Chapter 92
EIGHTEEN YEARS BEFORE
I was scared.
I was in a shelter, waiting for a new family to adopt me. Where was my mommy and daddy? One day, I was with them, and the next, I didn’t know where they were.
I was really scared. I just wanted someone to hug me.
Then I looked up and saw a boy and his parents approaching. I was nervous, and so I didn’t look up at them much. But the boy approached me with a smile.
“Hi, I’m Morgan,” he said.
He put his arm around me, and I felt strangely comforted. I was still scared, but I felt like I had someone who could make me feel happy finally.
“Do we really gotta do this?” the big man said. “You know I only want one.”
“Hush, Edwin, he’ll be a great addition,” the woman said.
She then crouched before me.
“Hi, I’m Melanie,” she said before putting a hand on me.
I went over to her and hugged her, causing her to go aww. I heard someone make what sounded like a groaning sound.
“I am your new mommy,” she said. “I will take care of you. But I promise you that if you ever want to see your real mommy, I’ll help you do that. OK?”
I nodded my head nervously, staying downcast.
“Can you say your name?”
I finally looked at the new mommy.
“Chance,” I said.
“Chance,” she said. “Welcome to the Hunts. I and the rest of us are here to support you with whatever you need, including seeing your real parents if you want.”
“Yeah,” Morgan said. “I like you, Chance. I’ll help you however you need.”
Present Day
The disappointment of Layla still stung, and thankfully, Mom seemed to pick up on it, choosing to remain silent as I stared out the window of our car on the three hour ride up to Rhode Island. I wondered why we didn’t just fly, but I understood why Mom had done it.
She wanted to give me the chance to ask any questions I had in private. It was just yet another way that my mother proved to be a wonderful woman that deserved more credit than she had ever received in her life from Edwin.
At the moment, though, I was just peering out the window, looking at the skyline of Manhattan recede in the rearview mirrors. It felt like an appropriate image—I had thought multiple times about just following Layla to Chicago.
But even beyond that, even if Layla refused my advances in Chicago, I was beginning to wonder if I would find what I was looking for in New York City.
I wanted love, peace, and calmness; New York City might give me someone whom I could love, but it was hard to find peace and calmness in a city where taxi cabs honked at all hours of the day.
I knew that the fact that I was asking myself this question meant I wasn’t going to live in Manhattan forever, but obviously, moving tomorrow and moving in ten years were two very different things.
“So you’ve really kept in touch with them this whole time,” I finally said, after we’d crossed over into Connecticut.
“Yep,” Mom said.
“Can I ask why?”
“Of course, you can ask anything, dear,” she said. “I always felt like a boy should know who his real parents are. And besides, they gave us the gift of you. I want to stay in touch with the person who gave me a gift that wonderful, you know?”
“Oh good grief,” I said, but I couldn’t help the smile that came to me. “Well, they gave me a gift, too. They gave me the gift of being your son.”
“Oh, now you need to stop,” Mom said. “You’re going to make me cry. I only hope I did an OK job. With Edwin, it was just so… hard sometimes.”
I put a hand on her arm and smiled.
“I’m going to see the woman that birthed me today, but you are my mother,” I said. “You got that title with the job you did. I’m just sorry it took me so long to call you that.”
Mom just smiled as tears streamed beneath her sunglasses. I let her have her moment, if only so that she could also concentrate on the road. We went silent for another fifteen minutes as I listened to the barely audible radio, playing classical rock from the 70’s and 80’s.
“What do you know about my birth mother?” I said.
“Well, you know her name is Bethany. She works as a personal trainer now at a gym, but back when she gave you up for adoption, she was a high school dropout. Just sixteen, I believe, when she gave birth to you.”
“Damn.”
“Worked a lot of jobs to try and make it work at first. But I’ll let her share the story. She’s a wonderful woman.”
I smiled and nodded. I supposed that my birth mother and I did have an awful lot to catch up on.
“Oh, one thing you’ll want to know, she did remarry,” Melanie said. “I think your stepfather—if you want to call him that—works as a mechanic somewhere.”
“Ahh,” I said. “I might be interested in meeting him. I mean, I’m sure I’ll shake his hand. But this trip is for my mother, you know?”
