The Other F-Word Read online

  “I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t,” Hollis said.

  It occurred to Milo, as the oven timer dinged and Frankie rushed back into the kitchen, that JJ had never volunteered his real name, and that Milo had never thought to ask.

  “Jonah Jedediah.”

  Hollis snorted. “Jonah Jedediah Rabinowitz?”

  “In the flesh.”

  “You don’t look Jewish.”

  “How do I look?”

  “Like you should be shucking corn on a football field in Nebraska.”

  JJ chuckled. “Very perceptive, Hollis Darby.” Then, after a beat, “I’m adopted.”

  Hollis nodded. “Well, that explains it.”

  “Yup,” JJ said.

  Milo sat there holding his frozen peas and waiting for JJ to elaborate, but JJ appeared to have said all he planned to say on the subject. Hollis leaned against the banister, nodding. Icing, elevating, nodding, standing. The conversation died a slow death.

  “Why don’t we get some breakfast?” Milo said.

  “Now you’re talking,” JJ said.

  “Hollis?”

  Hollis shrugged. “I could eat.”

  * * *

  “Oh my God.” Hollis leaned over and spat furiously into Milo’s trash can, then swiped at her mouth with the back of her hand. “What is that thing?”

  “That,” Milo said, “is a wheat-free, dairy-free, egg-free, soy-free, nut-free banana muffin.”

  Hollis stood up, shaking her head. “How do you survive? Seriously, what do you eat?”

  “A lot of salads,” Milo said. “Meat. Rice. Apples and pears. Beets.”

  “Beets?”

  “I can vouch for that,” JJ said from the comfort of Milo’s bed, where he was lounging beside Pete, stuffing his face with muffins.

  Hollis turned to JJ. “Do you ever come up for air?”

  “I’m a growing boy,” JJ said, spewing crumbs onto his shirt. “I need sustenance.”

  By Milo’s count, JJ had plowed his way through at least four muffins. Also a bowl of Frankie’s homemade granola with blueberries and a pig’s worth of bacon. He ate like a trash compactor.

  “Don’t your parents feed you?” Hollis said.

  JJ shrugged. “They travel a lot.”

  What he didn’t say was that his mom was a movie actress and his dad was a movie director and he lived in a Brooklyn Heights brownstone filled with so much art it could be a museum, and had a Sub-Zero refrigerator so stocked it could feed every person in the five boroughs of New York for a week.

  “Only child?” Hollis said.

  “Yup.”

  “Me too.”

  “Hey,” Milo said. “Where’s the love?”

  Hollis shrugged. “It’s not like we grew up together.”

  “Yeah, but you’re not exactly an ‘only child’ either.”

  “I am for all practical purposes.”

  “Okay, but for impractical purposes you have me and three other siblings.”

  “Whoa,” JJ said. He sat up straight, sending crumbs flying everywhere. “Hold the phone.”

  Hollis shook her head. “I don’t consider them siblings.”

  “What do you consider them?” Milo said.

  “I don’t consider them at all.”

  “Um,” JJ said. “Can we back up, please?”

  But Milo wasn’t ready to back up. “What do you consider me?”

  “You’re different,” Hollis said.

  “How?”

  “I don’t know.” She picked up the Rubik’s Cube from Milo’s desk, turned it a few rotations. “We met a long time ago.”

  “So if you’d met them a long time ago you would consider them siblings?”

  “No.” Hollis shook her head, put the Rubik’s Cube down. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

  This wasn’t going very well.

  “Yo,” JJ said.

  “Aren’t you even curious?” Milo said.

  “I’m curious!” JJ leapt off the bed, throwing his arms out, startling Pete off the bed, too. “Tell me what the frick you’re talking about!”

  Milo would have thought—after he finished explaining to JJ about the TGFB1 gene and the Donor Progeny Project and the information he’d plugged in to the site from JJ’s computer on New Year’s Eve—that JJ would think this was all nuts and he’d find some excuse to blow out of there.

  But he didn’t.

  He studied Milo’s face intently for a second. Then he nodded. “So, what do we do now?”

  “What do we do now?” Milo glanced across the room at Hollis, who had been pacing around the whole time he was talking and had finally landed on his beanbag chair with a book.

