not so ancient.

As expressed Christine didn’t like Christmas or New Years. In fact she was generally sour towards most holidays that came along; all they did was remind her of what she’d lost. No, that was giving herself far too much credit. They reminded her of what she’d given up. Ruminations of what life might have been like had she not gone through with that abortion years ago were infrequent, she’d been young and stupid, but giving up her son for adoption, that stung. That hurt. Working kept her mind diverted from him sufficiently during the year but the holidays always ripped the bandage off the wound and she thought of her own childhood, of her parents and those few days where they actually behaved like a real family for a change, before the sherry induced cat fights started and Christine would roll her eyes and disappear off into the house somewhere to let her ridiculous parents hiss and spit at each other in private. At this time of year she would find herself thinking about her son, what his Christmas had been like, what toy he had really, desperately wanted and if his adoptive parents had given it to him in the guise of Santa Claus. At this time of year she wondered whether or not he had her eyes or her blonde hair, if he was tall for his age, how many pairs of shoes he’d grown out of this last year. This time of year hurt like no other. Perhaps with the exception of his birthday.

There was exactly one photograph in her possession of her son and usually it stayed at home, tucked away somewhere safe and out of sight, which she hated to do, as if she were ashamed of him, to which her inner monologue often cried Well Aren’t You? It was just better that way, she thought. It avoided awkward questions, it meant she didn’t have to lie to anyone, say that he was a relation from some distant branch of the family. For the last few days though she’d been taking the photograph out of the drawer it was usually locked in and holding it in her palm as though it were fragile, breakable. From out of the once glossy rectangle a baby looked up at her, sleepy, impassive in a way. The longer she looked at him the more accusatory his expression seemed to become, the more knowing, until her chest felt tight and her eyes started to sting and she had to put the photo away; it burned her. Christine both hated and loved it. In the run up to Christmas it lived in the inside pocket of her business jacket and it was so heavy., but she had gotten to that point that she reached every year where she couldn’t put the photo away completely, she had to keep it close, sentimentality beat out her iron fisted control and she carried her son in her pocket. ( Maybe it was dangerous to do that, but she didn’t care. )

[ narrative . closed ]