Uncertain Undecided Undeclared

Terry Martin Sean &  Duc

“That’s your mom and dad?”
“Yes.”
“No it’s not.”
“You’re Black. They’re not your parents. They can’t be.”
“I’m adopted.”
“What’s dopted?”
“It’s when you don’t have parents.”
“No. It’s when your parents don’t want you.”
“No it’s not. My parents chose me. I was chosen.”
“What do you mean?”
“My mother chose to have me. She loved me, but my parents, they chose me because they could take real good care of me and my mother couldn’t.”
“What happened to your real mom?”
“Why are your… parents… the new ones… why are they white?”
“I don’t know where she is. She’s not from here. She lives in another country.”
“Ha ha ha! Your mom’s an illegal alien. A ha ha ha ha ha ha.”
“Ha ha ha. Yeah, your mom’s an alien.”
“That’s why you act like a girl.”

Mom Dad & Martin

“So Nana Joanne, she’s from Ireland. She grew up in a city close to Dublin. And Grandad was from Hannover. You know that’s in Germany.”
“Why don’t you call your grandparents? Do a little investigative reporting and get all of the facts that you can for your report. You know what we should do? At the next family reunion, why don’t you read your report at the barbecue? Don’t worry Christy, he can talk about the Steins too.”
“We steins have a very long history here, too long to simply mention at a MacBrayne barbecue. On my side of the family we’re Heinz 57. We’re a mix of everything! We got some Indian, Swedish, Scottish, some Ukranian but the Stein name always sticks, as your Granny used to say. The German’s been bred out of us, we’re mixed with so many different things now. That’s why I wanted to give you my name too. Do you know what stein means?”
“Maybe I can talk about, you know, the place where I was born?”
“What?”
“Marti. We told you all we know.”
“Okay.”
“I wish we knew more.”
“You were loved. That’s all we really know, and that’s the most important thing. You were loved.”
“I prayed for you. I prayed to have a little boy and god showed me that I was going to have a son and he was going to be sweet, and smart, and kind, and a little man of god in training.”
“We tried for years to have another child and that’s when your mother had that dream.”
“Libby was so lonely. Ha Ha. She had everything.”
“Literally everything. Our princess Libby… but she wanted a little brother or sister, and we wanted another baby.”
“Another member of the MacBrayne clan. The MacBrayne-Steins. Say, why don’t you put this in your report too?”
“Your family history… what we don’t know, what we wish we knew, substitute that with the truth. You came from love. From our love, the love of god, from prayer, from faith, and from obedience. God told me that…”
“It’s okay honey.”
“He told me that I couldn’t do it again and that we needed to adopt and that we were going to give a precious baby boy from far, far away a loving home. And that we were going to teach him the ways of Christ and to raise him in a home where there was nothing but love!”
“And as we love to tell you buddy, that little boy, well you’re not so little… but you’re what we got and you… you made us a family. We weren’t complete before. Now we’re a really family. You were the missing piece!”
“What’s the matter Marti?”
“What is it?”
“Talk to us?”
“You can tell us.”
“I can’t…”
“Marti, you know you can tell us anything. We’re your family.”
“If I tell you’re just gonna be mad at me.”
“Well, I don’t know what you want to tell us but if you tell us in a respectful way we’re not going to be mad at you.”
“We know that this… sometimes it’s a really sensitive subject. Even for us. We can’t change the past, and we can’t explain somebody else’s… circumstances to you.”
“Whatever it was, whatever happened, we can’t allow ourselves to feel sorry. We can’t feel sorry for ourselves and we can’t… we can’t feel sorry for the choices that other people made.”
“You’re here for a reason.”
“God sent you to us.”
“So as long as you don’t say anything that… challenges god’s plan for us as a family…”
“Because when you think about it, who are we? Who are we to think that we know better than god?”
“That’s right? Our thoughts are… say it with us…”
“Our thoughts are like dirty rags to him.”
“Our thoughts are like dirty rags to him.”
“Our thoughts are like dirty rags to him.”
“That’s right. See? You’re getting it. Whenever you feel upset. Whenever you feel like there’s a question that you want to ask and you know… you know that it’s going to upset your mother. Your mother fead you from her own breast… don’t make that face it’s true…”
“Yes, I did, and it took a lot of work but it gave me, it gave us a precious bond.”
“These are the things that you need to put in your report.”
“Maybe not about the breastfeeding.”
“I would skip that part Marti… but this is who you are. This is your story. You’re a Macbrayne…”
“And a Stein. You’re ours. When you have to write stories like this. Tell them you’re ours.”
“Our precious gift from god.”

