Mothers of the Missing Mermaid

By Brandi Bradley

Bea's mother, Kate, was diagnosed with breast cancer. 

 

But that's not the biggest news Bea heard that day. 

 

When they return home, Kate makes a shocking confession. 

 

She is not Bea's birth mother. 

 

For the past 18 years, Bea had no idea that the life they'd built in Destin, Florida was actually a refuge from those who could be looking for them. 

 

The story jets back to the early 1970s when Kate first walked the white sugar sand beaches with a 2-year-old Bea and hardly a penny to her name. Kate was forced to make difficult choices in order to ensure their survival. 

 

At that time, Destin was a sleepy little fishing village and as Bea grew, the community around them developed into the hottest vacation spot in the South.

 

Kate's breast cancer along with the realization that her life was a lie motivates Bea to search for the truth about her birth parents. Torn between her responsibilities to her ill mother and a desperate need to understand why Kate stole her as a baby, she packs her car and drives north to Kate's last-known address in Southern Illinois. Far away from everything she knows, she introduces herself to the group of strangers who are her birth family. While there, she tries to understand why Kate would flee with her while also trying to protect the only mother she has ever known.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rumor Mill Press
• Release date: Apr 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9798987261217

Book preview

When Kate lifted the toddler from the crib, she didn’t have a plan. She had enough sense to take the grocery money and a dress that made her look older. She only knew she had to leave before anyone woke.

She was sixteen, barely able to drive and flunking math. She had only ever worked one job at the local drugstore serving Cherry Cokes to the neighborhood girls in white dresses. Honestly, she thought she’d be caught before she left the living room.

But she wasn’t.

PART I

1

Fort Walton, Florida – March 1995

Heather Locklear slapped Regis Philbin on the hand, knocking his notecards to the ground.

The other people in the waiting room paid no attention, but Bea did. She was watching Live with Regis and Kathie Lee on the wood-veneer television that sat in the corner of the clinic waiting room. Bea crossed the room and fiddled with the volume. The clatter of phones, intercoms, and the buzz of conversations obscured the animated chat occurring on the TV. The office was relatively full. Rows of chairs had been arranged into mini seating areas with small tables overflowing with colorful magazines dividing the clusters.

Bea’s mother Kate – who had squeezed herself into the small chair, the arms of the chair pressing against her round stomach – flicked her pen and scribbled blank circles in the white space of a form attached to a clipboard. Dig around in my purse and see if you can find a better pen than this Bic they gave me.

Bea flopped into the chair next to her and reached into her mother’s fake-leather purse, fingering the metal of a wallet clasp, the pebbled texture of a checkbook, the frayed edge of old tissues, and the soft plastic envelope of a maxi pad. In all her 21 years, Bea has never been able to find anything in her mother’s purse. Bea removed a handful of items to assist the search.

No! Don’t pull everything out. I just need a pen.

I can’t find a pen because of all this junk.

Give it here. Kate pulled the purse back and pushed the clipboard to Bea.

While Kate searched, Bea swirled the Bic on the paper, leaving a trail of indentions into the paper. I don’t know how you find anything in there anyway.

I know where to look.

Bea glanced back at the TV. She was still struggling to hear the conversation on screen. I can go get another one at the desk.

Kate shook her head. Ha! Found it! Kate clicked the end of a substantial ballpoint pen, the kind a banker would keep to sign mortgage contracts. Kate pilfered good-quality pens. She often told Bea, You can’t beat a good pen.

Bea leaned back in the chair and watched a commercial of a kid giving her sneezing mother a box of Kleenex. Now with lotion.

I need gum. Bea lifted her own bag from the floor. She dug around inside, and her hand brushed against a pack of Camel Lights and a lighter instead. She hadn’t smoked on the way to the appointment and now searched for an excuse to walk outside. While she searched for her PlenTpack of Big Red gum, a little girl walked to the TV and turned the large knob. It made a clunking sound as it flipped channels, stopping on PBS. The girl sat cross-legged in front of the screen providing Bea with a view of a fishtail braid running down the back of the girl’s head.

I was watching that.

Kate shushed her. It’s fine.

Fine for you, Bea said. "You don’t even watch Melrose Place."

Neither do you. We don’t get that channel.

I’ve seen it. At Jason and Stephen’s.

Good God, Bea! You are grown. Let that baby watch Big Bird. Kate readjusted herself in her chair. Here, she pushed the clipboard to Bea. Take this to the desk for me. Please.

