Product of Sin

Some people are born when they are punted out of the womb. 

Others are born when they are twenty-eight. 

It’s not really confusing when you think about it. Take me for instance. I was brought into this world two months prematurely, in July of 1972. I was a bubble baby for six weeks and was brought home, still underweight with a fifty-fifty chance of survival. 

Despite that, I grew up strong with a slight astigmatism that affected my right eye more than my left. I was a quiet boy, happy to do what I was told. I was trusting even to a fault—so much that when I was five and a perverted stranger called on the phone, I dutifully did as he told me. Which was to smear mayonnaise on the underside of my lab-cocker spaniel mutt.  

I near got my hand bit off. 

That’s me, happy to go through life ignorant, compliant, and naïve. But life wasn’t going to be ignored by the likes of me. 

Sometimes it whispers to you. 

Other times, it plumb well smacks you across the face. 

A not so gentle wallop happened to me when I was reading my mother’s autobiography on the roof of my parent’s single-story house. 

In one chapter, I matched together two words. “Forced” and “Pregnant”. 

I went back in the chapter to check when this happened and found it took place in December, 1971. 

I re-read the paragraph summarizing my conception once more and put the book down. 

In my mind’s eye, and in my mother’s eloquent writing, I re-lived her experience of an untold wrong with her husband. 

He’s not my father. 

He’s my sperm donor. 

I have a real dad. My adoptive father. The one that plays ball with me, then tackles me and finds every tickle spot I have on my body.  My "real" dad takes me to movies and explains life.

Except this one detail. 

My brother didn’t have a "real" dad. Our Sperm Donor couldn't be bothered with his children. 

Daniel, my brother, was ten when I left with Mom and he chose to stay with Sperm Donor. 

I really can’t imagine the damage that had been done to him but I got a glimpse when he called Mom crying to come home with us.

That was six years ago. 

I watched him as he climbed our olive tree, the only way to get to the roof without dragging out a ladder. It wasn’t a good time to join me. 

As he strode over, I thought of helping him break the other unchipped tooth when he "accidentally" dove into our empty pool from the roof. 

He looked down at the book and then over at my face. “What chapter are you on?”

I just looked straight ahead trying to swallow the resentment filling me up. But emotions like that, they find a way to come out. And they do. In the most emasculating way you can think. I turned my head away from him and wrapped my arms around my bent knees. 

But he didn’t go away. Instead, he sat down next to me. 

I wanted to tell him to get out, but if I did, my voice would have cracked, and I did not want to give him the satisfaction. Instead of sniffling, I let the snot run down my upper lip. 

“You’re better than he was.” He scuffed the roof with his shoes.

“Whatever,” I said, proud that my tone sounded even.

He shifted his feet again. I wished he’d go away. He hardly came up here after his clumsy accident. And it was my refuge. No one bothered me here. No one criticized me for watching the sun go down. It was just me and the sky. No one below could see me up here and I liked it that way. 

“Sperm Donor’s liver failed,” he said. “I’m going to Corning to bury him.” 

“Good, I’m glad he’s dead.” 

A huge lip-flapping sigh came out of my brother and I could tell that was what he expected me to say. 

I thought it’s what he hoped I would say. He could be the good child and I’d be the bastard son. 

Then realization sent its star wide receiver, shock, to pummel my ass. 

Thank God I was already sitting down. My father, my sperm donor, my mother’s rapist, was gone. 

My brother got up and stood there looking at me for a while. I kept my head turned, but the blur in my eyes was gone. 

“Just know it wasn’t your fault.” He walked away before the drop of emotion cascaded down.

I wanted to throw another verbal bomb, but I didn’t. I just wanted him to leave. The only tribute of memory I gave to Sperm Donor was the time he called on my ninth birthday and told me he was my dad. I replied that he didn’t know what the hell he was talking about and ­my dad was standing in front of me in my kitchen.  

I think I even hung-up on him. 

Maybe I was born then. 

Or maybe I’d been sleeping all this time believing I was a good person. 

How could I be a good person when I’m the product of such a vile act? 

A few days after his phone call, I asked my mom if I was a planned baby. 

Yeah, you can twist that and lie. 

Every baby is “planned” for. Nine months--in my case only seven--but any mother can justify a "yes". 

Throughout my life, what was pounded into my head? The policy of truth. Tell the truth no matter what. But it’s ok to lie to a nine-year-old. 

And then to come clean like this? In a book where not only all your family members know, but the whole world? I was going to wonder if everyone looked at me and thought, like father like son. 

Does this mean I’ll be like that? 

The idea creeped me out and I wanted to take a shower but that would require me to climb down and look my brother, my dad and my mother in the eye.

I couldn’t face them right then.

But then again, what impact would an answer of "no" have on me?

The front door slammed and I could see the top of my mom’s straight auburn hair. 

“Stephen?” she called out.

I didn’t answer.

“Stephen, I know you’re up there. Come down for dinner.”

“I’m not hungry.” My tone fluctuated.

“Come down anyway,” she drawled in her southern accent.

“No, thank you.”

“Get your ass down here right now.” 

“I’m not a kid!” But you wouldn’t be able to tell from the crackling in my voice. 

“Stephen. Alex. Newman.”

That was it. I jumped up, clutching the autobiography, and rushed down the olive tree. Not really knowing what it was I wanted to say but armed with her book in my hand, I forged ahead like some bull after a red flag. 

“I read your book!” I sneered.

I didn’t expect her to cower before my new-found defiance but I didn’t think she would stand as straight and tall as she did. 

Our eyes met and connected with fierce electricity. Even though I was looking down at her, she still had enough presence to make me feel as if she loomed over me like a noble sentry. 

“What did you think?” Concern filled her voice.

I was ready to explode into vile tongue lashing. My thoughts must have been obvious through my expression. Near speechless, my lips parted to say something spiteful.  But she spoke first.

“You were the best thing to come out of that.”  

I blinked. And then I saw her, for the first time, as if I had just been born. 

My mother, this frail southern woman, thin as my pinky finger, had found the confidence to admit to her own son the atrocities she endured before and after his birth. I blinked again and saw how she clawed out from the pile of refuge that was Sperm Donor and made a new, enduring, and courageous life. And she fought to bring me with her. 

“Momma,” I said. “You remember that day when I came home from being teased about being adopted by my dad?”

“Yes,” she said.

“You remember what I asked you about being planned?”

“Yes.”

I wrapped my arms around this juggernaut of hope and unconditional love. My words were muffled, and not just because my face was in her hair, but I did manage to say, “I’m glad you lied.”