An Unwitting Discovery

Suzan cut back her hours at the restaurant, significantly, following the move. Now that she wasn't paying for a share of an apartment, and eating cafeteria food most of the time, her money was stretching much further without having to be supplemented by waitress wages and tips. She was digging the idea of focusing on studies and me. I couldn't have loved her more. I was just so over the moon that I decided to call my Dad to tell him the news.

It was late October, and he was home. Looking at the exact date on my phone, I realized I'd missed calling him for his birthday. That guy worked hard and was generally frugal. He didn't even have a cell phone. When he answered the phone, I wished him a belated happy birthday. Then I broke the news to him and told him Suzan and I were in our one-year trial period, and he just laughed.

I could hear him telling Katie my news, and she was saying something back to him. That was when he told me I should invite her to Corpus Christi, for Christmas at his place. They had already been expecting me to come for the holiday break. My two cousins, Zane and Adam, would be joining us a couple days before Christmas. I told him I'd think about it, as I wasn't sure how Suzan might react. Aunt Katie was after him to have me send them a picture. When I got off the phone I messaged Katie a picture I had of Suzan, from my phone. Then I had to laugh at the irony; she was a little older than Dad, but had better technology, and yet Dad was the one with a job in a technology field.

Suzan asked me, "What are you giggling about?"

I explained the irony of my Dad's aversion to cell phones, despite his technology-related job, and Aunt Katie's apparent hipness with gadgets. Then I took the chance. "They've invited you to come along with me, to Corpus Christi, for Christmas. You want to go?" I asked hopefully.

"Oh, definitely!" she exclaimed. "I've already heard so much about your Dad, and your Aunt Katie, from you, that I can't wait to meet them. What's the weather like, there, in December?"

"Well, you probably won't want to go swimming in the Gulf - at least, not without a wet suit - but Dad's pool is heated. The air temperature regularly gets into the low 70's."

"So he is off, in December?" she asked thoughtfully.

"Yeah, the whole month."

When it came to talking about family, I'd noticed a couple things. I knew that Suzan's parents were currently living in California, although I must have missed the reason for it. She really didn't talk all that much, about her family.

As far as my family was concerned, I'd told her that my Mom and stepfather lived outside Austin, and that I didn't really care to visit them or talk about them all that much. I'd talked a fair amount, about Dad, telling her that he programmed automation stuff for oil platforms in the Gulf, and had this crazy month-on, month-off work schedule. I'd also told her that my Aunt Katie had moved down to share the house with Dad, following her own divorce from my Uncle Jim. I didn't tell her about the couple revelations, about Aunt Katie's true relationship with Dad, which I'd only learned about during my trip to Europe, with them. I figured I'd have to clue her in on it, if our relationship got to the point where we were planning a trip to the altar, but not until then.

"At least your aunt had someone ready to help her out and cheer her up," Suzan mused, when I'd told her about how Aunt Katie had learned of her husband's infidelity. I really had to fight to keep the smile off my face, when I thought about just exactly how Dad was cheering my Aunt Katie up.

"Have you told your parents you've moved in with me?" I wondered aloud.

She got a queer look on her silent visage. I wasn't sure, but it looked like she might tear up.

"Hey, it's okay if you haven't. I just wondered..." I tried to change the trajectory of the question. "Is everything alright between you and them? You don't talk about them much. I know your dad's a preacher. Do they even know you're dating me?"

"You're going to find out soon enough, I guess." She fell silent as she looked for the words to say. "I'm adopted, Tommy. My folks are a nice, very religious couple, but I never felt like I was part of their family. When I decided to go for a degree in biology, instead of theology, they kind of stopped talking to me. I try to stay in touch, but..."

"Are you ashamed of me?" I asked without thinking about the accusatory nature of the question.

"Oh, god no! Tommy, you're the best thing that's ever happened to me," she said, as she flew into my arms, her sobs a mixture of joy and sorrow.

"Hey, I love you. I didn't mean to upset you," I said, as I gently stroked her hair. "Sometimes I'm insecure about what people think, about me. It was a stupid question."

