{One Year Ago}

Paxan Freck nodded as the doctor defined the symptoms of Alzheimer's diseases. A loss of long and short term memory, mood swings and the like were the most common manifestations of the disease. He explained to the young woman that who she had known as her mother, Lenair Freck, would eventually be lost as the illness robbed her of her memory and identity. Paxan almost smirked at that. Had she ever really known her mother? From as far back as she could remember, Lenair had not been the cuddliest of parents. Always more concerned with her appearance or latest boyfriend, Paxan had been forced to grow up quickly. As a teenager, she'd had enough and run away, vowing never to return or to see her family again...and yet, here she was learning that the woman who had birthed her was terminally ill and that before she'd eventually die, every bit if self would be stripped away. 

The woman nodded as the doctor had laid it out for her. He wasn't an expert neurologist but Paxan trusted that he'd done all he could for the old woman. Since the storms in Louisianna, there wasn't the bustling medical industry in cities like New Orleans that their were in other metropolitan areas around the country. Paxan would just have to accept that her mother wouldn't get better. 

"So, I suggest we just keep her comfortable," said the doctor as he reviewed her chart, "I see here she now resides in Morgan City...?" he asked with a lilt of his head and a frown, "Not the best of areas, I must say but I can arrange for regular home care visits, covered by medicare, until she becomes indigent. Then we can transfer her to a nursing home."

"My mother will hate that..." Paxan responded, her red hair resting along her shoulder, "She'd never agree."

The doctor nodded, "Well, she's still quite lucid now so it's not going to be a problem just this second. We will let her go home, resume a normal life and the home healthcare nurses will keep an eye on her. It would be best if she had family close to check on her regularly though," he kinda smiled awkwardly, "You wouldn't happen to live in Morgan City...would you?"

Paxan shook her head, letting out a deep sigh, "No, no...I live here...in New Orleans." Paxan let it stand with that. She didn't feel the need to go into all the details of her fucked up family dynamics and the Doctor would probably appreciate not knowing either. He had other patients after all and as soon as Paxan left, he'd be on to the next. "Well, might be something to consider...maybe having her relocated closer to you or your sister...when she is discharged from the hospital," he'd say, not noticing the frown in Paxan's face as he mentioned her sister. That relationship was as bad as the one she had with her mother.

"I'll think about it," she responded non-commitally before quickly switching gears, "So..when will she be released?"

{Six Months Ago}

Lenair's Freck was not known for being the best homemaker. Infact those neighbors who had lived nearby might say she was anything but domestic and it showed from her living conditions. Her house sat on a half acre of unkept, ungroomed yard that had been so over run with weeds, grass no longer grew there. The roof needed mending in spots and the eaves on the east side had all but fallen off. Children in the neighborhood had dubbed it 'The Bates House'' after the Psycho movies but not because a murder had happened there but because of the crazy woman who lived inside. Lenair 'Mrs Bates' Freck had that kind of reputation and everyone on her block hated her. That reputation was also why Paxan Freck had run away when she was only fifteen, escaping the house of horrors for good until she'd stepped back in a few months ago. Making the trip to Morgan City on her days off had been strenuous and exhausting but somewhere, deep down the young woman felt she had no choice. No matter what her mother had done (or not done) she was still her mom and Paxan couldn't just let her die alone in this shithole. So, whenever she could, Paxan would make the drive from New Orleans where her life was to Morgan City, near Lake Palourde. Lenair hadn't given her much trouble, which she'd appreciated but the motherly bonds Paxan had wanted all her life never came either. The young woman had kept herself occupied, cleaning up the clutter of the house and trying to make the outside as presentable as possible. That in itself had kept her busy.

As that task stretched on, seemingly unendless, Paxan found herself on the verge of reliving  a lot of the painful memories that had been her childhood. Stacks of boxes that Lenair had kept, filled with newspaper clippings, dingy photos and stacks of letters from the myriad of boyfriends she'd accumulated throughout the years. Paxan had avoided reading any of them as many of Lenair's lovers had been sadistic perverts and she never wanted to think of those men again for as long as she lived.

