Alicia Rasley - The Year She Fell

The tragic mystery at the heart of their family has finally surfaced...

When Presbyterian minister Ellen Wakefield OConnor is confronted by a young man armed with a birth certificate that mistakenly names her as his mother, she quickly sorts out the truth: his birth mother listed Ellen on the certificate to cover up her own identity, but also because Ellen was, in a way, related to the child.

The birth father is Ellens troubled husband, Tom.

Twenty-four years earlier, only months before Ellen gave birth to her and Toms daughter Sarah, his son, Brian, was born to Tom and the mystery woman, whose identity Tom now refuses to reveal. She may have come from Ellens own hometown.

Shattered, Ellen heads home to Wakefield , West Virginia named after her prosperous and respected family. She enlists her mother and sisters to help her comb through the memories of a turbulent past there, searching for clues about Toms affair and for reasons to save their marriage.

What she finds is a web of sorrows that entangles everyone she loves.

Dedicated with love to my parents, who taught all their eight children to be voracious readers: Dr. Robert M. Todd and Dr. Jeanne M. Todd, 1932-2010

In lumine tuo videbimus lumen.

The Year She Fell

Alicia Rasley

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the products of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons (living or dead,) events or locations is entirely coincidental.

Bell Bridge Books
PO BOX 300921
Memphis , TN 38130
ISBN: 978-1-61194-000-8

Bell Bridge Books is an Imprint of BelleBooks, Inc.

Copyright 2010 by Alicia Rasley

Printed and bound in the United States of America .

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

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Cover design: Debra Dixon
Interior design: Hank Smith
Photo credits:
Sky Javarman | Dreamstime.com
Woman (manipulated) Branislav Ostojic | Dreamstime.com

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CHAPTER ONE

Ellen

June

I couldnt help but think of him as the love child.

It was an old-fashioned term, more genteel than bastard, more evocative than biological son, with an origin not in genetics but in passion.

He walked into my life when he walked into the Second-Rushmore Presbyterian Churchmy church, or at least the Virginia church where I was currently serving as minister. Janitor, too, that June afternoon the boy came in.

I was just tidying up the pews after the Genesis Choir rehearsal, wandering down the aisle, grabbing up a paperback some child had left behind, a discarded baseball card. Id gotten about halfway down before I saw the man half-hidden in the shadow near the big arched oak door. I slipped the book into my jacket pocket and called out, Hello?

He stepped out into the light filtering through the rose window. I felt a flicker of recognition, but with no name or context attached. Probably Id seen him around town. A student from the university, maybehe had the requisite camouflage jacket and ripped jeans and scraggly goatee, and that hard scared look young people have these days. At least hed noticed he was in a church and pulled off the baseball cap. There was a quarter-inch of dark bristle left on his head.

He came forward, his sneakers making a sucking noise on the marble floor. His hands were jammed into his baggy cargo pockets, and for a moment I was frightened. Thered been a rash of church robberies and arsons during the winter, but the elders had agreed that a church just couldnt lock its doors until late in the evening. You will find Him among the murderers and thieves, I reminded myself, and walked down the aisle to meet him.

He stopped back at the last pew. Mrs. OConnor?

A serial murderer wouldnt know my name. I walked closer. YesIm the minister here.

I know.

His voice was deep but it wavered, echoing in the stone sanctuary. He stood there irresolute, his shoulders bunched, his hands knotted into fists in his pockets.

I knew that stance from years of counseling church members and students. He was in trouble of some kind, and embarrassed about it. Is there something you want to talk about?

He yanked his hand out of his pocket. He was holding nothing lethal, just a folded piece of paper. He thrust it across the yard or so divide between us. The paper felt rough and official as I smoothed away the wrinkles. A notarys raised seal rubbed under my fingers.

It was a birth certificate, with the state seal in the middle of a field of marble green. The first line read Adam Paul Wakefield.

On the line labeled mother was my own maiden name. Ellen Elizabeth Wakefield.

Unknown was named as the father.

There were other words and numbers, but the paper was rattling in my hand and I couldnt read any more. I dont understand.

Im Adam. Or I was. When I was adopted, my parentsmy adoptive parentsnamed me Brian Warrick.

I kept staring at the birth certificate, but still it made no sense. I dont know why my name is on this.

Suddenly he was curt, almost disrespectful. Isnt it obvious? Youre my birthmother.

As that echoed off the high ceiling of the sanctuary and through my disordered thoughts, I realized dimly that this wasnt a good place for such a conversation. At any moment the session moderator could come by to warn me about the great pew controversy at the meeting tonight. My position here as the churchs first woman minister was precarious enough already without allegations ofof whatever this boy, this love child, signified.

Come into my office. I dont know what this is, butbut lets talk there.

Silently he followed me out the side door and up the narrow steps to the third-floor warren of offices. Taking the upholstered seat across from my desk, he watched as I scanned the birth certificate, looking for the clue that would make this all make sense. The birth was registered in a county in southern Pennsylvania , about a hundred-fifty miles northeast. I didnt recognize the name of the hospital or the attending doctor. I did, however, recognize the entry on the mothers birthplace line.

He was studying me closely enough that he knew what I was reading. You were born in Wakefield , West Virginia . Just like it says.

I could hardly deny it. It was true, and besides, the town was named for our family. How did you find that out?

I did a search on the Web. Bitterness crept into his voice. I sent a letter to you there. There in Wakefield . And you didnt answer.

I felt defensive. I never got any letters. I havent lived there in twenty years. I set the birth certificate down on the open Bible on my desk and stared again at my name, my hometown. It made no sense.

Then I noticed the date.

I fumbled in my purse and came up with my leather wallet, solid and heavy with coins and credit cards. In a pocket I located the little plastic folder of photographs and took out one of Sarah. With relief I saw the date stamped on the back by the developer.

Look. I shoved the picture towards him. My hand was trembling. So was his as he took the photo from the desk blotter.

We were both frightened of this.

He studied the picture some hospital photographer had taken when Sarah was six hours old. She had her eyes open and didnt look happy about it. Little Winston Churchill, Tom and I always called that pugnacious image of our only child.

Thats my daughter Sarah.

So? He said it rudely, but from the way he was staring at it I suddenly realized there must be no creased and cherished photo of his earliest hours.