Chapter 1 RUNNING AWAY I was standing at the top of the stairs hoping I had everything I needed when I looked down and saw my pregnant mom hovering at the bottom of the staircase. She was waiting impatiently for me to come down, puffing wildly on a Pall Mall cigarette, white smoke filling the air. Mom was angry with me. Again. Usually her anger left me paralyzed, frozen with fear and unable to run, but not tonight. Not this time. Tonight, I would run away, and shockingly, my mom would let me go. As I stood there, she glared up at me and our eyes locked. She gave me her death stare, which always left me trembling with fear. Well, whatever the future holds in store for me, I thought, has to be better than this. Panic swept through me, and my heart began beating like crazy as I made my way down the stairs. But I knew everything would be fine as soon as I left. It had to be. In the hallway, Mom stood inches from my face. Her big brown eyes narrowed to hostile slits and turned cold, piercing right through me. But I stood my ground and stared right back. We were engaging in a fierce unblinking battle of wills which I was determined to win when suddenly, without warning, she snatched my purse from my hand and emptied the contents onto the table. She inspected each item, searching for my stash of drugs. She came up with nothing, because the speed she sought I had tucked safely in my bra inside a small plastic baggie. I held my breath and prayed a pat-down search would not follow. Angry and frustrated, Mom threw the items back into my purse and flung it at me. “So, you hate living here, do you? Think you’d be happier living somewhere else?” I nodded. “Well, mark my words, Lily—you’ll end up in a gutter someplace, hungry, cold and penniless!” She handed me a carton of Marlboros. “Don’t say your mother never gave you anything!” She laughed. “You’ve got twenty-four hours before I call the cops. And if they pick you up, I won’t come to get you like I did last time. This time you’re on your own. This time you can rot in juvenile hall for all I care.” Yeah, well, this time, I thought to myself, I’m not going to get caught. She shoved me toward the door and said, “Now, get out!” I was only too happy to oblige. Earlier Mom had allowed me to take only what I could wear, so I chose carefully. I wore my favorite pair of Palmetto jeans, a shiny pink silk blouse with long sleeves over a plain white t-shirt, and of course, my black down jacket for when it got cold. I couldn’t leave my beautiful, iridescent abalone shell necklace behind, so I put it around my neck. In the bathroom I gathered all the bathroom necessities and stuffed them in my purse, make-up included. I gazed at myself in the mirror. I was five feet six inches tall, one hundred and twenty pounds, with bright hazel eyes, auburn hair, and a nearly perfect 36(D)-26-34 hourglass figure. Many guys said I looked like I’d just stepped off a page from Playboy. Everywhere I went I was noticed, even when I didn’t want to be. But despite all the attention I attracted, I still felt empty and alone. I thought no one could ever truly love me because I was too broken, too messed up. Turning off the bathroom light, I walked back into my room. I said goodbye to my closet full of clothes and my belongings: my jewelry, posters, stuffed animals, record albums, yearbooks, knickknacks, photos—all my stuff that held special memories for me. But I was glad to leave all the bad memories behind. A few months earlier, Mom’s latest man, Ned, had moved in with us. He was much younger than she, tall and thin, an auto mechanic and Vietnam veteran. He shared scary, surreal stories about the war and how after he got back home he had turned to drugs such as marijuana to survive and escape the horrors he had witnessed. I hated Ned. Recently, when my mom had gone snooping through my room and found my stash of speed and marijuana, Ned became irate with me. Finding me alone in the tiny kitchen, he shouted, “How dare you have drugs and not share them with me! If you ever do that again, I’ll plant drugs in your room, call the cops, and have you sent away for a very long time! So don’t you ever—” Suddenly, my mom entered the kitchen as Ned continued, “I repeat, don’t you ever let me catch you doing drugs again, you hear?” As I stood there shocked and speechless, I realized Ned was a deceitful, despicable man. I loathed and distrusted him, but at least he hadn’t snuck into my bedroom at night like the one before him. Mom and Ned’s plan was to sell everything they owned, hit the road in his truck camper, and start a new family in Idaho. My siblings, eleven-year-old Eileen and five-year-old Bart, wanted to go. I was sixteen and had no intention of moving anywhere. It was a cold January night in 1977 when I ran away from my mom for the last time. As I turned the corner, relieved that I wouldn’t be leaving California and heading to Idaho with Mom and Ned, I realized I had no money and nowhere to go. Now what? I wondered. I had only twenty-four hours to figure out a plan before the cops might come for me, and that was if my mom kept her word and waited the twenty-four hours to report me. The thought of being locked away until I was eighteen terrified me. I called my boyfriend Vance. He told me not to worry, just come over. I couldn’t get there fast enough. _____ Vance’s parents were less than thrilled with their twenty-six- year-old son and his underage girlfriend living together. They were nervous about possible legal issues—like statutory rape—and felt a more sensible solution would be for me to move in with them. They wanted to care for me. So after three weeks of living at