 During one of these trips, as Paxan was moving boxes around to make room for the vacuum, the young woman came across a small metal lock box that had been shoved behind a piece of loose drywall, that had decayed under the ill repair of the house. Arching her neck, Paxan would pry away the wall a bit more and recovered the box, examining it curiously. The box was locked and there was no key to be found. As a child, Paxan had been known for her curiosity and it had gotten her into trouble on more than one occasion. Things hadn't changed. Prying the box open with a kitchen knife, Paxan opened the lid and looked inside to find a single piece of paper. The paper inside was no bigger that an index card and on it was the faded seal of a hospital in Nevada. It appeared to be a hospital crib card, issued to a baby by the name of Sarah Davenport from the late eighties. Paxan didn't recognize the name of the baby or those of the birth parents listed at all but from what the card said, the baby was a girl and born in the year 1987. Why would her mother have a crib card for a random baby, Paxan wondered.

Over the next few visits, the mystery of the crib card had not left Paxan's mind. Several times she'd almost asked Lenair about it but never could bring herself to follow through. A part of her didn't want to know what had happened to the baby that had made her notoriously unsentimental mother to keep it all these years, hidden like a treasure. Maybe the little girl had been a distant relative? Or the daughter of a close family friend. Whoever she was, she'd be mid twenties now, about her own age.

Weeks went by and finally, Paxan couldn't stand it any longer, the bit of intrigue behind that wall nagging at the back of her mind. With the crib card in hand, the young woman sat beside her mother in her armchair. The Young and The Restless had just ended and Lenair seemed to be in a good enough mood. "Mom, I wanted to talk to you if you have a second," Paxan started, trying not to sound bothersome as she knew her
mother had a short fuse.

"If this is about signing up for that nursing home then just forget it, Paxan!" she hissed as she lit up a cigarette and took a long puff, "I'm not even sick god damn it!" 

Paxan shook her head, trying to calm her with a soft touch of her hand to the old woman's arm, "No, no its not about the nursing home. I wanted to ask you about something I found..." Paxan took out the crib card and showed her mother, "I found this when I was cleaning out that back bedroom. It was hidden behind the wall. Do you know who this girl...Sarah Davenport is?" Her voice cracked a bit a she asked and Lenair's eyes grew wide and as they glanced at the card but looked away quickly. Her skin turned white as a sheet and Paxan almost jostled her arm to make sure he wasn't having a heart attack.

"What...who...how did you find that," Lenair whispered, without looking at the card as if it was something horrible and grotesque and the younger woman thought she saw fear in her eyes.

Paxan had come this far and was unrelenting, now even more interested, "So you did know her?" she asked quickly, hoping to keep Lenair's train of thought in the same direction. 

"Uh..no, no I ain't never heard that name! I don't know where that came from! I ain't never even lived in Las Vegas!!

The young redhead bit her lip. She'd caught her mother's slip the second it came from her mouth, "I never said it was from Las Vegas, Mom," she said, "What happened to this girl? Why don't you want to talk about it?"

"Shut up!" Lenair shrieked, waving the cigarette about inbetween her fingers, "I'm not talking about any more of this foolishness and that is that!" And that was that. Paxan knew the conversation was over and she let it go for now. Whether Lenair had known it or not, she'd already answered a few of her daughters burning questions.

{2 days later}

A few days later, Paxan couldn't think of anything but the mysterious card behind the wall. She was back in New Orleans and working at the bar on Magazine Street. It was midday and the bar was slow, Paxan knew she had a few minutes to continue her investigation. At the bar manager's office desk, Paxan logged into his computer and pulled up Google. She was by no means a computer whiz but how hard could doing an Internet search be? With the search bar displayed, Paxan pecked in the name of the girl in all caps "SARAH DAVENPORT, LAS VEGAS" and clicked search.

The search took a few seconds longer than normal as the bar's wifi connection kinda sucked but when the search finally yielded results, Paxan's eyes lit up in surprise. The first website to be displayed was The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The baby's name had a hit for the website and Paxan was soon looking at the posting of a kidnapped baby from just over twenty years ago. She read it slowly: "Baby Sarah was reported missing just days after birth from the neonatal unit at Las Vegas' Southern Methodist Hospital. Reward of $100,000 for information leading to the safe return of Sarah Davenport." The picture of the infant was non-descript as far as infants go. Chubby cheeked and bald, though it was grainy and taken in the earlier nineties. This all seemed incredibly confusing for the young woman and she didn't know what to make of it. Had Lenair known the baby's family? Perhaps the father had been a lover of hers? Paxan couldn't begin to figure things out at the moment but she quickly printed out the page from the website and backed out to the original Google search page. 

