Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 56606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 226(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 56606 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 283(@200wpm)___ 226(@250wpm)___ 189(@300wpm)
Facts are facts and I’m not their responsibility anymore. They accepted me and took that on when I was a minor. No matter what they say, it’s how I feel.
Now, though, I have to do for myself because I’m not their brother. Sure, they don’t say that no one does. Only, I know my truth. Also, I know their parents aren’t kicking me out or anything like that. They are cut from a different cloth and took me on as a little one. They love me, treat me, and accept me as one of their own kids. Their act of kindness is immeasurable. I will forever be grateful.
I have a plan for my future. I don’t need to stay here, using more of their kindness and love. I feel like they have given me more than they ever needed to. From the day I was born, they have given me unconditional love. Something my own mother never could give. As for my father, anyone’s guess on who he is goes. There isn’t a single lead, not even a name dropped by my mother around the time of my conception. From the day I was left behind, they stepped in and never let me feel the void.
All those years ago, they should have put me in foster care. No one would have judged them for it. If they had done what my mother planned to do and turn me over to the state, this would be my path: graduate and go. That is how it works for the other wards of the state. Aging out, that’s the process they call it. Happy birthday figure shit out.
Whether they realize it or not, it’s my reality. I should have been in the system. And that system would put me out at eighteen. I respect what they have given me, but I have to take care of myself. I need to find my own way. I need to have my own family.
The kind of family that doesn’t bail on responsibilities and commitments. The kind of family that is bonded through thick and thin.
My aunt, uncle, and cousins are the best. Not once have I ever felt like I didn’t belong. In fact, I’ve had a relatively normal childhood with them. To an outsider, there is no way to imagine what happened to me. The average person doesn’t get dropped and dashed like a damn take-out order.
Sure, it could have been worse. I wasn’t abused like a lot of kids, both in the system and stuck in a home with jacked up parents. None of that changes the voice inside my head that has always told me I wasn’t enough to keep. I wasn’t worth sticking around for. There isn’t a single thing to change the fact that she walked away without a second thought.
The truth though, will always burn deep. The way my mother went with me to have a visit at her brother’s house and never looked back is a trauma I don’t know that people get over. Maybe someone stronger than me can, but I haven’t been able to shake it no matter how much I try to. There isn’t a lack of love or attention from my family. I just can’t seem to let go. Compounded with what happened, I feel a need to get out of here and pave my own path.
The questions plague me and there is no changing the way I can’t shake them. It’s simple really, why did my mother leave me? How could she carry me, give birth to me, and then bail?
I was four years old the last time I saw my mother. I don’t remember much. She was with me when we got to Uncle Ty’s house. Aunt Kellie took me upstairs to the playroom with their sons, Link, Ven, and Nix. I went to bed thinking she was downstairs talking to my uncle. She didn’t tuck me in, although, she didn’t really tuck me in regularly. We didn’t have those kinds of routines, which was an adjustment when I came to live here because Aunt Kellie has all the schedules and traditions and smothers all of us with her love. When I got up the next morning, I had breakfast with my cousins and my mom never came to the table. The day went on and she wasn’t there.
That was it.
My mother never said goodbye. I don’t know when she left, only she was gone and never looked back. It took me a day or two to ask for her. I don’t remember the answer Uncle Ty gave me early on. I know I had this nervous anticipation with every holiday. Well, until the date passed, and she didn’t arrive. Not once did she come for a single holiday, not even a birthday card in the mail.