Page 144 of Toxic Wishes
The words replay in my head as I stare down at Cliff passed out on the couch with a bag of chips on his chest. I take him in, studying his features. It’s wild how I see a little of Colt and Blake in him. As I stare down at him, I see the regret in the creases around his lips. The exhaustion around his eyes, the lack of love, the way his arms are folded across his chest, his hug-like posture. I never expected him to help me get this album together, but it’s clear I’m helping even more so by including him.
Once I get to my parent’s house, I ensure I’m quiet when I open the front door instead of the garage. Despite the closed liquor stores, it was nighttime, and I still needed a new driver's license. My mom and dad kept all our important paperwork, like social security cards and legal documents, in a file cabinet in the office downstairs. I let out a sigh of relief when I walked through the door. The office was the first room you saw when you walked in, so even if my parents were awake watching TV in their bedroom or den, they wouldn’t hear me.
I slowly tiptoe into the office and open the cabinet door. I searched through the manilla envelopes until I found my name—Abigail Asher’s documents. I finger through the different paperwork until I spot my birth certificate or social security card, which I can take to the tag agency to issue a new driver’s license. A conversation with my mom a few years back pops into my mind.
“Mom I want to become an international singer”
“That’s great dear” my mom says as she fingers through the different dresses on the sales rack at Dillard’s
“But I need my passport and I asked Adalee and she said I would need my birthday certificate in order to get one. Do you know where that is mom?”
“I think so. I forget where I put all that stuff. It’s hard keeping up, besides I wouldn’t put your hopes on all that. The music industry is a cut throat business and I would hate for your silly wishes to become disappointed dreams.”
When I graduate, I will travel the world on my own dime not by relying on a man that I don’t even love.
She’s never had faith in me. She never gave me the support I deserved. The one person who should be your number one fan never was. An all too familiar pain in my chest burns, but I shove it down, ignoring it.
I spot my birth certificate, pinch the paper, and slip it from the envelope. I slowly close the file cabinet before letting myself out, praying no one spots me.
Once in my car, I place the certificate on the console and buckle my seat belt. I take a moment to close my eyes and breathe. That was stressful and yet another experience that reminded me how unhealthy it was for me to avoid my parents even on the simple task of asking for my birth certificate. But it’s been weeks since I came here to move back, and they met Colt, and I haven’t heard from either one of them after Colt abducted me that day. So, I’ve given up on trying to be a daughter who forms some relationship with her parents.
“Time to go home,” I say to myself, and the devil on my shoulder immediately whispers in my ear that I don’t have a home. And I knew he was right because I would leave the lake house soon.
When I shifted the clutch in reverse, I looked down at the birth certificate, and a name caught my eye. I pause. I look at it again, and as I’m backing up, I pull the car to the side of the street, and park. I picked up the certificate and reread it. Exhausted from lack of sleep and food, I needed to make sure my eyes weren't playing tricks on me. My heart drops in my chest, and I swear it feels like I’m about to have a heart attack.
This has to be a mistake. It has to be.
I look down at the certificate, and a tear drops on it. Unaware I was even crying, I wiped my face. I hold the certificate in both hands and stare at the black words that glare back at me. Laughing at me;
Birth Certificate
Abigail Asher
Born November 11, 2002, at 11:15 am.
Mother: Ashley Marie Asher
Father: Matthew Adams Asher
I put the car in drive, pressed the gas, and dialed the only person’s number that would have answers. The phone starts ringing, and I silently pray that she picks it up.
“Hello,” I hear my sister's voice, and relief washes over me.
“Hey Adalee.”
“Hey, Is everything okay?” She sounded groggy like she had just woken up.
“No. I need to ask you something, so please don’t lie to me.”
“Okay,” she says, elongating the vowels. “You’re starting to scare me. Have you been drinking and not eating again?”
I shake my head as tears start to fall down my face again. “Stop, not now, Adalee. I need to know, ” I suck in a breath, “am I adopted?”
It’s the most logical answer to why everyone treated me so differently from everyone else in the family. I don’t understand why mom’s name was the one on the birth certificate and another man’s. Did mom want another baby, but dad refused to have one?
“Jesus,” I hear Adalee say faintly.
“Is that a yes?” I feel my hands gripping the steering wheel tighter as I await her answer through the Bluetooth speaker.