Bea dropped her bag and took the clipboard. On her way to the desk, she passed a woman wearing a floral-print dress with a wide white collar. The woman called to the girl, Ashley. Did you ask that lady if you could change the channel?

It’s fine, Kate said. I don’t mind watching Big Bird. I might learn something.

---

Bea had turned twenty-one a few days before. Bea, Jason, and Stephen decided to spend it like the same careless Spring Break tourists that annually take over the whole Daytona strip, making the rounds at all the tacky bars. Bea had been in most of those places before, but this time she didn’t have to jump through all the hoops of sneaking alcohol. She drank rum punch that came in plastic cups the size of buckets and took every shot that anyone in the club bought for her. Jason barked, Girls never have to pay for a goddamned thing, when she took her eighth buttery nipple shot, purchased by a guy in a neon orange shirt.

After vomiting all the next morning, Bea had slinked home with a bag of McDonald’s and camped on the couch. Over her shoulder through the kitchen, keys jingled in the door. She rolled her head in the direction of the noise and her chest jerked from a dry heave. Hey, Mama!

Kate lumbered into the house and dropped grocery bags onto the kitchen table.

You’re up.

Not really. Bea wiggled another fry from her bag. Did you buy aspirin?

Didn’t know I was supposed to.

We’re out. She pulled the two-liter of Mountain Dew from the end of the couch, removed the top from her McDonald’s cup, and filled it.

You just don’t know where to look.

Bea heard the opening of cabinets in the kitchen. You can buy yourself McDonald’s, but not your own aspirin? Come and get it.

Bea wrapped herself in the crochet throw and waddled into the kitchen. She snatched the bottle from the table. They don’t make drive-throughs for medicine.

Kate loaded cans in the pantry. Yes, they do.

The fries seemed more important. Bea lined the arrows and pried the top from the bottle. She removed the cotton and shook two pills into her palm.

Do something for me? She pulled a box of Cheerios from the bag. I need you to go with me to the doctor this week.

Bea walked to the living room and grabbed her cup from the floor. She took a sip and walked back to the kitchen with the cup tucked into her arm. Doctor? Why?

Kate gripped the back of the kitchen chair. I have a lump in my breast. The doctor did a biopsy. Results come in Monday and I want you there.

Bea sat down in a nearby chair and pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders. What’s the worst-case scenario here? Cancer?

Kate removed the pizza rolls and frozen pot pies and shoved them in the freezer.

Bea made arrangements. She called friends and asked if they would share their class notes with her. She called her boss Cal and asked if she could switch shifts. She left messages for her professors with a vague doctor’s appointment as the reason why she would be absent. She and Kate woke early for the appointment, loading up on coffee and cereal, and left for the clinic in Fort Walton.

---

They hadn’t mentioned cancer since that day.

An hour or so passed before a nurse called for Kate. The nurse, a short woman in scrubs and sneakers, waited for them next to a cream and wine-colored desk, then led them down a hall into a second waiting room with gray chairs. Images showing cancer spreading through the body – brain, thyroid, breast, pancreas, bladder, prostate, bone – lined the walls. Small plastic boxes filled with pamphlets protruded from tables and shelves. Near a separate section with pamphlets for leukemia, a man sat reading a copy of Field and Stream. The overhead fluorescent light in the small room seemed to turn the skin of the man’s skin gray.

Bea dropped her bag in the chair next to Kate. She dug around a nearby table at the magazines: Woman's Day, Women’s World, Redbook, McCalls, tiny green Bibles. She handed Kate the Women’s World. Do you think they’ll call us to a third waiting room here in a minute? They’re moving us from one small box to another. It’s suffocating. She studied the illustration of the female body on the wall and took one of the pink pamphlets about breast cancer. Inside was a rendering of an interior of the breast, full of yellow fatty tissue, pink lobes, and lines indicating the milk ducts. Did you breastfeed me?

No. Kate jerked her head and Bea followed her gaze to the reading man, who lifted his magazine higher, covering his face. Kate snatched the first magazine on the top of the stack and growled, Sit down.

Bea flopped in the chair next to her mother. Because I was reading this thing about clogged milk ducts and I wonder if that was something that could hang around for a long time.

It’s not a clogged milk duct.

Bea was restless. She tugged at the sand dollar charm that hung from her purple and green hair wrap. She stretched her leg to tap the empty seat across from her with the tip of her sneaker.