I’d heard enough to have a base of knowledge to go off of.
Once we were less than an hour out, I was surprised to realize how nervous I felt.
These were people I had refused to see, even refused to visit at the graveyard.
Would Bethany forgive me for refusing to come to Parker’s funeral?
Would she be mad at me? I knew she had some measure of compassion if she was inviting me and Melanie over, but still…
At least I’m not spending so much time thinking about Layla. At least this is so heavy and so important to me right now that my mind’s not thinking about her.
We pulled into a small town, Richmond, and took a few detour streets before we pulled up to an apartment complex. It looked a little run down, but I didn’t feel unsafe. It was certainly a far cry from the mansion I had grown up in, but then again, what wasn’t?
“You ready?” Mom asked me.
I gulped and nodded. I tried to wonder what my Mom would look like and how she would react.
But as we got closer and closer to the door, my brain started to just shut down.
I couldn’t think straight. I was really glad that Melanie had come with me; I wasn’t sure I would have been able to finish this part of the task without her.
Mom knocked on the door.
“Coming,” I heard on the other side.
It was a sweet, gentle voice. The door handle clicked, and the door swung open.
And there was my mother. My real Mom. I knew immediately it was her—I could just feel the connection. I could see the same eyes as I had. I could see the body frame. I could sense her spirit.
“Mom,” I gasped.
“Chance? Chance…”
She leaned in and hugged me, and I took her into my arms. I felt tears streaming down my face as my mother also sobbed into my chest.
It had been eighteen years since I’d seen my mother.
An entire childhood had come and went without me ever seeing her, without me ever talking to her, without me almost ever acknowledging her existence.
But now that I was here, it felt like just yesterday that I’d seen her. It certainly had that vibe.
“Oh, Chance,” she said. “Come in, both of you! I made us brownies for the occasion.”
“Oh, you’re my mother, alright.”
The four of us, including my birth mother’s new husband, sat in her living room, munching on her brownies. It was interesting to observe the contrast that I would have grown up with if I had stayed with my birth mother and father. It was as stark a contrast as blue collar and white collar.
Their apartment—and apparently, all the other places they had been before—were very run of the mill places.
The most space they ever had was a house with two rooms. I had no other siblings; my birth had complicated things for my mother, which had racked up enormous medical bills, constraining her and my father’s ability to take care of me.
My mother did mention that Melanie had paid those bills as part of the thank you for adopting me, which made me love everyone in the room that much more.
They said that the newest vehicle they drove was from 2005; they said that a treat for them was going to Outback Steakhouse. They had gone to New York City once in the last eighteen years, and they had felt out of their element.
But one thing that struck me, listening to my mother, was how loving and doting she was and how she described my father being.
Even my stepfather, a man by the name of Carl, was a kind and gentle person.
I was happy to have grown up under Melanie, but now I felt even more pain about the fact that I never had a father figure.
“I’m so happy to see the kind of man you’ve grown up to be, Chance,” my biological mother said. “I knew Melanie would take care of you, but you always worry about the people you love. I never stopped worrying about you.”
“I…”
I had no idea what to say.
“I’m just sorry I didn’t try and reach out earlier.”
“Nonsense,” Bethany said. “If I were in your shoes, I would’ve been angry too. To be given up for adoption at that age, you can’t know for sure what’s going on. You just feel abandoned and left behind. So I would be angry in your spot too.”
It was incredible how well she knew what I had experienced. Either she just had that mother’s intuition, or maybe… maybe she’d been adopted too?
“Can I ask…” I said before trailing off.
I didn’t know if it was appropriate to ask. I didn’t want to cross any boundaries. But I couldn’t shake the question from my mind.
“Why you gave me up?”
“Oh, honey, I fully expected you to ask the question, of course you can ask,” Bethany said.
“Well, when I had you, I was sixteen years old. I had to drop out of high school. My parents disowned me for having a child out of wedlock, but Parker was the most devoted father that you could have ever seen. He was in the military, but when he was around, he made up for the times he was deployed or at base. The problem was, as I mentioned, I had the medical issues giving birth—nothing that was your fault, just something that happened as a freak accident. So I took on as many jobs as I could, but then it became a real pain.”