  “Don’t ask me.” Hollis held Milo’s gaze, almost defiantly. “It’s your quest.”

  “Do we log on?”

  “Hell yeah,” JJ said. “We log on.”

  HOLLIS

  The text came while Hollis was sitting on a beanbag chair in Milo’s room, watching him log on to the Donor Progeny Project.

  Your an ugly ho bag slut who dosnt no how to dress. U’l nevr hav a real boyfriend. Hes just using u. He’ll use u & then on trash day he’ll thro u out w/ the other trash.

  Well, someone needed a grammar lesson. Or at least enough sense to turn on autocorrect.

  “Who’s texting you?” JJ whipped his big golden-retriever head around as soon as he heard the ping. “Boyfriend?”

  “Hardly.”

  Hollis didn’t have a boyfriend. What Hollis had was Malory Keener and her size-zero wrecking crew, sending out their daily dose of love.

  “No boyfriend?”

  “No boyfriend.”

  Gunnar did not qualify as a boyfriend. Hollis didn’t know what he qualified as, but it wasn’t that. Given the clearly delineated social strata of high school, it should have been statistically impossible for a girl like Hollis Darby-Barnes to hook up with a guy like Gunnar Mott. It was also quite a feat to steal the limelight away from a girl like Malory Keener. Superslut that Hollis was, she’d managed to accomplish both in a single night. This happened way back on December 4, but the ripple effect was lasting.

  Hollis didn’t know why Gunnar kept coming back for more. Well, yes she did. Hollis’s body was on the Kardashian growth plan and Gunnar was a guy. The real question was why she kept going back for more. Sure, Malory deserved it. And sure, Gunnar was gorgeous, in a generic, pass-me-the-football kind of way. But Hollis didn’t love him or anything. They barely even talked. It was … hard to explain. But when Hollis was in the moment—when the two of them were under the bleachers, pressed up against the wrestling mats and it was just lips and tongues and hands and bellies and the smell of Big Red and boy sweat—she forgot about everything else. She forgot about Malory, she forgot about her mother, she forgot how angry and alone she felt. For a moment, she could disappear.

  Maybe Gunnar wasn’t using her. Maybe she was using him.

  “Hey,” Milo said. “I’m on.”

  Hollis deleted the text with her thumb. She stood up and walked over to Milo’s desk.

  “You want my seat?” JJ said, half rising.

  “That’s okay.”

  “Take it,” he said. “I insist.”

  Hollis shook her head. “I like standing.”

  She didn’t, actually. She liked sitting. And she was feeling lightheaded. Part of her wanted to run out of the room, but she wasn’t sure why. It’s not like her sperm donor was going to pop out of the computer and introduce himself. It wasn’t even about him. This was the Donor Progeny Project, after all. This was about the progeny.

  Progeny. It was a weird word now that Hollis thought about it. Was it weirder or less weird than offspring?

  “So here,” Milo said, pointing to a form on the screen, “is where I registered. I plugged in my name, my birthday, the city where I was born, the name of the cryobank, the donor number … and here…” He paused, opening a new tab. “is what I got back. Check it out.”

  Hollis leaned in.

&n
bsp; Welcome to the Donor Progeny Project!

  She closed her eyes for a second. Her heart was thumping so hard. She put her hand on the back of Milo’s chair to steady herself.

  “You okay?” JJ said.

  “Why wouldn’t I be okay?”

  Hollis kept reading.

  Our aim at the DPP is to assist you in making mutually desired contact with your genetic half siblings and to facilitate donor family connections. According to our records, sperm donations from Donor #9677 of the Twin Cities Cryolab have resulted in five births to date. What does this mean? This means that you should take a breath.

  “Holy crap,” Hollis breathed.

  “I know, right?” Milo turned to look at her. He was half smiling. There was a muffin crumb stuck to the corner of his mouth.

  “‘Whatever you are feeling in this moment is completely normal,’” JJ read aloud. “‘Whatever you decide to do with this information, if anything, is up to you. There is no ‘right’”—he paused, scratching quote marks in the air—“‘course of action.’”

