chapter 26

“You have a good placement with the Kerrys. I’m sorry, Sadie, but I still see no reason to recommend early release from foster care for you.”

“That’s not fair! You know I’ve wanted this forever! I can find a job. I talked to a couple of places last week, and they told me to come back when I’m sixteen. I can take care of myself! You can supervise me or whatever, check in. I don’t mind. Just let me get a place!” I sound like I’m begging, which isn’t cool. I have to calm down so she’ll listen to me.

“Sadie, the Board very seldom recommends early release from care. It is only in extreme cases, and most often for someone for whom we can’t find a better situation. You have a better situation. You can stay with the Kerrys until you’re eighteen and then just walk away if you want. But you can stay with them longer if you want to go on in school.”

“I don’t even want to stay in school now. It sucks and I suck at it.” I did it again. I didn’t mean to say that. I meant to say that I agree with her and that I want to go on in school. I meant to lie and instead I told the truth. What’s the matter with me?

“But the report says…”

“I don’t want to talk about the stupid report. It says that school sucks and I suck at it. Period.”

“It says you’re smart.”

“Yeah, yeah. So I hear. Well, if I’m so smart you should let me live on my own before they change the rules and I can’t.”

“I thought you liked the Kerrys.”

“I like them fine. It’s not about that! It’s not like they’re my real family or anything. I don’t have one of those, remember? There’s just me, and I want it to be just me.”

“This might be the time to talk about your real family.”

I open my mouth to tell her I don’t want to hear it, and then I close it again. I already screwed up on the school angle. She’s sitting there handing me the chance to try Plan B. I still don’t really want to hear it, but I guess I have to try anything.

“OK.”

“OK?” She looks confused. Which is the way she usually looks around me. Guess she was expecting my usual answer.

“OK, go ahead. Tell me all the wonderful things about my real family.” I feel like I want to cover my ears, but that would look stupid. Besides, who cares anyway? Nothing she says can bother me. It’s a story about strangers. Just like a TV movie. It doesn’t really have anything to do with me. Not really.

“All right. You’re sure you want to do this right now? You aren’t in a great frame of mind.”

“My mind is framed just fine. It’s my history. You have to give it to me. You told me that enough times.”

“All right then. I think you already know bits and pieces.”

“Yeah, like the whole door-to-door begging routine. That true?” I’m looking away from her. I need that blank wall from Jackson’s room to stare at.

“Yes, unfortunately. Your mother was on her own with the two of you children, and she was having some pretty serious substance abuse problems. At one point she left you alone for a few days. Your brother managed to feed the two of you from the food in the house, but when that ran out he took you to the neighbors’ to ask for food. They alerted the police, who then alerted us and you went into care.”

I’m still looking at my imaginary blank wall. The story of my life in a hundred words or less. Nothing new to my ears except the druggy part. I guess drugs are more interesting than kids to some people.

“How old was she?”

“Your mother? In her early twenties, I believe. She had been married to your father but he left soon after you were born and was never heard from again as far as I know.”

Early twenties. Old enough to know better. Not some teenager who didn’t know how to control her life. A grownup. Man, I quit smoking when I was fourteen.

“How old was I?” Not that it matters much.

“You were three and your brother Christopher was almost five.”

Christopher. Chris. I had that part right. Maybe my brain doesn’t have as many holes in it as I thought.

“And she left us alone.” Don’t know why I’m saying it again. Sounded bad enough when Cecilia said it.

“Yes. Sometimes people lose control of their lives and priorities, and children get caught in the middle. I’m sorry that this happened to you.”

“You didn’t do it. You don’t need to be sorry.” My mother’s the one who should apologize.

“Anyway, your mother is now living in a city a couple of hours’ drive from here and is holding down a job.”

“How nice for her.” Why would I care? She’s not part of my life. This is why I didn’t want to hear all of this crap in the first place. I just don’t care. This better be worth it. Cecilia better be impressed by my maturity here, because I am not enjoying this.