The short nurse poked her head around the corner. She gestured to the man. Mr. Griffin. He stood and Bea snatched the Field and Stream from his chair. In her lap, it fell open to a Marlboro advertisement. The same ones in her bag. She thumbed through the pages until she reached an article about trout fishing. The nurse returned and told Kate she was taking her to an exam room. Kate stood and gathered her purse and the magazine she’d been reading. When Bea rose to follow, Kate said, You can stay here. I’ll have them come get you if I need you.

I thought you wanted me with you.

I have to take off my shirt for my doctor, Bea.

Like I ain’t ever seen that before?

Just stop. I’ll come get you if I need you.

Bea needed to smoke. Kate could be with the doctor for 20 minutes or up to to an hour. She hitched her bag to her shoulder and stood in the doorway of the waiting room, overhearing the nurse direct Kate to the scale and then the clank of the lower bar moving up, up, up, up, up, up. Bea peeked down the hall to make sure Kate had disappeared before she dashed to the exit.

---

Outside the clinic, Bea leaned against Kate’s gray and maroon Monte Carlo. She flicked her lighter and the flame shot up like a torch. Shit! She dropped it to the ground. The little girl who had hogged the TV walked out with her mother. The girl wore a bandage around her elbow and a sucker stick hung from her red-stained mouth. Bea waved. She picked up the lighter from the ground. She’d asked Stephen to remove the child safety latch and he took the liberty of tampering with the fuel intake valve. He and Jason did this all the time. Once she rechecked her bag and patted the pockets of her shorts, she tilted her head and lit her cigarette off the huge flame. This trick was only cool at parties. Assholes.

She wrestled her school planner from her bag while she smoked. On the pages for that week, she had drawn an X over this day with the words Mama’s appointment. On the next day’s space, she had written Statistics: Equations 1-20 pg 87 and Organic Chemistry: Chapter 7, filling the remainder of the week with tasks.

She fanned the smoke smell from her T-shirt when she jogged back inside. On the way to the tiny gray room, she made two wrong turns. Finally, Bea passed a small desk where the short nurse sat writing on charts. Did my mother come looking for me?

No. Not yet.

The tiny gray room had acquired more patients since she left: a couple dressed in coordinating wind suits and a woman in a glittery T-shirt. Bea squeezed past them to the far corner and placed her backpack in its own chair. She unpacked her Statistics book and completed the exercises in chapter five. Once she returned her notebook to her backpack, Kate called her name. You can come in now.

The short nurse escorted Bea and Kate into the doctor’s personal office. Kate sat, and Bea dropped her bags to the floor. Bookshelves lined the room from floor to ceiling: blue, red, and orange books printed with gold embossed letters. So many books about so many smart things. Nearly every day Bea carries books on her back, and some days they weighed her down. Bea placed her hand against a spine at least five inches wide. She slid the book from the shelf and tipped it into her palm.

Bea. Sit down.

I just want to see how heavy this is.

No. No touching.

Bea slid the book back to its home. Kate flipped through the copy of Women’s World that she had lifted from the gray waiting room. Bea sat down next to her. She reached for her backpack and unzipped it. I wonder how much my books will cost next semester.

Why? Ain’t that what I filled out all those student loan papers for? You think it won’t pay for books?

I don’t know. It probably will. I’m just wondering.

You’re always wondering.

Bea glanced over at the magazine her mother was reading. The cover photo showed Mel Gibson with his arms crossed over his chest next to the headline, The Mel Gibson You Don’t Know. "The Lethal Weapon movie sucked."

Kate adjusted herself in the chair and Bea leaned in to read over her mother’s shoulder. I thought you liked it.

I liked the first two. I didn’t like that one.

I don’t like any of them. Kate handed the magazine to Bea, who closed it and rolled it into a tube that she tapped against her knee. Kate dug around in her purse and located a roll of Butterscotch Lifesavers. After she popped one in her own mouth, she handed the candy roll to Bea and took the magazine back.

The chair squeaked and wobbled under Bea’s weight. I hate these chairs.

Me, too.

It was too tense in the room, Kate’s and Bea’s worry radiating off them. Bea needed to break it, so she snaked her hand down the leg of her mother’s chair and gave it a slight shake. Kate clutched her magazine and purse. Goddamnit, Bea! I swear to God, you made me break this chair, I’ll never forgive you!

Mama, hush. We’re in a doctor’s office.