  Hollis looked at JJ, nodding stupidly. Even though she’d been thinking about it for thirty-six hours now, the magnitude of this moment—of actually being on the Donor Progeny Project website, of possibly finding her other half siblings—was still hard to comprehend.

  “So?” Milo said.

  “So,” Hollis said.

  “Do we want to post something?”

  “Post something?”

  “Everything’s anonymous. If we post under Twin Cities Cryolab, our message gets relayed to whatever email accounts they have on record for our match families, but it uses a ghost email address for the sender, like Craigslist.”

  “Oh.” Hollis nodded like she understood. “Uh-huh.”

  “That way it’s up to us whether or not to share our contact information, depending on our comfort level. Assuming we get any response at all. Which we may not.”

  “Right.” Hollis nodded.

  “It would be so flipping cool if you did, though,” JJ said.

  “It would,” Milo said. He looked at Hollis. “What do you think?”

  Hollis hesitated. Her heart was beating hard. The blood that was rushing through her ears was so loud. “Okay.”

  “‘Okay,’ you want to post something?”

  “Okay.”

  “Are you sure?” Milo said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Because … no pressure. I don’t want to force you into anything.”

  “You’re not,” Hollis said. “Let’s do it.”

  * * *

  Dear Donor Siblings

  (and/or Donor Siblings’ Parents),

  We’re not sure exactly what to say so we’re just going to throw this out there and see what happens. Our names are Milo (age 15) and Hollis (age 14). We met for the first time 7 years ago when our mothers discovered we were half siblings both conceived using donor sperm from the Twin Cities Cryolab in Minneapolis. Our donor was # 9677. We are hoping to make contact with our other half siblings. We welcome anything you would like to share with us. Ummm … not sure what else to write … Post back if you get this. Thanks!

  —Milo and Hollis

  With his right hand wrapped in frozen peas, it took Milo a long time to type. When he finally finished, he looked at Hollis. “Your turn.”

  “What?”

  “Click Submit.”

  So Hollis reached over Milo’s shoulder and clicked the mouse.

  “‘Congratulations!’” JJ read aloud. “‘Your message has been added to the DPP database!’”

  The three of them stared at the screen in silence. Who knows how long they sat there? Two minutes? Ten? At some point JJ started crunching on a piece of bacon, and Hollis felt her stomach clench. Was it hunger? Nerves? Regret? She didn’t know what she was feeling. There was some quote from The Great Gatsby, but she couldn’t remember the exact words. It was Nick Carraway feeling excited and disgusted at the same time.

  “Hey.” JJ turned to them, his expression earnest. “We should go bowling.”

  “Bowling?” Hollis looked at him blankly.

  “It’ll take your mind off things while you wait.”

  “There’s that place on Thirty-Seventh,” Milo offered. “Or there’s Strike 10, on Strickland…”

  “I’m thinking of a different place,” JJ said.

  “Where?”

  “My basement.”

  * * *

  “You have a bowling alley in your house?” Frankie gaped at JJ.

  He shrugged. “My dad likes to bowl.”

  Hollis, Milo, and JJ were standing in the living room while Hollis’s mother and Suzanne lounged on the couch with their coffee mugs and Frankie launched her interrogation.

  “Will your father be home?” she asked JJ.

  “He’s in Budapest.”

  “What about your mother?”

  “She’s also in Budapest.”

  Frankie turned to Milo, shaking her head. “No. No way.”

  “Ma. Come on.”

  “Maxime will be there,” JJ said.

  “And who is Maxime?”

  “My au pair. He lives with us.”

  Hollis nearly choked. “You have a manny?”

  “What’s a manny?” Leigh asked from the couch.

  “A male nanny.”

  “He’s not a manny,” JJ said. “He’s an au pair.”

  And Suzanne piped in, “I believe the preferred term is child care provider.”

  Milo grinned at JJ. “I prefer manny.”

  “You’re just jealous. Maxime teaches me French. He’s trente-trois ans and très responsable.”

  Hollis was impressed by JJ’s French, but Frankie, apparently, was not. Her mouth was set in a grim line. “What is Maxime’s phone number?”

