Jenna considered herself the best mom of all
of her neighborhood. As a matter of fact, her children had given her various
“awards” throughout the years with the labels “best mom”, “greatest mommy” and
others. She had left her career in real estate to say at home and take care of
her children but when her Andy reached the age of five, she decided it was time
to go back to work, at least part time.
Her boss asked her repeatedly if she was
certain about it and she always said she was very sure of it. Every morning,
she would take her two children Andy and Veronica (who was three years old) to
the daycare center. Then, she would work until the clock hit two o’clock. She
would pick up her children at that time and would normally take them for food
shortly afterwards.
The meal of choice was always fast food. It
did not matter if it was hamburgers, chicken nuggets, chili fries, subs or,
sometimes, ice cream. Her mother thought she spoiled them too much but she did
not think so. To be honest, she took them to those places for them to be happy,
as every time she picked them up, they would be rather sad. She had no idea why
and didn’t have time to wonder why.
Jenna’s husband worked in a multinational
company, selling various electronic devices to retailers all around the world.
This meant he was rarely at home and almost had no chance to spend time with
his wife. To be honest, Jenna had not had any sex with her husband since she
had been pregnant with Veronica. That was a long time to spend without a kiss
or a caress. But she was no saint…
Sometimes she would be late to pick up her
children, for reasons no one but her knew. Jenna would always compensate her
absentmindedness by buying candy and more food and toys to her children. And
they seemed to like it so there was no real harm in it. Besides being late, she
would sometimes scream and them. She would never hit them or anything but she
had to let out some steam somehow, especially when her husband called her to
say he would be staying two more weeks in some country she didn’t even knew.
That was Jenna’s life: she did what she
thought was right, trying desperately to mend a life that had turned against
her, or so she felt. One day she cried especially hard because she realized
something that hurt her and no, it wasn’t that her husband was cheating. That
she had known for many years and was the main reason she refused to be touched
by him. What she realized was that she didn’t like her children. They made her
feel trapped in a life that wasn’t he one she had thought for herself all those
years ago, when she was and felt young.
However, in her office, she worked with a man
called Vincent. He was a very clean man, very thorough with every assignment he
did. He didn’t like Jenna very much. To be honest, he didn’t really like anyone
in the office. It wasn’t that he didn’t like people; he just didn’t like them.
He had many friends out of work and enjoyed spending time with them although
some conversations with them proved to be difficult. With time they got easier
but there was always some kind of “awkward factor”.
When he was younger, Vincent had to be sent to
psychologist because his behavior was “strange”, according to his father.
According to him, his son had never been with a woman and he was already
twenty-two years old. He even went on to say that if he were gay, it would have
happened earlier but nothing. Vincent and the doctor had many sessions until he
realized he was asexual, which meant he didn’t feel any sexual desire for any
gender.
This revelation was obviously hard on his
parents but was even harder to accept by Vincent. He knew it beforehand but the
appearance of a word that describe who he was, made him think a lot of other
things: would he ever have a family, for example? Was love always linked to
sexual desire? The doctor had said he could have meaningful romantic
relationships with whomever he wanted but now that seemed just a nice phrase to
make him feel better.
By the time he had gotten the job in the real estate
office, he had realized that the doctor had been right. A year into his arrival
at the job he had met a very nice woman called Rita. She was beautiful and
brave and funny. She was simply everything he loved about people but summed up
in a single person. They would spend many nights together, talking about
various subjects that interested both of them. Their first kiss was difficult
but he was able to overcome it.
She knew about him being asexual and assured
him she was fine with it. But after marrying and living together, they both
felt they lacked something and that was a child. They couldn’t have him
naturally for obvious reasons and when doing tests to make an “in vitro”
fertilization, doctors informed Rita she was infertile. That came as a big blow
to them, feeling unlucky and sad.
They finally decided to adopt and discovered
how difficult it could be. The agency they went to go through all of their
history included their medical records. When asking about the psychologist
sessions he had in his youth, Vincent told the agency he was asexual and that
settled the matter for them. They told them they had a strong religious
consciousness and couldn’t give children to people that “defied the model of
what a family and a person should be”.
Naturally, the couple was destroyed by this decision.
They left the agency without speaking and knowing their relationship had
encountered a large hurdle. Before they left, they saw a child playing in the
gardens, maybe around ten years old. They smiled at him and then left on their
car, never to come back again.
That child’s name was Anthony. He had been
under the care of the orphanage for a long time, since he was maybe four or
five. He didn’t know all the details but he knew his mother was deemed
unsuitable to have any children with her, so they took him away. He didn’t know
if he had any brothers or sisters, he didn’t know if his mother was alive or
his father had ever cared to find him but after so much time, the answer to
that question was rather obvious.
After playing in the garden with a bucket and
a plastic shovel, he decided to go back inside, as dinner was only two hours
away. He loved food and he loved to see how they did it. The ladies at the
kitchens were very nice, although normally no child was let inside. They did
exceptions all the time for Anthony, who loved to see how his favorite stew was
made. He also loved the sounds of the machines, the chopping of vegetables and
the gorgeous scents that filled the place.
When he lay down in bed at night, in a room
with at least five other kids, he often thought of food first and then he
daydreamed about a family that would someday come for him. The older ones in
the orphanage teased him sometimes, and told him he was already too old to be
considered for adoption, as couple always preferred small children who they
could raise for themselves.
Anthony knew this was true because he had seen
many of the young ones leave but he rarely saw an older kid do the same. But
nevertheless, he was full of hope. Maybe his mother didn’t love him enough to
keep him or maybe he was better off without her. That wasn’t important. But he
knew he would love someone to teach him how to cook, to take him to school and
to play with every day.
Adults were strange all over, that much he
knew. But he also thought that some of them were very nice, like the kitchen
ladies. So every night he would dream about the family that would come for him.
He always saw two people in his dreams but they never had defined faces or
traits. They were just there, loving him in his dreams, been warm and making
Anthony feel that, at last, he had a home. And that he was loved and was
important to them.