Don’t mess with me, Bea. Not today. Kate pulled at her shirt and rubbed her hands over her bare arms as if she were cold.

It had been a cheap shot. Kate was a large woman and self-conscious about chairs holding her weight. She would swap rickety ones at restaurants and refused to squeeze herself into a booth. The only chair she was secure in was her recliner at home - at times choosing it instead of sleeping in her own bed.

I’m sorry, Mama. I was just playing.

Just don’t be a little shit.

Kate touched Bea’s arm and turned it to expose a tattoo, a set of gills on the inside of her arm. I hate this tattoo.

You love this tattoo.

Might as well have gotten one of those Sailor Jerry naked ladies on your arm.

Maybe next time.

Kate took both of Bea’s hands in her own and squeezed them. You act like you’re grown, but you ain’t grown. You are still that baby girl. You were … Kate sighed, a deep long sigh. You were always mine.

I love you, too, Mama. Bea leaned over and lay her head against Kate’s shoulder. They sat together in silence, rocking their bodies slightly and holding hands.

Kate said, I need to tell you something … But the clank of the door opening interrupted her statement.

Hello, hello. Dr. Behr swept into the room, tucking his stethoscope into his white coat pocket. The spicy scent of cologne entered the room behind him.

Bea stood and shook the doctor’s hand. I’m the daughter.

Yes. Nice to meet you. He walked behind his desk and sat down. He sifted through some standard beige file folders on his desk. He took one, opened it flat on the desk, and scanned the first page; then he closed the folder and clasped his hands over it. Kate. We’ve reviewed the results of the biopsy that we performed last week. We were able to determine that the lump in your breast is malignant, and approximately 4 cm large. This qualifies as Stage II breast cancer.

Kate expelled a large gust of air. Bea reached over and clasped her mother’s hand. A muffled beeping sound emitted from the doctor’s waistband.

We were also able to determine by your CT scan that the cancer has not spread to your lymph nodes. This is good. What I recommend is removing the tumor and placing you on a course of chemotherapy.

Goosebumps sprouted on Bea’s arms and legs.

Kate cleared her throat. Will you need to remove the breast? Kate’s voice sounded like the operator’s automated voice recordings telling the time or that the number you have called has been disconnected.

That’s up to you. At this point, I have no reason to suspect the cancer will return once we have removed the tumor. We can be more certain if we remove the breast. However, it would be understandable if you choose not to have the mastectomy.

After a gentle knock on the door, a tall woman entered holding a folder. Kate. I am Miranda. I’m the treatment coordinator for Dr. Behr. She held out her hand for Kate to shake it but Kate kept her grip on her purse. Bea reached around and shook Miranda’s hand, which was hot and sweaty so that Bea had to wipe her own on her cutoffs after.

Miranda will schedule your surgery and review procedures, prep, and everything else you need to know. He passed Kate’s chart to Miranda.

If you will come with me. She led them from the office and down the hall. Kate pulled Bea closer and, hands clasped to wrists like a promenade, they walked shoulder to shoulder down the narrow hall behind Miranda. Kate’s grip was tight. Bea pulled against it but found no release. A man attempted to pass them, but they never broke ranks, forcing him to turn to the side to avoid their unapologetic trudge down the hall. Bea lugged her backpack on her arm. The nylon chaffed her skin.

Miranda led them into a blue room. Patients usually feel more comfortable in here. She pointed to the couch and matching chair, both upholstered in an abstract pastel pattern that resembled water lilies. The small room had a couch and chair with a small table, pulling it together into a seating area, as well as a desk with a computer and a small fish tank full of neon tetras swimming inside.

Please, have a seat.

Bea sat down on the couch and linked her arm under Kate’s. They clasped hands."

Sometimes it takes a little while for the news to sink in. Miranda closed the door and sat down in the chair. Bea looked back and forth between Miranda and her mother.

Kate sat straight and held her head up. He told me that I have cancer.

Yes. You do. Miranda picked up a square box of tissues and held them toward Kate, who maintained her stone-face and kept her hands in her lap. Miranda placed the tissues back on the table, nudging them closer to Kate with the tips of her fingers. I’m here to walk you through the treatment process. Do you have any questions?

Kate curled her fingers around her purse. We’re supposed to set up the appointments to get it out of me, right? Let’s do that.

We will, but do you have any other questions about how this might affect you?

Like what?