  Wow, Hollis thought as Frankie proceeded to get on the horn with JJ’s Belgian manny to check out his story. Holy helicopter mom. Frankie seemed satisfied with whatever answer she got, but as soon as she hung up the phone, she went right back to firing questions. How would they get to JJ’s? How long were they planning to stay there? What would they do for lunch? Did Milo have his EpiPen? Did Hollis and JJ know how to use an EpiPen? Frankie opened a drawer in the kitchen, took out an EpiPen, and started giving them a tutorial. “First, you pop the cap. Then you slide it out. And—see this orange tip? It needs to be pointing down…” She went through the whole spiel, even grabbing Milo’s thigh to show Hollis and JJ how to massage the injection site.

  “Ma,” Milo groaned. “Come on.”

  And Suzanne said, “Give the kid a break, Frank. Let him go have some fun.”

  Frankie turned to Suzanne, her expression inscrutable. Hollis was no relationship expert, so she wasn’t exactly qualified to interpret the looks Milo’s moms were exchanging, but there was definitely tension.

  “Leigh?” Frankie shifted her gaze to Hollis’s mother. “Are you comfortable with this?”

  “Sure. Hollis has a cell phone.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” Hollis said, although she had no idea why she was thanking her mother. Leigh ran a loose ship. She treated Hollis like an adult. Last night, when the two of them were lying on the pullout couch in the living room, it struck Hollis that she couldn’t remember a time when she and her mother had slept side by side. Not even when she was little. Not even when she had a bad dream. It was Pam whose name Hollis had called out in the middle of the night—Pam who had crawled into Hollis’s bed and sung to her until she fell asleep. Not that Hollis mentioned this to her mother. No way. Leigh was in too good a mood last night—relaxed, probably from the wine she’d drunk at dinner. The last thing Hollis wanted was to turn on the waterworks.

  Come to think of it, her mother looked pretty relaxed this morning, too, chilling on the couch with Suzanne, wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, hair loose, sipping from her coffee mug. Which begged the question, what was she really drinking from that coffee mug?

  “Grab some money from my purse,” Leigh said to Hollis. “I think
it’s on one of the stools in the kitchen.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Well then,” Frankie said. “I guess you’re going bowling.” She forced a smile. “Have fun.”

  “Love you, Ma,” Milo said, giving her a quick hug. “I’ll call you when we get there.”

  “I love you, too.”

  Milo hugged Suzanne.

  Hollis, feeling like a bad daughter, hugged her mother.

  JJ, inexplicably and somewhat comically, walked around the room, hugging all three moms.

  Finally, Milo, JJ, and Hollis stepped out the front door of the apartment building and into the world, where the sky was clear and the air was crisp and the tiny blue ice-melting pellets crunched beneath their feet. From behind them, Hollis could hear Frankie’s disembodied voice calling, “Put on your hat! It’s cold out there!”

  * * *

  JJ’s basement was all shiny floors and vintage bowling signs suspended from the ceiling. Bowl-a-Rama. Lucky Strikes. Hi Roller. The wood-paneled walls were covered in bowling memorabilia: framed satin jackets with names embroidered on the lapels, championship patches, black-and-white photographs of old-time bowlers. Even the air smelled authentic, like popcorn and cigar smoke and feet.

  “Wow,” Hollis breathed.

  JJ flicked a switch and the room filled with disco lights. “Cool, huh?”

  “This is more than cool,” Milo said, looking around. “This is a nostalgia piece. This is Americana. This”—Milo lowered himself onto a cracked leather bench, shaking his head in amazement—“is a movie set.”

  “Didn’t you see it on New Year’s Eve?”

  “I was upstairs the whole time. On your computer, remember?”

  “Right,” JJ said.

  Which brought them full circle, back to the Donor Progeny Project, which was the one thing they were trying to distract themselves from by going bowling.

  “Hé là, JJ.”

  Maxime, JJ’s skinny, scruffy-chinned Belgian manny who had greeted them at the door when they first arrived, suddenly materialized with a tray of food.

  “Oh, hey, Max,” JJ said.

  “Vous voulez manger ou quoi?”

  Hollis, who had five years of French under her belt, recognized the expression. You want to eat or what?

  “Mais oui,” JJ said, taking the tray. “Merci, Max.”

  “Pas de prob, mon homme.” Maxime gave JJ a fist bump, which didn’t seem very Belgian to Hollis.