"It wasn't stupid; it was open and honest. You were sharing and I wasn't..." she bawled.

"Look, if there is one thing I know, it's that we don't get to pick our families. After how I fell for you in what seemed to be the blink of an eye, I don't even think we get to pick who we fall in love with, either!"

Her tears turned to kisses, and kisses turned to groping. Almost before either of us knew what was happening, we were naked upon our new sofa. Let's just say the sofa was a big hit, that night and many others. The soft arms of the sofa were at just the height to allow me to bend her over one of them, for perfect rear entry, and she was really beginning to think that 'doggie' was one of her favorite positions. The material was pleather, so the cleanup was easy. It had become more than a study and reading place. It was a part of our 'sexual architecture'.

---

Towards the end of October Professor Franklin gave us more details about the final project. On the syllabus it just read as: Familial Testing Project. It would involve each of the lab partner teams rotating through his research lab in order to perform the final portions of the experiment. I felt it might be a recruiting technique aimed at attracting undergraduates into doing research alongside his grad students.

The biology department, and the university in general, had a relatively strong undergraduate research program running, and I was actually considering getting involved in it, since students often got to travel and do research abroad during the summer. Of course, it didn't hurt that Suzan was interested in doing research, too.

The final lab would be a multi-part affair. Each student would be sending cotton swabs to their parents, to get DNA samples. (Yes, they could opt out, if they were paranoid.) The collection would take time so, we needed to get those in the mail as soon as possible. All of the results would be confidential and very unofficial; we weren't professionals.

Suzan discussed her situation with Professor Franklin, and was told that she (or anyone else opting out) could get samples from random volunteers. The object was to perform the steps to prepare the samples (if you've watched any 'CSI' episode, you've seen some of the process), then put them through the analyzing equipment and compare the sixteen genetic markers among the alleles in our own samples with that of our parents.

After class that day we each called our parents. I had to make two calls. Launa was iffy about giving the sample, but she finally agreed when I told her that everything would be kept entirely confidential. Dan was easy; he just needed the swab to show up in the mail before he left for the month of November. I was going to have to FedEx his, overnight, but he just had to swab. Aunt Katie could send it back via snail-mail.

I didn't hear the call Suzan made to her parents, but she told me, "Well, they consented."

"That's good, right? Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I didn't want to listen to a sermon about how I was living in sin, so I didn't tell them we were living together," she told me. "But I did tell them I was seeing someone. I even told them your name, okay?"

"More than okay, Suz! I love you."

The love making that evening was soft, sweet and uninhibited. That night, a burden seemed to have been removed and her mind emotionally freed. We were still learning from one another, and she performed several rather enjoyable experiments upon me, that evening.

Later that night, as she slept beside me, I thought about how complex Suzan's relationship with her parents was. We hadn't really discussed religion yet... I never knew how to bring it up with her Dad being a pastor. I wondered how large a schism there was between her and her parents and how much it had to do with religious belief. I considered myself an agnostic, like my dad. I didn't really know very many pastors' kids. Of the few I did know, one was the rowdiest of the bunch that he ran with. I could imagine Suzan might be struggling with questions about her beliefs.

---

Thanksgiving break was our first holiday together. We shared it alone. I baked a turkey breast. Yeah, I cooked. It was simple stuff that Dad had taught me. So we had turkey, smashed potatoes and asparagus. Suzan did the hard part; she made the gravy. We went out afterward and looked at the Christmas decorations. We'd agreed that, since we were going to spend a couple weeks in Corpus Christi, for Christmas, it made little sense to splurge on decorating the apartment for the holiday season - though Susan did insist on hanging a wreath on the door, and taping a sprig of mistletoe over the doorway between our main area and the bedroom.

When we got back, we sat on the sofa and talked about what we were thankful for. We were both thankful that we'd found one another. She was thankful for our health. I was thankful that we were getting along so well. I finally admitted to her that I wasn't really religious and opened the door to allow that conversation.