It is surgery, which always carries some risk. You will be meeting with a radiologist to discuss chemotherapy as well. Some people have a lot of questions about loss of hair and sex drive, about the amount of weight they might lose … or potentially gain … Miranda’s gaze lingered on Kate’s round belly. Perhaps you have heard about skin sensitivity.

I just want to get this cut out of me. I don’t see why we need to sit here and talk about it.

Would you like for me to give you a minute to process? I can get you some water. Would you like some?

Bea held up her hand. I would love some water.

I don’t want water. I don’t have any questions. I don’t want to talk about it. What I want is for you to schedule the surgery. Perhaps you should be sitting behind the computer to see when we can get this thing cut out of me.

Miranda tapped on the arm of the chair with her index finger. Yes, ma’am. She rose and walked around the desk to the computer. As she typed, each key clicked with Miranda’s forceful stroke. Bea removed her planner from her bag and poised her pen for someone to announce a date and time.

I will schedule your mastectomy with Dr. Adams.

Dr. Behr said I might not need a mastectomy.

It is recommended considering that the cancer could return.

He said it was up to me.

It is. But most women choose the option that makes it less likely for the cancer to return.

I say cut the lump out and leave the boob where it is.

Fine. Miranda hammers on the keyboard like a piano. Dr. Adams can perform your lumpectomy next Tuesday morning.

Wonderful. Kate heaved herself from the couch.

Bea looked down at the Tuesday block in her planner and saw the words Org Chemistry TEST written in red ink. Mama! But Kate was gone.

Bea moved closer to Miranda’s computer. Is there another day that week that we could do this thing? Procedure?

That is the only day that Dr. Adams has available next week. Miranda handed Bea a pink folder stuffed to the point of bulging. Here is your information packet. Make sure she arrives by nine.

Bea left the blue room, trailing her things behind her. She took a right on the way out the door and found herself standing in front of an emergency exit and a sign explaining how an alarm would sound if she opened it. She took another wrong turn. Cursing, she strapped on her backpack and hung her purse across her chest, flagged down a nurse and begged her to release her from this medical maze. Finally, outside in the sun, she jogged over to Kate standing beside the car, sunglasses on her face, looking as cool as someone waiting outside a gas station or JC Penney, except for a crumpled tissue balled in her hand. Kate opened the passenger side door. Let’s go.

After Bea pulled the Monte Carlo out of the parking lot, she asked, Where are we going to eat?

I don’t care.

Bea held the wheel and with her free hand, jammed the car radio presets until she found a station playing music. Kate reached over and turned the radio off, then turned the air conditioner up as high as it would go and pointed each air vent toward her, the pink cancer folder resting on the dash.

When Bea pulled the car into the Denny’s, she turned off the engine and said, Here. It’s close.

Good. I have to pee. Kate opened the door and tucked the cancer folder under her arm.

Bea climbed out of the car and tried to slam the Monte Carlo’s heavy door, stiff and slow to move on its old hinges. Walking toward the rear of the restaurant, she pulled her Camel Lights from her bag, stood by the dumpster and flicked her lighter – the flame shooting in the air – then tilted her head to light her cigarette.

The dumpster overflowed with bags and boxes. Propping her foot on the edge of a tomato box, Bea pushed it to its side and flipped it like a die. Flip, flip, flip. She hooked the open end with her toe and flipped it in the air. When it landed, she tossed her cigarette to the side and kicked the box as hard as she could against the wall. It made a popping sound and rebounded. One, two, three times she chased and kicked the box. The smell of rotten tomatoes and lettuce from the dumpster permeated the air, but still she kicked, getting closer and closer to the wall with each thunk until she was kicking the brick with her shoe: her foot stung inside her sneakers, tears running down her face. She stopped when a man walked out of the back door and pulled a pack of smokes out of his apron pocket.

She wiped her face dry with her shirt. Hey.

Hey. You don’t work here.

No, I don’t, she shrugged. I’m hiding.

He wasn’t much older than she was. The hair beneath his backward baseball cap curled like duck feathers. He lit his cigarette with a black Zippo and snapped it closed. She looked at his hands, blotched red, likely from washing dishes. A tattoo peeked from under his shirt sleeve and she could see the tip of a dagger or sword, old and faded blue from the sun.

You don’t happen to have an extra lighter or pack of matches in your pocket, do you?

He shook his head. If you need a light, you can use this. He held out the black Zippo.

"Nah, See, my