“There is a chance that you could reconnect with her at some point. When you’re ready. She has approached the agency and indicated that she would be interested in seeing you.”

I wasn’t expecting that. I don’t have an answer so I just stay quiet.

“Your brother also would like to see you again.” I turn to look at her. My brother. Chris. Do I remember him? Can I remember him feeding me and taking me out so other people could feed me?

“Where is he?” Not that I would know him. He wouldn’t feel like my brother. Just another guy.

Cecilia doesn’t answer at first. She looks uncomfortable, like she’s wishing that the conversation was already over. I stare at her until she’s forced to answer.

“Actually, he still lives with your mother.”

“What?” I don’t think I heard her right. He can’t be in the system and live with my mother at the same time. We were both taken away. Right?

Cecilia kind of sighs and looks like she wishes she hadn’t ever opened her mouth.

“Your mother worked hard to go straight after you two were taken away. A couple of years after you went into the system, she made an appeal to the court to have your brother returned to her custody. She was successful and he has lived with her ever since. Sadie, I know this is hard to hear and I wish I could tell you something different, but I owe you the truth. It was nothing to do with you personally. She just felt overwhelmed at the thought of trying to raise two children on her own and decided you would be better off with someone different raising you.”

I’m still staring at her. My ears are working, but obviously I can’t process words anymore because nothing she is saying is making any sense to me. My mother took my brother back and not me? He grew up in a house with a mother while I got bounced around from house to house like a rejected tennis ball?

“Someone different? Twelve foster parents or whatever it is now?”

“In fairness to her, Sadie, she thought you would be adopted by a nice family. It just didn’t turn out that way.” She reaches out to touch me. I slap her hand away. I don’t care if that counts as violence and she calls my PO. I want to slap her in the mouth hard enough to bury all of her stupid words back inside her pathetic brain where they belong.

“Fairness? You have to be kidding me. There’s nothing fair here. My brother lives with his mommy, and I’m in another stupid foster home with people who don’t want me.”

“The Kerrys do want you,” she says, as if that’s the point. Which it isn’t. She’s also wimping out and changing the subject. Fine with me. I’m done talking about my so-called real family. I don’t want to know anything else about them. Ever.

“I’ve been in enough houses to know the score with this place. They’re not the first people to say they want to make nice and keep me for a while. It never actually happens, and I don’t even want it to.”

“The Kerrys are different.”

“You said that about the Thompsons. I even changed my last name when I lived with them. Mrs. Thompson told me to call her Mom. I don’t see them anywhere, do you?” That shut her up. Cecilia just looks at me like she’s trying to come up with some lie that won’t make her look like a liar.

“Don’t worry about it, C, I know you don’t have a snappy comeback for that one. I know how it is. I’ve been around awhile. You can tell me all the wonderful crap in the world and that won’t make it true. I can only trust me, and I only want to live with me. Why can’t you get that?”

“I do understand. But I don’t think it’s in your best interest right now.”

“What if I find a job and prove to you I can work and do school at the same time? Then will you think about it?” She looks at me for a minute and I can tell by her eyes that she’s giving up the argument. Probably feels guilty that she just told me my mother and brother lived happily ever after without me. Fine. I’ll use that if it gets her to reconsider.

“I will think about it, I guess. But don’t get your hopes up. I can’t promise anything, and I don’t know if or when the age limit is going to change.”

“Don’t worry about me. I never get my hopes up.”

Why would I? It’s just like Buffy told me. You let yourself think something good is going to happen, and then you go flying up with your hopes just so you can come down harder when everything crashes. It’s easier to expect the worst. Most of the time, the worst happens anyway, so you might as well be ready for it. I expected the worst when I finally let Cecilia tell me about my life and I got slammed to the ground with it anyway. Imagine how I’d be feeling now if I’d expected good news.

I wonder for just a second how Alisha is doing with her aunt. I wonder if she still has hope.

Right now, my hope is buried so far underground that I would need a shovel to dig it up.