Pastor Graham & Martin

“Come in Marti. Take a load off. You like rootbeer barrels? I’m all out of butterscotch. Probably a good thing for my teeth. You can close the door behind you. Come on in and take a seat. I haven’t seen you since you were baptised. How are things?”
“Okay.”
“Just okay?”
“I guess so.”
“Well that’s what we’re here to do. We’re here to see if things can be better than okay! Why don’t you start by telling me why you think we’re here today.”
“My mom thinks I should be here. She said I need ‘guidance’. She says her and my dad can’t give it to me.”
“We all need guidance. If we didn’t we wouldn’t need the good lord. What do you need guidance with Marti? Tell me about your life. Tell me about school. Your friends, and how you feel about your family right now.”
“Okay. School is, school is good.”
“That’s good.”
“Mr. Turko is my favorite teacher.”
“Mr. Turko huh? What does he teach?”
“Physical Science.”
“Do you like science?”
“Yes. I like it because you learn about the way things work and Mr. Turko is really funny and he makes it really interesting.”
“Are you a good student?”
“English is hard sometimes. Art too. My dad says maybe I’m good at history and math and science because I like to solve things, I like to memorise facts.”
“What about sports? You’re getting tall. Time to start shooting those hoops right?”
“I like skating and swimming but in P.E. we have to play all the sports.”
“You know how to swim?”
“I learned at the same time Billy did remember?”
“My grandson Billy?”
“Yes. Mrs. Graham asked my mom if he could learn with me when my mom hired a swimming instructor to teach me at our house.”
“Oh yeah! That’s right. That’s right. I forgot. I’m gettin old. Your mom is such a good woman. A woman of god. You know she loves you so much.”
“I know she loves me. I love her too.”
“Do you think she knows that?”
“I think so.”
“Hmm. So tell me more about school. I bet you have a lot of friends… maybe even a girlfriend or two? I bet you stand out at Hilton. There aren’t a lot of little fellas like you running around there. I bet all the girls just flock to you.”
“There are three… there’s three of us.”
“What do you mean Marti?”
“There’s only three Black kids in the whole school if you count me. We don’t talk to each other. Maybe just like hi but that’s it. And I don’t have any friends there. Not really.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“I don’t know? I’m used to it.”
“You don’t get along with the other kids?”
“No. I mean… we don’t really talk. I eat lunch outside the library, and then I just read when I’m done until the bell rings. Hilton… it’s just a place I have to go to.”
“What does that mean?”
“My mom and dad tell me all the time that I’m lucky to,to go to Hilton so I have to get the best grades that I can. So that’s what I do.”
“But high school… you don’t know it now, but these are the best years of your life. You’re learning about yourself, you’re maturing, you’re making friends. Don’t you want that? To make friends with people your own age?”
“I want… I want it to all be over. I just want to graduate.”
“Why? What’s so bad about high school?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“You might be right about that, but you know who would? J.C.! He understands everything. He’s been through it all, because guess what? He is us and we are him! What I don’t get, J.C. can explain. He can help both of us. He can help me help you. So why don’t you tell me what’s on in your mind? You’re doing so well. Let’s see what we can learn together, and learn from the good lord.”
“I can’t talk to anyone about it. Not even Libby.”
“You and Libby are real close. Do you know where she is? Have you heard anything from her?’
“Not since they told her leave. I mean… I saw her once at The Grill, but when I went back they told me she was gone.”
“Did you tell your mom and dad about that?”
“No. Mom just starts crying whenever we talk about Libby.”
“Do you trust me Marti?”
“...”
“Do you? Let me put it to you another way, do you trust the Lord? Trust in the lord in all things...”
“Phewwwwww.”
“Look it’s normal. At your age, you start to ask questions. You start to feel like you know things, like you know what’s best. But I can promise you, you need god… you need god’s word now more than ever. That’s what… that’s what happened to Libby. I tried to help her too but she fell into temptation. She committed herself to the deadliest sin and that’s pride. She hardened her heart against the Lord and well… I couldn’t save her. Jesus saved her! And one day I believe she’ll hear the lord’s call and she’ll answer. But right now I’m trying to make sure that you… cause you’re special see, you don’t know how special you are and that, that’s a gift. That’s how we’re going to save you, because you are so humble and that’s something that the lord can work with. I’ve watched you, you know? I can see that he planted that seed inside of your heart, inside of your soul. You were never meant to be anything other Marti MacBrayne. That’s who god chose you to be. That’s your calling. So many other children… I don’t think you know how blessed you are. So many children don’t get… they’re not chosen to have the life you have. So many kids who have the… the same background as you are not chosen by the lord to escape poverty, drugs, broken homes, ghettos… Now that’s not to say that god has abandoned them. He loves all his children the same way and he gives us all a chance to turn to him so that we may be instruments of the lord. Are you willing to let god use you? Forget about what this world is telling you and latch on to your faith. Latch on to the love of the Macbrayne’s. Are you willing to let god use you?”
“Yes.”
“Say it louder!”
“Yes.”
“C’mon you can do better.”
“Yes!”
“Alright Marti. Alright. The first step for you is to repent but to repent you need to be honest. Marti we’re worried about you. You know why we’re here today. I’ve tried to give you an easy in into the conversation that we need to have today. Your mother, my god, she loves you. She found some filthy videos on the computer. Images of… it’s so disgusting it makes me sick thinking about it. How could two men…. We know they’re not your dad’s. They’re not your mom’s. They’re not Libby’s. That only leaves one other person Marti. We know you’re sick and we want to help you. It’s a good thing we found out now before anything happened. You don’t want that life Marti. You don’t want to be sick. You don’t want to be chasin drugs. You’re a lamb, you’re soft, but you don’t want some man rippin the flesh in your behind night after night? You don’t want to go to hell do ya? God delivered you from the hands of some young woman, maybe even some young girl who had the good sense to trust him. Trust god. Trust me. You don’t want to be some sissy. This life is already gonna be hard for a boy like you. You wanna be Black and a faggot too?”

