Just The Three Of Us

An adopted child learns about her birth mother in this poignant short story by Jacqui Cooper.

SOME kids struggle when they learn they are adopted, but not me. My adoptive parents were wonderful and my childhood was as happy as any child could wish for.

The first time I remember hearing the word

“adopted”, I was three. It was my birthday and Mum and I were making a cake. She’d let me decorate the cake with Smarties.

“Just think,” she began, admiring our handiwork, “somewhere out there, another woman is thinking about you today.”

I remember that, when we cut the cake, we cut a slice for my “other mummy”, too.

After that, every birthday we cut her a slice and wondered what she was doing. Of course she was never there to eat the cake, which magically vanished, like Santa’s mince-pies on Christmas Eve.

Over the years, my other mother was referred to often, but in a casual way. For example, when I turned out to have a talent for music, my skill was attributed to her.

Mum was also convinced that my biological father looked like James Bond. Every James Bond. Even when there was a new one.

Dad and I found that hilarious and it became a family joke.

I wrote a Christmas card and a Mother’s Day card to my birth mother almost every year.

I say almost, because no matter how positive a spin my parents put on it, there were times I resented the fact that my biological parents hadn’t loved me enough to keep me.

When that mood struck, Mum encouraged me to list all the reasons my other parents might have made the choices they did.

For instance, what if I’d been born a princess and my parents had been forced to hide me from a wicked fairy?

I had a scar on my arm and easily convinced myself it was caused by the touch of the wicked fairy’s wand.

Later, my birth parents became love-struck teenagers. My father had been killed in some heroic but unspecified way, and my mother was unable to provide for me.

Mum listened to my ramblings, agreeing that the chances were endless.

At first, when I wrote the cards, Mum addressed them for me. Once I was old enough to do this myself, I saw they went to the adoption agency.

I knew that when I was older I could apply to see if my other mother had been doing the same.

I thought of my biological parents as characters from a favourite book – real but not real.

When I turned eighteen I considered contacting the adoption agency.

“What do you think?” I asked Mum. To my surprise, she hesitated.

“Promise me, if you do, you’ll speak to us before you actually contact your family.”

I promised, but I never did contact anyone. I sat my exams, started uni, and joyfully embraced life.

It wasn’t until I was twenty-five that the subject came up again. I was engaged and planning my wedding when I lost my wonderful father to a hereditary illness, the reason that he and Mum had decided against having children of their own.

As Mum and I comforted each other, I realised that I knew nothing about my medical background.

Should I contact the adoption agency?

I filled in the forms and waited. The details, when they came, were sparse – my birth mother’s name and a very old address.

No father’s details. No big box of birthday cards written with love. No letter full of tearful explanations of why it had been necessary to give me up.

“Well, we have a name,” I said to Mum, reaching for my laptop. “Let’s see what we can find out about her.”

“Wait,” Mum said quickly. “There’s something you need to see.”

Going upstairs, she came back with a box filled with all the letters and cards I’d written to my other mother over the years.

I looked at Mum.

“I don’t understand.” What Mum then told me was a reminder that children weren’t always given up because a loving mother couldn’t cope.

Some children were taken from their parents for very different reasons.

“We fostered you,” Mum said. “The court case was all over the papers. It wasn’t hard to work out that you were the child in the news. When your mother was sentenced, we applied to adopt you.”

“But why the cards?” I asked. “Why the fantasy?”

“Because you deserved a happy childhood,” Mum replied fiercely. “Every way we could give it to you.”

I glanced at the “wicked fairy” scar on my arm. I thought of all the happy “memories” Mum had encouraged me to create, and my heart filled with love.

My childhood had been happy, and it was all down to my mum and dad . . .

The End.