The second search result of the missing baby was a newspaper article from "The Las Vegas Review Journal", dated one month after the kidnapping. Paxan read the article, her blue eyes dancing over each word: 

"Authorities have called off the ground search of the baby that went missing from her hospital crib during the early hours of July 21, 1987. Police believe the kidnapper responsible entered the hospital unit through an unsupervised entrance that was found wedged open with piece of metal. No unusual fingerprints were found and investigators do believe this was a premeditated crime.

Family of the missing baby has increased the reward to $100,000 dollars for the safe return of their daughter. Sarah Davenport was born a fraternal twin two weeks early to Constance Olivia Davenport. Her father's name has not been releases but police do not consider him a suspect. Baby Sarah had been in the hospital NNICU as a precautionary measure due to her premature birth but was said to be healthy and thriving when she mysteriously disappeared. The abducted child is described as 7lbs, 2 ounces, caucasian with blue eyes and blonde peach fuzz hair. All staff and family members have been cleared of suspicion and hospital administration has already enacted new procedures to protect future patients. If you have any information on the  whereabouts of  baby Sarah Davenport, please call the Las Vegas Police Department or the National Center of Missing and Exploited Children."

Paxan sat back into the chair, her body feeling numb and a lump forming in her throat. It was all there in black and white and it didn't take a rocket scientist to connect the dots. The evidence was plain. A suspicious crib card found with the name of a baby that had been kidnapped. Her mother obviously knew something about it but refused to discuss it. The baby was Paxan's approximate same age with blue eyes and blonde hair. Although, now ginger...Paxan knew she'd been blonde headed as a child. She also now realized how dissimilar she was to the other members of her family. Lenair had been auburn and Charlie brunette, both having brown eyes. Paxan had never met her real father and Lenair had always explained him as a one night stand but what if that wasn't the truth? What if...Paxan Freck was Sarah Davenport? 

She needed evidence. Paxan knew that much and until she had  positive proof, it wouldn't be real. 

Weeks later, that evidence came. 

Proving Paxan was the missing daughter of Constance Olivia Davenport wouldn't be easy but proving she was not the daughter of Lenair Freck was all she really needed to do at that point. Collecting a hair sample from Lenair while she had been asleep was all it took to send to a mail order DNA testing lab Paxan had found online. One hundred twenty dollars and three weeks later, Paxan had the results in hand courtesy of a FedEx courier. She stared at the unopened envelope for a long time, the beating of her heart audible in her ears. Inside that package would either change her life forever or make her feel incredibly stupid. 

Biting the bullet, Paxan tore open the envelope and pulled out the paper, her blue eyes reading each line of the report, finding the pertinent sentence within a second: 

"...as compared to the sample listed as 'mother', there is a 0% probability of parentage to subject specimen submitted as 'child'."

Paxan felt like someone had punched her in the stomach, air escaping her lungs as she gasped. She almost expected Maury Povich to appear from thin air shaking his head as she tried to regain her bearings and not pass out. This paper had changed Paxan's life in an instant and a part of her felt like mourning but she couldn't quite understand why. Who she had always thought she'd been was a lie. Even though she didn't get along well with her, she felt internally devastated that Charlie wasn't really her sister. Also, it meant that not only did she have a mother and father she didn't know but the woman whom she always called mother was really a kidnapper, or at the very least an accomplice. Her entire life had been a lie and that was terrifying to the young woman. She read the results again, making sure she'd not misunderstood but there it was, all there in black and white.

Later, after the initial shock had ebbed, Paxan found she had more questions then before. Among them was how this had happened, but strangely, Paxan couldn't help but wonder more about who here real family was. Maybe it was because she'd so lacked a stable home of her own growing up, maybe because of the abuse she'd suffered and the lack of good role models or maybe because she'd so wanted better for herself. All Paxan could wonder was - What if?

Confronting Lenair wasn't an option at this point either. The woman was old and infirm and because of her advanced Alzheimer's disease and hard living, her memory on most days was sketchy at best. Even when she'd been relatively healthy, Lenair wasn't the most forthcoming of people and so, Paxan had made up her mind not to discuss what she'd learned with the woman or even with Charlie.  Those conversations would come in time but, right now there were far more important things for Paxan to find out, starting with the people whom were her real family.