"I don't really know what I am, Tommy. Growing up, a pastor's kid sees a lot of things most folk don't. I became acutely aware of the ugliness that can sometimes occur in the name of God. My Dad's behavior often seemed at odds with his supposed beliefs. I supposed having to come up with fifty-two sermons a year leads to some odd things taken somewhat out of context to avoid being boring or repetitious. But to me it almost seemed Machiavellian the way words were twisted to make a certain point. I have personally observed the most devout behave hypocritically and the unrepentant be absolved when their donations are large."

"I wasn't trying to push you to think any particular way. I just figure we each need to know how the other feels, about various things, as we progress in our relationship. With you being a preacher's kid, religion naturally becomes one of those 'various things.' You've never once said anything, about wanting to go to church."

"Yeah, it's part of the problem between me and my parents, especially my Dad. They think I've lost my faith... I don't know what to tell them, I am conflicted and not even sure if I ever had it. I believe in lots of the messages that encourage moral behavior but I always questioned everything. The older I got, and the more I learned, the more I see the things that don't fit with scientific observations. The pursuit of biology has me looking for an orderly universe controlled by observable rules, not the whim of some being."

"Well, that's where I am too. I don't actively disbelieve, I just don't actively believe. I'm agnostic. If I saw some proof, I might. I like the idea that morals are a social optimization of happiness," I said trying to make the conversation lighter. There was definitely something I was picking up about her Dad. Luckily, she seemed to come back from that darkness.

"How does someone with such a Texan accent have such deep geeky thoughts?" she asked snuggling up to kiss me.

"You know someone with a Texan accent? I think I'd like to meet them."

That got me some giggles and a long make out session on the couch. It seemed to me like there were no barriers in sight. We seemed compatible. To me I was counting down the months, two months down and ten to go. After we made love that evening I lay awake wondering when we might get married. She was going to be a senior next year and then graduate after that.

---

The final days of the semester were upon us quickly. Both Suzan and I had finals to study for and papers to turn in. The small apartment didn't have much in to keep all of the material we were generating straight. It was on our list to see about a file cabinet and some bookshelves, but the rush of getting finished was overriding everything. Professors seem to procrastinate about some things, as much as students. I was getting back midterm papers and homework that had been turned in weeks ago.

During this time period we also had our final BIO lab. It was pretty straightforward once I had gotten the samples. Aunt Katie had sent Dan's swab back, right after he left for his month on the platform. Launa, however, had to be reminded twice to before I actually got her swab back. We took a Thursday afternoon appointment, to go through professor's lab, since Thursday was now a light day for both of us. We ran our samples and got the printouts. The automated equipment made some of the previous labs feel much harder, in retrospect.

Back at the apartment that evening, we worked across from one another at the kitchen table. Despite working together to do the lab, this lab was supposed to be an individual effort to write up, since the results were personal, and since it was going to be counted as the final for the lab. We both took our printouts and began working on our write-ups. Reviewing my results, it was clear I had multiple matches with my parents. I had eleven matches with Dan, and five with Launa. I was nearly finished when I saw Suzan's expression. I could tell there hadn't been any matches, but there was a kind of sadness on her face as she taped her results to the top of her results page and close her notebook.

Getting up I went to her and hugged her tight. "I know," I told her.

She hugged me back, "I'm being kind of silly. I knew there wouldn't be any matches. I don't know why, but seeing it confirmed on paper made me feel sad."

The week of finals seemed like a blur. Suzan and I studied together for the BIO class, but we each had a full load of classes. I was actually a little over on credits to catch up for the change in major. Suzan and I studied endlessly on the sofa. There were almost no sex breaks. Almost. My exams went smoothly for the most part. Statics was looking like a strong B but everything else was looking like A's.

The night before we were going to leave for our winter break trip to Corpus Christi, Suzan and I found ourselves cleaning our apartment. We had both left various books, notebooks, returned homework, and other papers in piles throughout the living area during our mad dash for finals and everything that goes with that. We had taken a divide and conquer approach. Suzan was tackling our mixed piles of course work. I was working on the kitchen: refrigerator, kitchen sink, dishwasher, and garbage.