She took a deep breath.
“Parker’s parents helped so much in that time, but it was becoming a strain. We couldn’t afford to raise you, but I didn’t want to give you up. I loved you and still do, and…”
Bethany paused to wipe a tear away. Even I was starting to feel emotional; my eyes were watering and on the verge of spilling out.
“Parker and I just wanted what was best for you, Chance. We knew you were a gifted child; we saw signs of it early, like how you learned to spell early and how you learned basic math quickly. But we knew that you would never reach your full potential in this household. And so… we put you up for adoption. And an angel by the name of Melanie came through and helped out.”
“Oh, you’re too sweet,” Melanie said, but she was crying now too.
About the only person who wasn’t crying was Carl, and he had his hand over his mouth, as if trying to stave off the emotions of the moment.
“I’m sorry I never got to know you before,” I said. “I know I said it, but you sound like you would have been wonderful parents, even if you didn’t have the money my adopted father did.”
“Your father was a wonderful man, Chance,” my birth mother said.
“He put up with a lot of my weaker moments. He understood that sometimes, just because I tried to push him away, it didn’t mean I actually wanted him away.
I’m just an introvert by trade, and sometimes I needed to be left alone.
But he was always there for me, and when you have someone like that in your corner, it’s a wonderful thing. ”
I smiled. I’d like to be that person for someone. For Layla, ideally.
“Do you have any ladies in your life, Chance?”
I cracked a smile.
“Eh, kind of,” I said. “It’s a long story.”
“Oh, I don’t mean to pride,” Bethany said. “I just was curious.”
But I think she knew what she’d done. She had that mother’s intuition that always seemed to know the truth, even when the son hadn’t even hinted at or said anything about what kind of advice she was dropping.
We spent the next couple of hours trading stories of a much lighter variety; Melanie didn’t say much, perhaps conscious of coming across as rich and spoiled, but I was more than happy to tell my mom and Carl about everything I’d experienced as a kid.
Edwin’s name never crossed my lips, but otherwise, anything went.
It was wonderful. I felt even more pain that I hadn’t reached out before, but that was more than erased by the joy of being with my biological mother.
The day reached its late afternoon when my biological mom offered me the chance to do something I should have done five years prior.
“Do you want to visit your father?” she said.
We pulled up to the graveyard where my father rested just as the sun began to set.
Melanie drove, Carl sat in the front, and Bethany and I sat in the back.
She swiped through and showed me photos of my father; the resemblance was a bit uncanny.
I could see a similar face and build to me, the muscular, tall, lean type.
She shared stories of him and his humor nonstop; apparently, he had quite the charm.
Thanks for that, Dad.
Melanie parked, and we all piled out. Melanie held Carl back, and Bethany and I approached the tomb marking my father’s final resting spot.
I couldn’t say that I started crying, nor could I say I had some profound emotional moment seeing my father’s burial spot. But it was certainly a strongly meaningful moment. I stood in silence, reading the tombstone.
“Here lies Parker Givens. A husband, a father, and a fighter.”
And a fighter.
He really is my father.
I ran my hand over the tombstone, smiled, and patted.
“If you’re listening to this, Dad,” I said. “Thanks for everything you’ve given me. I’m sorry I’m doing this now instead of before. But hopefully, you can hear me and you can know you did all that you could. I’m doing alright, Dad. I’m doing alright.”
I stood as Bethany remained just a little bit longer.
I put my arm around her, and she leaned into me.
I looked back to see Melanie and Carl watching from a distance, a sweet smile on my adoptive mother’s face.
How lucky I am to have two women I can call Mom.
They both have had such a strong impact on my life.
As I stood there, looking at the grave for my father, I remembered what Bethany had said to me earlier in the afternoon. “Sometimes I needed to be left alone. But he was always there for me, and when you have someone like that in your corner, it’s a wonderful thing.”
Even though Mom didn’t know, she knew. She knew what I was going through.
She knew that until I was forced away, until I was truly rejected, until Layla stopped taking me in…
I had to keep going all-in.
I couldn’t quit.
No matter what it took, no matter what I had to do to get her and keep her in my life…
I had to do it.
I had to love her with all of the bold, audacious spirit that I had within me.