"Let's go home baby." She softly said with a tear stained face. She then gently lifted her foot off of the brake, giving the car a little gas as they quietly headed home.
* * * * * * * *
April, 1983 -Age 10 months Marla was trembling slightly as she took the key to open the door to their new two-bedroom home. It wasn't much, but still it was theirs. Finally after almost a year of struggling to find a bank that would underwrite a mortgage for a loan to her; Marla and now the almost one year-old Jayden could finally move into a home of their own; a home where she would watch green grass growing and decorate the yard with pretty little flowers and a place with a backyard that Jayden could play in and invite friends over for sleepovers. She had used her small savings from her supermarket job as the down-payment for this house. Later Marla would worry about furnishing it along with finding some more money to pay off her student loans. Right now she was too excited that she could call herself homeowner and provide at least this much for her son.
She placed a hand against the wall searching and soon she found what she was looking for; the light switch. Abruptly the place was illuminated and she put Jayden down on the carpeted floor. He immediately began crawling-walking around as if he was inspecting the place.
"What do you think Jayden?" She squatted down near her him. He looked around curiously as if he was really inspecting the place. This made his mom smile as she looked at him. She half expected him to give her a thumb-up approval rating as he babbled on and on in his baby gibberish. His chubby little fingers found his ear and began slightly tugging at it as if he were giving her words serious thought. Marla's smile broadened as she watched her son's nervous habit.
Though she hated to admit it, even though Jacob as of yet had a first time to come and meet his son; Jayden was already displaying habits that were clearly of his father. Then her smile turned to a frown. Suddenly she was reminded of her son's birth certificate. She wouldn't think about that now. She refused to allow ill thoughts of her son's father to dampen her spirit and steal her joy. Still, she couldn't stop the stinging tears that shimmered in her eyes as she watched the love and joy of her life looking around the new unfamiliar surroundings. He was as her Aunt Shirley had said "the splitting image of that no-good sucker…" Right down to his father's coloring and body type- he had been carbon-copied as if Jacob Ellis had birthed the child himself. It was like the universe was playing a cruel joke on her. How could a child resemble someone so much who had refused to come and meet him, refused to acknowledge him as his son and refused to sign his birth certificate even after over a year's time?