions about these articles, you should discuss
them with him or her.”
“Yeah, okay.”
Angus riffled through the papers, then stood. “Thanks for your help.”
I said, “You’re
welcome. Good luck. And happy holidays.”
He grunted and
walked away.
Once he was out
of view Liz said, “Whoa. That kid has issues.”
“Ya think? I hope
he’s the dad, though. If Angus thinks the other
guy is a loser…”
Liz snorted a
laugh. “Seriously.”
Her phone beeped.
She read the screen and said, “Oh, hell to
the no. We are not eating lasagna on
Christmas…” and began to text furiously.
I reopened my
book and propped my feet on the garbage can.
***
Find out more about Meg and her work here!