Vance’s, I moved in with his parents, and they contacted an attorney to begin the process of becoming my legal guardians. The following week their attorney, Mr. Silva, phoned me to ask some routine questions which I didn’t mind answering. But when he asked me “Father’s name,” I felt a strange sense of déjà vu as I remembered the night a cranky old lady at Santa Cruz Juvenile Hall asked me the same question four years before. That morning I’d ditched my school books, grabbed my stuff—a canteen of Kool-Aid, a small bottle of Johnson’s Baby Shampoo, a few packs of Marlboros, two dollars and fifty-six cents, and some make-up—and hitchhiked thirty miles south down the coast to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk with my girlfriend. There, without a flutter of hesitation, we threw off our shoes and ran into the waves, splashing, giggling, and feeling so carefree, we wished the moment would never end. But that night under the Boardwalk, we were busted and thrown into juvenile hall for running away from home. “Father’s name,” the older gray-haired lady sitting behind her typewriter had asked me, raising her brow and waiting for my reply. “Which one?” I asked. “Well, how many are there?” she asked, staring at me with a half puzzled, half annoyed look. “Three.” “Okay, how ‘bout we go with the first one,” she said, irritated. “Okay, Bill Capello,” I replied. “Father’s address,” the monotone voice asked. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen him since I was seven,” I replied. Mom and Dad had divorced when I was two but shared custody of me until I was seven. At that point, in Santa Cruz Juvenile Hall, I hadn’t seen him in five years. “Okay, how about your second father then,” she barked. I wondered why she seemed to be in such a hurry. “Jeffrey Styles,” I responded. “His address,” she snapped as her fingers rested impatiently above the typewriter keys, eager to type my response. “Somewhere in London, England,” I replied. Mom and Jeffrey, a kind, soft-spoken Englishman, had married when I was six and divorced when I was ten. I hadn’t seen him since he had returned home to London the month before. “Okay, then, how ‘bout your third father,” she said, frustrated, shaking her head and rolling her eyes. “Sure, Carlos Sanchez,” I said. My latest father and Mom’s own first cousin—electrician by day, child molester by night—was an arrogant, cruel man who had started molesting me the year before. I hated him; he was part of the reason I’d run away. Now, four years later, I had to go through the questioning again over the phone. “Sorry, I didn’t hear you, Lily. What did you say your father’s name was?” Mr. Silva asked me again. Great, I thought, here we go again. “Which one?” I asked. “Well, how many are there?” he asked. “Three, or maybe four, I’m not sure,” I said, wondering if Mom and Ned had married. “Hmm … Well, let’s start with the first one,” Mr. Silva said. “Okay, his name’s Bill Capello,” I said. “Bill Capello, you say? By any chance is he a private investigator?” he asked, surprised. “What? I don’t know. I haven’t seen him since I was seven,” I said. “Okay, do you remember anything about him?” “Well…he used to live in Campbell. He had a wife named Betsy, or something like that. And I remember playing with Rick, my older brother. There was a baby too, but I don’t remember his name.” I couldn’t really remember what my dad looked like anymore. It had been nine years since I had seen him, and my mom had destroyed all his photos, so my memories were hazy at best. “Okay—I think I may know your father. Let’s put this process on hold while I try to locate him. If I do locate him, would you like to speak with him?” I hesitated. “Yeah, I guess.” I wasn’t sure how I felt about my father. Sometimes I missed him, but I didn’t like to think about it because when I did, it hurt far too much. Since he had never tried to contact me, I assumed he didn’t care about me. I doubted he’d even want to speak to me. I hung up the phone feeling anxious and a little numb. A few days later, Vance’s petite mother, Pat, called me over to chat. “Lily, Mr. Silva called. He’s located your father. It just so happens your father is a private investigator who works for Mr. Silva. He spoke with your father, who said he’d like to meet with you if that’s okay. Would you like that?” “Gee, Pat, I don’t know. I’m kind of nervous,” I said. “Why?” she asked. “Well, I don’t really know him. The last time I saw him, I was seven. My mom said that my father was a terrible man but never explained why. What if he is?” I asked. I had no bad memories of my father, but it seemed like my mom did. “I’ve found when people go through a divorce, emotions run high, and sadly, it’s very common for many mean and hurtful things to be said in the heat of the moment. I wouldn’t worry too much about your mother’s comments regarding your father,” Pat said. “Really?” I asked. “Yes,” she said, nodding. “We can have your father come by the house and see how it goes. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. Remember, you’re always welcome to stay here. That hasn’t changed.” “Okay, thanks,” I said. “You’re welcome,” she said and gave me a reassuring hug. The next day, as the three o’clock meeting time drew near, I felt nervous and paced the floor, my eyes darting between the clock and the front window. I wondered if my biological father and I had ever crossed paths before and I didn’t even know it. After Jeffrey had adopted me, my mom insisted that he was my “real” and only father, and there would be no more talk about Bill ever again; it was like he never existed. And yet he did exist because I was about to meet him.