Free Baked Alaska by Josi S. Kilpack Page B

much as possible. In the class about the different ports, Sadie had learned that Juneau was only accessible by boat or plane—there were no roads that crossed through the mountains. Though it taxed Sadie’s levels of poetry, she could relate to the feeling of stuckness that some of the Juneauites must feel from time to time. If the weather was bad, or the water too rough, they had no choice but to stay put, right? Kind of like she had no choice but to stay and deal with everything she’d learned, everything Shawn had been keeping from her.
    Shawn’s birth mother was named Lorraina Juxteson—not Tanice—and had discovered his profile on an adoption reunification website eight months ago. He’d only posted his profile a couple of months earlier but hadn’t determined how to tell Sadie about his search before they found each other, so he chose simply to not tell her anything at all. He’d pursued the relationship with his birth mother without Sadie’s knowledge. In fact, the reason he’d only stayed in Colorado for a few days at Christmastime wasn’t because of work, it was because he’d spent the rest of the break in Knoxville, Tennessee, with his real mother. That’s not what he’d called her, of course, but it’s how the term “birth mother” sounded to Sadie’s ears. He’d met some of Lorraina’s family; they had a single picture of him, taken at the hospital before Lorraina had signed the paperwork putting him up for adoption.
    A stiff breeze came at Sadie from behind, barely moving her gelled-stiff curls, and she shivered. She looked around for a deck chair she could settle into, as though being more comfortable would help her work things out in her head. She’d always known her children might one day want to seek out their birth parents. Both adoptions had been closed, with minimal information about the birth parents made available to Sadie and her late husband, Neil. Today, birth parents often received pictures or even had visits with their biological children, but twenty-something years ago, things had been different. Even so, Sadie would have told them everything she knew and helped them in their search, even if it were painful. It was far more painful to be left out; being excluded from this important discovery made her feel so oddly insignificant.
    And after all these years, this woman—Lorraina—could waltz in and share Sadie’s motherhood? Just like that?
    Sadie had thought that the woman’s obvious drunkenness of the night before would have worn off by morning, but the opposite had taken place. Lorraina had gone into arrhythmia not long after being taken to the infirmary and had stopped breathing at one point, requiring a breathing tube. As her condition worsened, the medical staff onboard the ship reached the limit of care they could give her and the decision had been made to transport her to a hospital in Juneau. A helicopter had picked her up early in the morning while Sadie had been fast asleep. Lorraina was now in the Intensive Care unit in Juneau. Shawn said that Lorraina was a recovered alcoholic with a bad liver. Her condition was serious.
    Sadie’s feelings were twisted and complicated and hard to make sense of in her own head, let alone put into words. That’s why she’d excused herself after Shawn’s rushed explanation. She needed some time alone to line up her thoughts.
    Now that she’d had that time, she could admit she was angry, but felt guilty for it. Sadie was hurt that Shawn hadn’t told her, but felt guilty about that too. She knew his pain was greater than hers, and yet she still hurt so much that she didn’t know how to talk to him about what he was feeling. She was also sad, and that just made her feel silly because, regardless of how she felt, the birth mother Shawn had only recently met was fighting for her life. It said a lot about Lorraina’s condition that she had been life-flighted off the ship just a few hours before they docked.
    Sadie closed her eyes