I was about to haul a big plastic garbage bag down to the dumpster, when I saw Suzan stumble over a stack of stack of material which contained our returned lab books. She wasn't hurt, but her attention was drawn to the data sheets from our last lab. My notebook had landed so that the allele data was sticking out and hers was opened to that page. They weren't directly touching, adjacent, or even facing in the same direction. But for some reason Suzan knelt down and placed them side-by-side.

The entire incident must have taken seconds to happen, but it seemed like everything was happening in slow motion. First there was a light smile on her face, which quickly changed to something akin to horror. She looked at me with tears filling her eyes. Suddenly I was watching her run into our bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

I went to look at the data sheets where she'd arranged them. My Mom's results were on the outer right and were aligned with hers, which were on the left in the crease of her notebook. As I studied both sheets, it hit me: she'd matched nine alleles from my mother.

Suzan was apparently my half-sister.

"Just fuck me blind," I muttered. "What are the chances of that?"

I knew what the test results meant, but I didn't want it to be true. Then I compared her results with mine, and we only matched three. That made some sense, because I'd apparently acquired the majority of my DNA from Dan, and there were no matches between Suzan and Dan. What the fuck are we going to do? I thought.

Now, I knew I'd left Suzan alone for too long. She must have been in shock. I could only imagine what she might be feeling.

"Honey," I knocked lightly at the door. "Honey, can I come in?"

"No!"

"Please, Suz. This doesn't change anything."

"It changes everything!" she said, between sobs.

I cracked the door open a little. "Please. I love you."

She was lying face down on the bed with her head buried in my big feather pillow. Tears had already soaked large wet spots of the navy pillowcase.

She turned her head slightly and rasped, "Tommy, don't you realize what we've done?"

Entering the room I joined her on the bed. I attempted to sooth her I as I stroked her back. "Suz, we haven't done anything wrong, legally or morally."

She wasn't having it. "We're related, damn it!"

"We might be related," I corrected her. "This sixteen marker test is not definitive on any of this stuff."

"You saw how many matches I have with your mother?"

"Okay, it a high probability, but it isn't definitive."

"We can't do this. I can't do this." She started to get up. "I've got to go, I can't stay here."

"No, Suz, please don't go. Please, sweetie, I love you. We can work through this," I said, as I followed her to the apartment door.

Suzan wouldn't be stopped. She was in fight-or-flight mode, and I didn't want to fight with her.

"Please, think about it! Don't give up on us," I pleaded as she went out the door into the night.

After she left, I plopped heavily back in my chair at the kitchen table. I was struggling to figure out how this might even be possible. Suzan was about a year and a half older than me. Launa was a shade over three years older than Dad. I wondered if she could have possibly had a daughter before they were married, one that she gave up for adoption?

There was no way I would even broach the issue with Mom. I thought about calling Dad to discuss it with him, but we were supposed to leave for Corpus Christi tomorrow morning. I decided against doing anything, immediately. It wouldn't be fair to Suzan, for me to do anything without discussing it with her first, but we couldn't wait long.

I gave myself an hour to let her calm down. In my numb state of shock, I went ahead and carried the garbage out, as if we might leave together tomorrow. As I walked I kept thinking that how bright Suzan was. I was certain she could rationalize all this, given a little time. The emotional shock of finding your biological mother, on top of finding out your boyfriend's mother might also be your mother must have been extreme. Still, given time, I was just sure that we could sort it out.

The minutes of that hour were some of the longest of my life. My longing to hold Suzan and make it all okay had me in emotional knots. I was pretty sure we were on safe ground, legally. She was adopted just after her birth, so the records would surely be sealed. Her surname was not the same as Launa's maiden name, Duinerua. As long as neither of us said anything, we could legally take our relationship all the way to the altar. The only problem that might arise was if the professor had noticed. He no longer had the lab books, though, and my guess was that he most probably wouldn't have picked up on the matches, either, unless he was looking for them.