Aishason & Martin

“This was your first time here, at BSU huh?”
“Marshawn invited me. We have chemistry. I mean chemistry like the class. He told me to come through.”
“So what do you think about us newbie?”
“Yeah, it was cool.”
“You thought it was ‘cool’?”
“Why you say it like that?”
“Why I say it like that? You just sounded so white right now. Oh don’t look at me like that! You were smiling during the whole meeting, now you look like a lost puppy dog. Okay now you look even more sad. I know you’ve heard that before right?”
“Yeah. For most of my life.”
“You know what? I talk too much.”
“Maybe you do… a little bit... “
“Ouch!”
“I… I was… I’m adopted. I was adopted by a white family.”
“So me telling you that you sound white must be mad triggering?”
“No. I mean, yeah, it was. But that’s not really… in junior high, the school I went to was really white, whiter than here, and there they used to call me ‘Rescue Dawg”.”
“What?”
“Rescue Dawg. Rescue Rover. Rescue The Big Black Dog. Sometimes ‘Bones’. They used to  call me Bones. ‘Fetch’. ‘House trained’.”
“Damn. Kids can be so fucked up.”
“It’s aight. Is that better?”
“It’s aight! Yeah. That’s better.”
“Prol… probably by the next meeting I’ll get it. You’ll see.”
“Probably? I hope so, but do I have to wait til the next meeting to see you?”
“When’s the next meeting?”
“Um, I don’t know? Whenever Talon says. Prolly like, two weeks? Yeah bout two weeks.”
“And you want to meet before then? You can’t wait?”
“ He got jokes. I see. Yeah, maybe… maybe we could, I don’t know. I don’t know what you like to do but two weeks is a long time. I mean, maybe it’s not. You wanna wait until the next BSU?”
“ I’m gonna say ‘No, no, no, no, no’!”
“‘No, no, no, no, no, no… say yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.’”
“For me, it’s a yes. Yes to seeing you. If you want, before the next one.”
“Okay. Yeah, let’s do it.”
“I don’t even know your name.”
“It’s Aisahason.”
“What?”
“You can say it. It’s Aishason. I’m Aisha’s son. I’m a twin and Twiny got named after dad and mom wanted to name me after her. Daddy said, ‘Woman you can’t name no boy Aisha. You gon make him soft.’ Oops! Ha ha ha ha. Anyways I’m Aisha’s son, so voila!. Aisahason.”
“Aishason.”
“That’s better.”
“But not perfect?”
“Just say Aisha’s son. You made it sound like Aisha-san.”
“I like it. Your name has a story. I like how your mom also got to name you after her, like how your brother got named after your dad. What is your brother’s name?”
“Victor.”
“I like Aishason better.”
“Me too. Not gonna lie. I didn’t always like it, but I matured into it. But all this talking about my name… you gotta name?”
“Phew… yeah. Get ready. It’s just Martin. I’m just Martin. My adopted parents… they picked it out.” 
“Do you… have any contact with your… birth parents I guess?”
“No. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Don’t know anything about them.”
“What’s it like having white parents?”
“Not easy. It’s all I know though. But they wouldn’t have been comfortable with me doing something like this, coming here to a Black space. They just… I dunno… they really didn’t say anything to me about me being Black. I mean… there were little things here and there but it was all about how god put me with them. Like god over everything.”
“So you a church boy?”
