a place to rest my thoughts |
It was Christmas when she told me I wasn't the kid's father. My ears were ringing, and I knew I didn't hear her right, because the kid was five now, and he ran to me when I came in the room, and held my hand and tucked himself into my side to watch those stupid kid shows he was always watching on my phone, and fell asleep next to me as heavy and boneless as a cat, and how could he not be my kid? From the moment I met him, a solemn little man, only ten months old and already walking when she looked me in the eye and swore he was mine, I'd seen me in him. The kid had her eye color but my eye shape. His nose was my mama's and his chin was identical to my baby sister's, stubbornness and all. And now, all those proofs were empty. I was sitting and I couldn't remember getting to a chair—lucky I wasn't on the floor, but she was still standing by the tree with the presents I'd brought for the kid taking up almost half of the room, and she was still talking. “He's not mine either. My cousin and her man couldn't keep him because they caught charges. And then you came into town and the timing was right.” The couple sitting on the couch waved, but they weren't paying much attention to the conversation because their eyes were on the kid, sitting still and quiet across the room on his screen like we practiced before church, and I couldn't tell whether he was listening. I hoped he wasn't. I hoped he wasn't hearing his mama saying that his daddy wasn't really his, and that he belonged to two people who'd never cleaned up his messes when he was sick or went out at midnight because his mama was out of diapers or showed up to stay with him at half an hours notice because she had to go out and couldn't find a sitter, even though I lived forty minutes away. “But they're back now.” And the apartment was filled with the smells and sounds of Christmas but I didn't know what to say, so I watched with them as the kid opened his gifts, and he smiled at me and hugged me when he saw the things and I tried not to be too happy about the fact that the kid wasn't comfortable enough with his father that he smiled at him or gave him hugs. And then we ate together, and inside of me was a hole where the kid had wormed his way into me, but I waited until he was sleeping, which took the better part of the day because five year old's don't take naps. And he wanted me to put him away, so I tucked in my little man and rested my hand on his head and said, “Love you, kid.” and he gave me love back, like he always had for four years while he was mine, and then I came back out to talk with her. “I had to do it,” she said. “I couldn't do it on my own.” My spine was stiffer now, and I stood and looked at her, so certain that she had done the right thing by the kid or by herself, but she sure hadn't done right by me. “Why?” I didn't raise my voice. I've never raised my voice or hand to her or the kid. “Why did you tell me he was mine?” And I couldn't say so, but I knew that I'd made it easy because I'd wanted him to be mine. When she asked for diapers or food before she'd let me see him, I'd sometimes given so much that I went hungry in my room across town. I'd talked to child services about getting a custody arrangement on so that I could have rights too, and now, I wasn't anything. “I did what was best.” “But why did you lie to me?” Because now, the kid was the one who would hurt. She stood straighter and shook her head. “I can't deal with you, now. Just go.” And with that, she kicked me out of her house and blocked me and I was out in the cold, sitting in my car, and on the seat, in the pile of things that I never take out of my car was a Christmas card from the kid, hand drawn in red and green was a tree and a little blob for the kid and a big blob for me because yesterday, we were family. And when I saw it, my eyes went blurred. And the empty place inside me hurt. word count: 799 |