Mafia Baby

CHAPTER THREE

JENNA

Documents were scattered all over Mom's bed, pictures started becoming visible on each of them as I walked closer to the bed. There were passport photographs all over them with the same face. Some of them had different colors, though. Mom was all silent, leaving me to figure out the puzzle she'd set up for me in her room. It was her birthday, not mine. Why did I have to be surprised and left blank?

I picked one of the documents in an attempt to read through its contents. I couldn't take the suspense any longer. Mom stood behind me, looking the other way. Certificate of adoption, the bold part of it read. Another was a birth certificate of a girl born on the third of March, 2000. That's my birthday, I thought. But the names seemed different.

I looked over to Mom, confused. I tried to find a clue of what was happening in her countenance. She was blank, she looked confused. Mom took a deep breath, walked towards me, and grabbed my hands.

“Look, honey, we didn't mean to keep this a secret from you all these while, okay?” She said, pity written all over her face. I discovered wrinkles on her cheeks. She was beginning to age. I admired her beauty. Her skin maintained its fairness, Dad made no mistake by choosing her as my mom.

“What secret? I don't even know what you're talking about,” I replied. One thing about being human is this: sometimes, we're faced with the truth, but we still won't believe it. We all have the things we want to always believe in at the base of our hearts. I'd caught a clue from the documents that I might have been adopted, but it was hard to believe. How could this beautiful woman not be my biological mother? How could that hardworking, caring man not be my biological father?

She placed a hand on my shoulder, “You were adopted a few weeks after birth, darling.”

My insides emptied immediately, a force didn't give passage to words through my throat. I felt a tingling feeling on my cheeks. What happened to my biological mother at birth? Was my head too big? Did I cause birth complications for her? Why? What? How?

I didn't know which of the questions to put up in exchange for an answer. A feeling of guilt mixed with betrayal crept through my spine. I felt guilty, I could be the cause of someone's death. My existence betrayed me.

“What about my biological parents?” I asked, expecting an appropriate answer for someone to put up their child for adoption a few weeks after birth.

“I have no recent information about them. the last time I heard from them was when you clocked ten,” she responded with disappointment. A flash occurred in my memory – a voice speaking to me on the phone. Sobbing, telling me to never doubt my existence. “Here is her picture,” she handed an old picture to me. The person in the picture was lithe, she had the same nose as me. The truth stared at me, right from the confines of that picture.

“What is her name?” I asked. My bucket list would later be updated. I needed to find my parents and ask them so many Whys and Hows. I used to think I took after Mom's beauty. My brain took another wave as it was evident that the woman in the picture was my biological mother.

“Beatrice Snowman,” she answered.

Beatrice Snowman. The name got stuck in my memory immediately. I would later go on to search through f*******:.

The feeling of betrayal engulfed me again. This time, I stormed out of Mom's room into my room. Everything seemed out of place. I loathed everything, the environment, the people I was with. My world was tearing apart, I wondered what they had been thinking of me before they broke the news to me. They were probably concerned about how I would take it, but it would have saved me time.

The knocks on the door of my room were consistent. They were not promising to stop soon. The weight of the world felt heavy on my shoulders as I went to open the door. It was Mom.

“I'm sorry, sweetie,” mom said. She sat with me on my bed, stretched out a hand to wipe the tears that rolled down my cheeks.

“I feel betrayed, Mom,” I said. “Why was this kept a secret from me all these while? Why did Beatrice Showman -”

“Snowman. It's Snowman.” Mom whispered. I understood that she didn't mean to cut in, but she was not that used to accommodating blunders, especially when they have to do with words.

I nodded. “Why did she put me up for adoption? She didn't die during childbirth,” I said with a broken voice, sniffing my nose. Tears rolled down my cheeks, my soul was weak. I knew, right from the time I felt uneasy in bed, that the day wasn't going to be so good. A sharp pain went through my spine, and another feeling of unease engulfed me. It was time for me to change my tampons.

The mirror in the toilet didn't seem relevant as I stared at it. The girl who stared back at me looked strange. She seemed as though she was ready to take up something more than her. She looked exhausted without even embarking on the quest she was about to take. The post I'd seen on Twitter flashed through my mind again. This time, it didn't make me smile. Rather, it made me feel the void that lay in me.

I didn't expect that Mom would still be in my room, sitting and staring blankly at the high school pictures that I pasted on my wall. They were there to remind me of my good days in high school. I spent a few seconds staring at it as well – the innocence, the beauty.

“I'll find her,” I said. I had no idea how I was going about it, but I chose to pick the quest up as something to live for. Ever since I finished high school, nothing pushed me up every morning. Although there was the urge to go to work, I needed something more. Something more than my imagination that I would get up to pursue every morning. Every day.

“What?” Mom snapped out of her thoughts.

“I'll find my maternal mom,” I said sharply. I had snapped out of the feeling of pity and betrayal I was engulfed in.

“What are you talking about?” She stood up, trying to pull me into another embrace. “I wouldn't advise you to embark on such an indefinite quest, I have no idea whether she's alive or not, and I don't know her whereabouts either.”

“Have you got the last address?” My words were sharp and definite. One would think I had a structured and effective plan all drawn on a board. Each step will lead me to the next, I thought to myself. One thing about thought patterns is that they cannot be fully effective in all spheres of life. What if a clue leads me to a logjam? What if a step doesn't lead to the next?

She responded with a nod. I guessed that she was holding tears from erupting by not saying anything. I was right. The next words she would utter were obstructed by an outburst of tears and sobs that made her pull me in a tight hug. I took her whole body in as I rested my head on her shoulder.