Page 97 of The Blessing

“So, have you two thought about a date for the wedding?”

As Felicity and my girl make small-talk, I sit back in silence holding Grey. I don’t want to contribute to the conversation, despite wanting to know my biological mom. I thought all this would be a hell of a lot easier. Instead, seeing her makes me clam up. I can’t seem to find any words to say to her at this point. I have so many questions, but I can’t find it within myself to ask them just yet. I want answers from her; I deserve answers from her. I don’t want to just sit here and dance around the elephant in the room while playing fucking “catch-up.” I want to know why I haven’t seen her until now. I want to know what made her give me up without a second thought. All of these questions begin to burn a hole in my brain, and yet, that’s where they remain. They never escape past my lips because I can’t seem to gain the courage vocalize them. The shock of seeing her might just be too fucking much.

While talking to Ronnie about wedding plans, Felicity shoots me glances here and there. It’s as if she’s trying to decide what to say to me. It looks like we both suck at communicating when it seems to matter most. What can you really say to the child you abandoned, though? What can I say to the woman who left me behind? No wonder we aren’t too fucking chatty! Thank fuck I brought Ronnie along. Otherwise, we’d just be sitting here fucking staring at each other while my dad would try to awkwardly fill the silence.

“So, I hear Greyson’s birthday is coming up?” Felicity asks, finally directing a comment at me.

I sit up straighter in my seat and give her a curt nod. “He’ll be one in January.” My voice is so gruff and raw I almost cringe hearing it.

Felicity gives me a small smile and leans forward in her seat. “He seems like a wonderful baby. You’ve done a great job with him, Trevor.”

Her warm smile makes me feel uneasy. My chest begins to tighten. I don’t want to begin to describe the feelings that flood my body, overwhelming my senses. Her words make me… happy. Happy and fucking confused at the same time. Hearing her praise makes me feel connected to her in some way—even though I don’t really know her at all.

“Thanks. Grey’s really easy to take care of,” I awkwardly explain.

She looks at Greyson, who’s resting on my shoulder, and tells me, “Well, it seems like you make a great father, Trevor.”

I shift uncomfortably in my seat and utter an awkward, “Thank you.” I’m not used to being complimented like this. I wish I could say the same to her, but I don’t know what she’s like as a parent or even as a person, for that matter. Well, if you consider the whole “abandonment thing,” it doesn’t suggest that she’s a great one. She must sense my unease because she gives me a sad but understanding smile before turning her attention back to my dad.

It feels shitty to be unable to express what I’m feeling, but what can I really say? I don’t want to start a delicate conversation over our meal. At least not with my girl and son here to witness it. Maybe I can try getting to know her as a person before moving on to getting to know her as my mother. Would that possibly make things easier? At this point, I doubt anything would. I need to have a conversation about the circumstances surrounding why she left me. Did she leave me right away, or did she have me for a while before handing me over to my dad? She mentioned at the store where I first ran into her that she used to read to her son. So, I must’ve stayed with her for a little while, right? Something must’ve happened to separate us. I couldn’t imagine anything that would separate me from Grey. Nothing could ever cause me to leave him. If I was faced with something horrible—I’d still fight for him every fucking day. So, why hadn’t Felicity fought for me?

The question weighs on my mind as my dad eases our conversation to another safe topic. He spends the rest of our meal trying his best to engage me. I can’t blame the man for trying, but I’m not feeling very receptive at the moment. Felicity smiles at me from time to time, me feel guilty for not trying harder to reach out to her right now. If I did open my mouth, though, I doubt she’d like what I had to say. I want the truth, not some sugar-coated version of the story I’m sure they’d whip up just to placate me. They have been lying to me my entire life. I know what I have to do and who I’ll have to talk to if I want to get the true, but most likely, unappealing story. Evelyn wouldn’t care enough about me to spare my feelings. I haven’t talked to her since her divorce from my dad. All of our issues were left completely unresolved. I know if I want to move forward, I’ll have to deal with every aspect of my past. Including resolving the issues between me and the woman I used to think of as my mother. God, just thinking about that last part fucking irks me.

I keep my mouth shut for the remainder of our meal. When Dad pays the bill, I’m thrilled that this torturous fucking meeting is over. I have so much on my mind, and now that I know what I want to do, I want to contact Evelyn as soon as possible. She was part of all this and I need to hear her side of the story.

As we exit the restaurant and head out to our cars, Felicity walks along beside me. I can tell that she’s dying to talk to me, but something causes her to remain silent. Maybe she and I are more alike that I’d originally thought. We both want to bottle up our feelings and pretend they don’t exist.

