Halloween hauntings

It started with a request, one I've heard before, from Raphael.

"I want a picture of my biological dad," he said, "I don't know what he looks like."

Max tried to help him.

"Here's what I remember about him," he said, evenly, as though he were explaining mixed fractions, "he was sort of pudgy, with a round face, and lots of dark dark hair. And he was usually scruffy, here," he rubbed his chin, "like he was growing a beard."

"I want a picture."

And so Clay brought down two boxes of pictures that I had exiled to the garage, and eventually I opened them up and let them spill out. I hid in the only place I can go to get away (a little) from the family, the floor between Sophia's crib and Jennie's bed. It is not enough room for the mess from my former life, but it is all the space I could find.

He liked taking pictures, my ex, so there are hundreds of them. Envelope after envelope, many with descriptions written in his cartoonish lettering to describe what is inside - "Tre turns one. Playing in the pool." I rifled through them all. Our wedding, pregnancies, my babies sleeping on his chest.

It has been eight years since we have been a family. He left eight years today. And most of the time I willfully forget the life I lived before. But there it is, now strewn on the carpet in a space too small to make sense of it.

Of course it is hard to look at him, to see the pictures of us in love, and worse, of my sons and him in love. But what struck me this time was me. How young I was. I look like a child, and not in the vital and glowing way either. I am soft and unformed and unguarded around the eyes. I had no idea what this story we were spinning was going to become. Good Lord, I was inadequate. No wonder he...

Let's not go there.

It also bears mentioning that it was five years ago yesterday that Clay and I went on our first date. On that day he told me that he loved me and that he intended to marry me. On our first date! I looked at him and thought, either this man is a scary stalker...or the love of my life.

He turns out not to be a scary stalker.

"Does it bother you?" I asked him, "Raphael's fascination with his biological dad?" He shakes his head, which is always his answer when I ask him if something bothers him. But his voice is calm and sure.

"It makes sense that he would wonder. And..." he picks his words carefully, "...I'm not threatened by him."

And of course. How could he be?

I found a picture for Raphael today. Not only a picture of his biological dad, but one of newborn Raphael, one day old, in his arms.

"That's me?" He stared at it, delighted. "And that's my dad."

I prefer "biological dad", because it is an accurate description, but also because it is a snub, should he ever hear it. But I did not correct him. I sat there, surrounded by the archaeological remains of that life, while Raphael stared at a picture of a man he hasn't seen for eight years, and called him dad. Tre and Max hovered, picked up pictures here and there.

"It's hard for me, guys," I said, tears threatening, "we were happy once. You need to know that. Your biological dad and I were happy once. And then it all...broke. And it was so awful at the end, and everyone was hurt."

"I wasn't hurt," Raphael said. He was four months old, after all.

"But it hurts now, doesn't it? Trying to figure it out." He nodded. "And I'm so glad to have the life I have now, to be married to your dad...but it's hard to look at these pictures and remember."

"Maybe," Max pushed a stack of pictures away from him, "it would have been better if you had just never married him. If you had married our dad the first time, and never had to get a divorce."

I am struck dumb by this, because he doesn't seem to understand that I couldn't have had them without him.

It seems I still can't have them without him.

I gave Raphael a frame for his picture, and he set it on the ledge in the living room. Clay came home from work and saw it.

"Oh, you found one for Raphi, huh?"

And I crumpled, just folded into his chest and wept.

Comments

[liz]

Sending cyber (((hugs))) to you, even though we've never met.

[Mir]

Oh, sweetie. This made my heart hurt.

I maintain that there is no great joy without great sorrow. That was a gift he gave you all, by accident. And -- much like the boys -- it's something you wouldn't have, now, without him.

Hugs to all.

[steff]

you are so graceful and loving.

[Salome Ellen]

Oh, it may and does hurt, but you are doing it so right! First a cyber-hug, and then a cyber-high-five.

[Mit]

You are so strong and loving with your boys. I admire you.

[pharmgirl]

Tell Clay that a little round woman in the midwest would like to kiss him right in the middle of the forehead.

And you - you get the best wine I can offer, a hug and my admiration.

Well done, Mom.

[Swistle]

Oh, this is so touching, and so EVOCATIVE of what this must be LIKE! "My babies sleeping on his chest" just killed me dead with vividness.

[Jill W.]

I don't even know what to say-- but as always, I am bowled over by the intimacy and eloquence of your writing.

[Amy]

Hugs to Kira and Kudos to Clay.

[Dawn]

It is very, VERY difficult. And a good too many of us living these schizoid lives. But what a treasure Clay is. I'm so glad you found each other and that the boys are getting to grow up with a real dad.

[Andrea]

Kira you make me cry. You are an amazing mother, and Clay is an awesome dad. Your boys & girls are so lucky!

[Clarity]

BTDT, have the therapy bills to prove it. Hurts something fierce doesn't it? I'm so sorry. There are certain ages that seem to rip the scab right off of the gaping hole a parent's abandonment leaves behind in their child and suddenly it bleeds all over again. From 5-7 my daughter kept her bio dad's picture close to her bed and we spent many a bedtime crying over what had been lost. Now at 10 she wants nothing whatsoever to do with his memory and has fully accepted the man who's raised her as his own since she was 2, but we both know it's a cyclical thing and the day when she yells "you're not my REAL dad" may be yet to come.

Family, as I'm sure you already know, are the ones who are still THERE, the ones who hold their children close while they cry no matter what their DNA may be.

[Clarity]

Oh on a more cheerful note? My son is my Sophia, IOW, my husband's biological son, but for the LONGEST time he was convinced he had a phantom biological father like his sister and would talk about his "other papa, you know, Papa Mark?"

Try explaining THAT one to your in-laws, LMAO

[mirdy]

Kira,you're an amazing woman & mom! I know the pain of the past still hurts but I so admire your honesty! I'm so happy your "true" family is complete now with Clay!