Blood in the Low Country

It wasn’t until later that summer that Rose told Walker that Eli had a different father. Rose was driving Walker to a friend’s house. Eli was not along for the ride, so Walker got to sit in the front seat. Then, out of the blue and without any prompting or context, Rose told Walker a stunning truth while simultaneously trying to bury it.

“Walker, there’s something I need to tell you,” said Rose.

“What is it, Mom?”

“I was married to another man a long time ago, before I met your father. That man was your brother’s father,” said Rose.

Walker didn’t know what to say. He just stared at his mother, waiting for an explanation, but nothing more was said. When Walker asked his mother questions about Eli’s dad, she refused to answer him.

Silence filled the car. As they pulled up to the house where Walker’s friend lived, Walker asked one last question.

“Does Eli know?”

“Yes, of course,” said his mother. “But your father adopted Eli. Now don’t ever ask me about it again.”

For an eight-year-old, this was very confusing because it raised so many questions about his mother. Who had she married before Monty? Why wasn’t she still married to him? What else was she keeping from him? And what did his dad think? From watching Monty with the boys, you would never know that Eli had a different biological father. Monty loved them both, played with each of them in the backyard, and treated them the same.

* * *

The paternal bond Monty felt toward Walker did not diminish his feelings for Eli in any way. Monty knew Eli needed a father, and he was determined to be that father.

Nevertheless, despite Monty’s best efforts, he could never permanently erase Eli’s lurking sadness or feelings of not belonging. In family pictures of the four of them, because of their age difference, Eli loomed so much larger than Walker. And he did so in an odd, misplaced fashion, making it appear that Eli’s presence required explanation as if the camera had captured Eli’s feelings of isolation.