At the Sound of Daybreak

At the Sound of Daybreak

By Heather Ann Martinez

Fortune favors those born with all their finger and toes. Fortunate are those who have beauty and charisma. They seek attention while others shy away from it. Still others could sit in the corner pretending to read a magazine or watch a football match. Then there were those somewhat in between. There were those who had at least one known living parent who would return some day. There were those who were labeled orphan but had what other would never had. They had hope for being reunited with a long lost mom or dad. They knew someone was thinking of them and missing them. There weren’t words to describe their bond, their affection for one another. It all seemed so complicated when summers turned to winters turned to spring. Hope of that parent returning began to fade like a dream. Waking up to the reality that someone who knows you so intimately yet doesn’t know who you have become at all with the passing of one too many seasons.

It was like that for Clara who knew her mother was alive and living somewhere in the world. Clara lived with her mother’s parents until they passed away. She was then sent to live in a foster home, then a group home and then another foster home until she turned eighteen. She did manage to graduate from high school. She was not interested in going to college. She knew she needed to find a job and a place to live. She found both with others who also aged out. Unlike the others, Clara didn’t have a lot of goals for her adult life. She tried working in fast food restaurants, as a proofreader for an online magazine, as a hotel maid and finally as a caregiver. She was assigned as a caregiver to an older woman who lived in the neighborhood Clara and her roommates moved to. The older woman, Jackie, did not have any family that Clara knew of. Jackie had a few friends that she played cards with on Wednesday evenings. She was quick to give Clara advice. She was always concerned she would forget it if she didn’t talk about it as it came to her. Jackie was a queen of sticky notes and scribbled pieces of a lifetime of wisdom. Clara always went to Jackie whenever she had to make a big decision like buying a used car and saving money to rent an apartment of her own someday.

One day, Clara was brushing Jackie’s hair. Jackie took an envelope out of her dresser and handed it to Clara. 

“What is this?” Clara asked her.

“I don’t know. Why don’t you open it and find out?” Jackie countered.

“It’s addressed to the last foster home I had lived in before some of us got the apartment. I haven’t lived there in months.” Clara said. She carefully opened the envelope and took out a letter that was dated a year earlier. She then folded the letter and put it into her front sweater pocket. She continued brushing Jackie’s hair.

“Well, aren’t you going to read the letter?” Jackie asked her hoping to be included in this conversation. She knew Clara was thinking about what was written in the letter and also terrified there was more bad news. Jackie took the hairbrush out of Clara’s hand and told her she should read the letter. It took a long time to get to her. Jackie reminded her that some things are worth the wait. Jackie said that some days you have to set that crockpot on low and let your soup simmer until dusk. There are things that are only better after the passage of time. Clara pulled the letter out of her pocket.

The letter was typed. The stationary was worn. Clara couldn’t get over how old it looked. Jackie kept motioning her to read it.

It read:

Dearest Clara,

Tomorrow is your eighteen birthday, and I am finally able to contact you. There are a lot of reasons why I have not been able to do so until now. I don’t want to tell you about the legal drama I have had with your biological father. He wanted to have full custody of you and he wanted you to leave the country with him. He used you as a pawn for years. I am so sorry I brought you into an unstable family home. Your father and I were happy once. We met in our late thirties. We didn’t think about having children as much as other younger couples did. We traveled for work and your father was from Europe. I had no idea how homesick he was. I thought he acclimated to living in the United States well. He had been living in the US for almost five years before we met. I didn’t pay attention to him when he talked about going to back to the village he grew up in. When I became pregnant, he would rest his head against my belly and tell you all kinds of childhood stories. He would tell you about all of his favorite places he wanted to take you to. I assumed that he wanted us to go to all of these places together as a family, but I quickly realized he did not want me to be in the picture. He said he had grown tired of me. He thought I was boring and too caught up in my routines. I admit I lived a fairly normal but boring life. I worked and met up with friends and family once or twice a week. Your father didn’t like to stay in one place very long and he left. A few weeks later, he filed for full custody. He proved I was an unfit mother using false witnesses. You were taken away from me, but I always knew where you were.

A few days ago, your father passed away in his sleep. His custody suit was dropped almost immediately and I could finally reunite with you. I went to the foster home you were living in and I looked in the window. I saw you talking with the other girls about what you were going to do after you turned eighteen. Unlike the other girls, you really didn’t have any ambitions. You didn’t want to go to college. You didn’t really seem to care about what you did next. I realized your father and I both robbed you selfishly wanting to have custody of you. Neither of us got to help steer you in any direction while both of us had very full lives. I couldn’t give you all that you wanted in your childhood, but I could give you what I know you will need for the years ahead. I hope you will contact me at All Angels.

With All My Love,

Jackie

Clara looked at Jackie.

“Are you? Did you?”

“Yes, Clara. I wrote you that letter. Your foster parents kept it from you and sent it back to me. I had a stroke shortly after receiving the returned letter, but I still wanted to reunite with you.”

“Why didn’t you tell me who you were? I have been helping you for months.”

“I was trying to work up the courage to tell you. Your foster parents didn’t think me coming back into your life was a good thing. They read what the legal papers said about me being an unfit mother. Your foster parents were worried that I would abandon you again or remember that I had neglected you, as your father claimed, somewhere in the past. I knew I didn’t but it did give me pause to doubt. So, I am asking you now if you would really like to meet your mother.”

“I don’t know what to say. Jackie, you should have told me.”

Clara walked out the door. Jackie began crying. Clara went home to her roommates and told them about what happened. Her roommate Jenny asked her why she was sitting here talking with them. She said she would do anything to meet her birth mother, to find her family. The others nodded in agreement. They explained to Clara she had received a great gift. Too many people take the gifts they have been given for granted. Clara did not see Jackie again for another week. She walked into Jackie’s house and started making oatmeal on the stove. Jackie walked into the kitchen. Clara looked at her and told her to sit down.

“Go ahead and sit down Jackie. Your tea is waiting for you and your oatmeal will be ready in a few minutes. I hope your jawbone is not bothering you too much today.”

“No, it did at the sound of daybreak.”

“Don’t you mean the light of daybreak?”

“No, the only time my jawbone ever really hurt me was at the sound of daybreak when I was giving birth to you.”

Clara served Jackie her oatmeal and herself a cup of tea.

“Tell me all about it.”