[Later On]

Google had become Paxan's new best friend as she'd relied on it the last few weeks than in her whole life. Searching through old newspaper articles and public records, she'd learned more about the details surrounding her kidnapping as a child. 

Police had combed the area after she'd disappeared, searching high and low for any lead that would help find the child. Multiple tips had surfaced about a suspicious woman seen lurking around the hospital in the weeks prior but she had never been identified. During that time in Las Vegas, the city had been plagued with budget cuts that had forced the hospital to loose much of his city funded grants. The trickle down of the budget problems culminated with hospital security being reduced which was one reason being blamed for the kidnapping.  Still though, the baby's family had sued the hospital and the city and had been awarded millions in damages, eventually resulting in the hospital being bought out and rebranded ad University Medical Center. As for baby Sarah, she had never been found . Until now.

Several news outlets reported that the missing baby's mother, Constance Olivia Davenport struggled with  alcoholism afterwards, while others mentioned only very limited details on Sarah's twin brother. There was nothing to be found about her father though other than that he was not apart of Constance's life at the time of the birth.  Ultimately, after some years, interest in the story would wane and eventually it would seem that people had forgotten about it all together.  Life went on...other tragedies occurred and people simply forgot.

Paxan ran a hand through her hair as she wondered what had become of them all. The Davenports were an affluent family with substantial wealth it seemed and Paxan had a sick feeling if she showed up on their doorstep, they might reject her. Her upbringing had beaten that kind of thinking into her: No one will accept you.  No one wants you. You're worthless. It had shaped her self esteem and the relationships for her entire life and Paxan couldn't help but envision Constance Davenport turning her away at the doorstep of her mansion, unable to accept the woman for who she'd been raised to become: a white trash bartender with no money or anyone who loved her. The kind of girl, mothers would be ashamed of.  Paxan had done a lot of questionable things to stay afloat over the years, things she wouldn't want to tell her newly found mother about just yet...if ever. 

It was irrational she knew, but it was still how she saw herself and Paxan knew she had to find another way.  Her father was still a mystery and it seemed it would be terribly difficult to find out without notifying Constance.  That left only one option.  Her twin brother. Ahn Davenport, but how could she find him? Paxan racked her brain for anyone that could help her. She remembered she had a friend who might be able to help, Alice. This woman was a cop who was considered a regular at the bar and more interestingly a big butch lesbian who'd taken a liking to Paxan. She tipped well and Paxan never felt uncomfortable about the looks Alice gave her. Hell, Paxan  had even flirted back a few times. It kept the tips high and as was now the case, having a police officer as a friend would come in handy.

Since Alice was a regular, Paxan didn't have to wait long to see her coming into the bar for a drink after her shift. The redhead got Alice a drink then leaned over the bar to get things started. Paxan explained the situation, leaving out details of the kidnapping and that she was actually looking for her long lost twin brother. Instead she spun a new tale about looking for a former boyfriend who owed her money. Paxan wanted to send a legal letter demanding payment from the lout or so she told the cop. Alice was more than happy to help the attractive bartender stick it to a man and within a few minutes, the policewoman had called in to the station and pulled up Ahn's record.

"The sonnabitch got arrested in Hathian," said Alice after hanging up with her contact at NOPD, "A minor offense mind you but nuthin' good comes from that shithole."

Paxan tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear, "Does it say where he lives?" she asked a bit to interestedly but she quickly amended, "You know so I have an address to mail the legal paperwork."

Alice furrowed her butchy brow and scratched her short spiky hair, "Nah. Don't look like it. Your best bet is to contact the HPD an see if they can round him up. Hathian's not that big a town."

The young redhead nodded, taking that information in. She'd heard of Hathian...all the horror stories atleast. Finding one person amongst a town even as small as that place wouldn't be easy and something told Paxan she'd need to do more than just visit. 

This was her crossroads. This was a decision that would ultimately change her life and there was nothing in New Orleans holding her back. A week later, Paxan loaded up what little belongings she had and moved to Hathian. A month later she'd rented a house for her mother on the outskirts of town, the old crone still refusing to be admitted into a nursing home. Leaving her in Morgan City wasn't an option, Paxan needed her close incase she let slip more details of her past....and ultimately nothing would be the same again.