“I would really love to get a chance to see you again, Trevor,” she casually states, although, her words sound loaded as they escape her mouth.

I hesitate for a moment before finally agreeing. “That’d be cool. I’m free pretty much every weekend, so, just let me know when it’s a good time for you.” God, why do I sound so insecure whenever I talk to her?

“This weekend sounds good,” she replies with a small smile. “We can grab something to eat and talk. Just you and me.” She stops speaking and observes me, as if taking in my appearance for the very first time.

“What?” I prompt, feeling unsure of myself all of a sudden.

“Nothing,” she says, shaking her head with a wistful look in her eye. “It’s just the last time I really got a good look at you, you were just a little baby. I’ve been imagining what your face would look like for so long… Which makes seeing you for the first time really surreal.”

I give her an uncomfortable nod and slide my hands into my pockets, leaning back against my truck as Ronnie gets Grey strapped into his car seat on the opposite side. “Well, everyone grows up, you know? Do I look the way you imagined I would?” I just have to ask.

I expected her to say no. I doubt she pictured her little baby growing up to be the man I am now. So, I’m shocked when she her nods her head with a teary-eyed grin.

“You look exactly like I imagined you would.”

I don’t know if it’s the tone of her voice or her comforting words, but my entire body relaxes against my truck. I always thought people liked me despite my harsh appearance. However, Felicity seems as though she’d like me no matter what I looked like. She’s so fucking different than the motherly figure I’ve grown accustomed to over the years. That’s the reason why I’m at a complete loss for words and don’t know how to respond.

“Am I what you imagined?” she goes on to quietly ask.

I think for a moment because I’ve never had the chance to imagine anything as a child because Evelyn was all that I knew. Finally, I answer her with the only response that I can give.

“You’re what I pictured, Felicity,” I say because she seems like what a mother ought to be.

She smiles at me and I smile back at her. The world seems to come to a halt as I experience my first “moment”with my real mom.

“Before you go, I’ve got something to give to you,” she tells me as she fishes through her purse.

She smiles as she finds whatever she was looking for before pulling her hand out of her bag, producing a photograph. She hands it to me then she takes a step back, giving me one last smile.

“I wanted you to have this. It’s one of our first moments together. I’d stare at that photo every day, but now I want it to belong to you.”

She smiles, hesitating for a moment, as if she were trying to decide whether or not to embrace me. She decides on just giving me an awkward, but hopeful “goodbye” before taking my dad’s hand. I watch them as they walk back toward his car.

When they leave I look down at the photograph, and just as soon as I do I feel fucking lost. My eyes fill with tears and my heart constricts in my chest until it becomes fucking unbearable. It’s a picture of Felicity and me. She’s sitting in a rocking chair—by a large picture window—with me in her arms. I’m so little. I barely recognize myself. I trace her beautiful face with my index finger, just staring at the small photograph until it becomes wet with a few of my tears. She looks so young here and so fucking happy. Yet, there’s something about her eyes that doesn’t sit right with me. There’s this melancholy look in their depths, which makes me feel sad for her. I’m smiling in the photo. My little head is nestled against her chest. As I stare at the picture, I think, this is what love looks like. Is this how I look when I’m holding Grey in my arms? I’m quietly fucking sobbing with the photo clenched between my shaking fingers. Ronnie notices the state I’m in and slowly approaches me.

“Trevor? Baby, what is it?” she asks, her voice soothing.

I hand her the photograph and cup my face within my hands, trying to gain control over myself. I don’t know why I’m crying like this. It’s like the floodgates have fucking opened and all of my emotions finally have the chance to come pouring out. I feel embarrassed, while at the same time, I feel fucking relieved. I needed a good cry. I needed to feel something other than this fucking numbness.

“This is so beautiful, Trev,” she muses as she observes the photograph. “You were such a cute little baby.”

Her comment causes me to smile. Soon after my crying starts to subside, and I wrap my arm around my girl’s shoulders and bring her up against my side. I inhale her scent and immerse myself in its calming effects.

“We should get a nice frame for this,” she suggests as she gently dabs my tears off the picture with her sleeve.

I nod, welcoming the sound of that suggestion. Ronnie helps me into the passenger seat of my truck because after today, I’m fucking useless. I study the photo as she drives us home. Looking from my mom’s face to mine, I wonder what caused our separation. She looks like she loved me in this picture. Loving expressions like that can’t be faked. What on Earth could have happened to make her give me up? I hold onto the photo as I rest my eyes, imagining what the first few months of my life spent with her were like before slowly drifting to sleep.