Chapter 5 - Abby
I LAY MY GUITAR on top of my bed and grab my laptop off the nightstand. I sit cross-legged as I set the computer on the bed in front of me. Flipping open the screen, I type in my password then open my browser to my bookmarks. I stare at the name of the website for a moment before I click on it: birthrecords.com.
I know my dad’s credit-card number. I have it saved in a text file because my dad was tired of giving it to me every time I wanted to download a new movie. But my parents will definitely notice a charge on their account made to birthrecords.com. Then I’ll lose my credit-card privileges and they’ll probably move us to a remote island in the South Pacific with no Internet access. Well, my dad will probably protest for a couple of days before he gives into my mom, as always.
I open up my “Saved Orders” page and stare at the “Submit” button. Just a few more clicks and I can have the name of the agency that handled my adoption. That doesn’t mean they’ll give me the names of my birth parents, or that the agency still exists. All it means is that I’ll have one more piece of the puzzle. One tiny piece of a puzzle that’s missing half its pieces. It may seem insignificant and pointless, but it means the world to me.
Why can’t my mother see that?
If I knew what hospital I was born in, or what time I was born, I could go to the county courthouse and search the birth records myself. But my parents have already admitted to lying about this information when I asked them about it years ago in casual conversation.
“Mommy, where was I born?”
“In a hospital, of course.”
“What hospital?”
Mom and Dad exchanged shifty looks as they used their ESP to come up with a lie. Always covering their tracks. God forbid I should want to know anything about my true identity.
I wonder if I look more like my biological mom or dad. I wonder if they play music like me. I wonder if they live here in North Carolina or somewhere cool like New York or Hollywood. I wonder if they broke up or if they had more kids after they gave me up. Maybe I was the only one they didn’t want.
Most of all, I just wonder if they ever think of me.
I open up a new tab on my browser and begin a new search: abigail jensen adoption decree. I hit go and, of course, nothing related to me or my parents comes up. But that hasn’t stopped me from repeating this same search string a billion times over the past three days. Since he gave me the idea.
I open my email next to check for new messages and I’m relieved to find I have two. I already feel like a ghost in this house. I don’t think I could handle being invisible to my friends.
I check Amy’s message first.
From: [email protected]: [email protected] Subject: Lameness
Vanessa’s party isn’t gonna be a sleepover anymore. Her parents flipped out when they heard boys were coming. Her parents are the worst.
I chuckle at the last sentence in my best friend’s email. She doesn’t know what I found out a few days ago. If she knew, she would have to agree that my parents are the worst. At least, my mom is.
I type a reply to Amy telling her I’m not sure I’ll be able to go to the party anyway. My parents only let me go back to school today because they think it will get me talking to them again. They’re afraid of me being around a lot of germs while my body is adjusting to the new meds. I hit send then my finger trembles as I click on the next email in the queue.
From: [email protected]: [email protected] Subject: homework
did you take down the page numbers for warner?
I smile at the obvious ploy to start up a conversation. Caleb Everett is the last guy I would expect to email me. He’s been sitting next to me in Mr. Warner’s algebra class for four months and he hasn’t spoken to me all year. Though, I have caught him sneaking glances at me once in a while. I just figured that was the way he was with all girls.
I’ve never actually had a boyfriend. Not that this is terribly uncommon for girls my age. But I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t imagined walking the halls hand-in-hand with Caleb ever since we ran into each other in the hospital four days ago.
I was getting ready to leave my hospital room, but I was still waiting for my parents to bring my street clothes. They were settling the financial stuff down the hall from my room and I was getting pretty impatient. Grabbing the back of my hospital gown to hold it closed, I slid out of bed and tiptoed to the doorway to peer down the corridor. That’s when I saw him.
Caleb was running his hand over his messy light-brown hair, his gaze pointed at the floor in front of him. He looked worried and this intrigued me enough that I actually forgot where I was for a moment. When he looked up and straight at me, I didn’t look away fast enough. His green eyes locked on mine, then that frown on his face turned into a warm half smile that could literally give me a heart attack if I weren’t on my new meds.
“You’re in Warner’s class with me,” he stated. It wasn’t a question. There was no way I could mistake sitting next to him for an hour a day for the past four months.
I nodded, tightening my grip on the back of my hospital gown and hoping he didn’t look down at my feet. My mom didn’t bother painting my toenails while I was in a coma. It didn’t seem important at the time.
He stopped just a couple of feet away, close enough for me to smell the warm, fresh scent of his black T-shirt, which bore the logo of a band I’d never heard of. God, why was he smiling at me like that?
“I heard you were in the hospital.”
“You did?” I replied, my voice a bit shrill as I wondered what exactly he heard and who he heard it from. He probably thought I was totally lame and sickly.
“Yeah, I asked about you and Ewan said you were in the hospital for your heart.”
“You asked about me?”
“What’s wrong with your heart?”
I looked up into his gorgeous green eyes and tried not to collapse right there. I managed to hold it together long enough to tell him about my reaction to the old meds and to find out why he was in the hospital that day. His dad also had liver problems, caused by something totally different. In the ten minutes we spoke, I saw something in his eyes I’d never seen in Mr. Warner’s class.
Hope.
I type up my reply and hold my breath as I hit send.
From: [email protected]: [email protected]: Re: homework
134-139 and 156-158. 156-158 is the practice test and it’s hard. You should get started on that or you’ll be up all night. ;-)
My stomach flutters as I wait for his response. The moment my email dings, my fingers race to open the new message.
From: [email protected]: [email protected] Subject: Re: homework
do you think warner will go easy on me if I tell him I couldn’t finish ’cause I was too busy emailing my future girlfriend?
Just a few simple, corny words and everything has changed. Just a few words and I have… hope.