“Um… I would say my relationship status with god is complicated.”
“So you mo the type to pass by the church, but you don’t really, you not all up in the church like that?”
“Pass by the church?”
“I was trying to be… it’s not fu… nevermind?”
“Yeah, I missed that one. What about you though? Did you go to church?”
“Chile my parents are dose Easter, Christmas christians. Me and Victor and my older sister would just be there for the holidays or when our grandmothers came to visit. Then we were there every Sunday til they went home. I don’t know. My parents worship at the church of ca-ching!”
“What’s that?”
“It means they like to have nice things, so they’re always working and doing little businesses together. They’re also really into each other. Don’t get me wrong, they’re cool, but if they could, they would spend all their time together. They do everything together. It’s one of those epic loves. I was like watching them when I was little,  and thinking, okay, it’s supposed to be like that. Oh okay. I see.”
“You want to have a relationship like theirs? Just like your parents?”
“Oh I don’t know about all that, but the bar is pretty high and they set it all the way up there. They’re really loud, we a loud family, but sometimes I… I would see them on the couch all laid up on each other just holding on to each other. No tv. No music. No wine coolers, cause they loved their little wine coolers and I thought… I still think that’s the bar. But you know, I just keep it cute. Keep it light. I’m all about school. School and work. What about you?”
“Yeah, I guess I’m the same. I still wanna meet you before the next BSU though.”
“Yeah let’s do that. What’s your major?”
“I still don’t know. I’m good at math, and science too. I don’t know what I want to do yet. What about you?”
“And you like math and science? Me, don’t laugh but I’m thinking about international relations. Do you know where you wanna transfer to at least?”
“Probably like a state school. What about you?”
“You’re gonna think I’m weird… oh, oh okay. You already think I’m weird. Okay. Fine. I’ll tell you then. I was looking at some schools in Europe.”
“In Europe? Really? You been out there before?”
“No, not yet. My parents said they’ll send me as like a graduation gift once I get my AA. Maybe I can get a French passport cos my grandfather had one.”
“You speak French?”
“With my mom but, I don’t know, being there is gonna be somethin else.”
“Well you know what you want. It sounds cool. I’m still tryna figure everything out.”
“I wanna hear about it. After finals we’re gonna have a big party? What are you doing? What are your plans? Are you going home to Casa Blanca?”
“You mean to… to my family’s? No. No I’m, ima stay here. We… don’t talk.”
“Oh… I’m sorry. I’m asking you a lot of, maybe personal questions. That’s just how I am. I don’t mean to be all up in your business. Sorry.”
“No. It’s aight.”
“Aight.”
“It’s okay. They… they kicked me out of the house, and we haven’t spoken since then. I’ve tried but they don’t… they won’t listen anymore.”
“Was it about…?”
“Yes, but also no.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you another time. Not on our first, like the first time we hang out.”
“I just keep going there. Every question I ask you is like too much too soon.”
“I guess that’s how it is sometimes. You think everybody else’s life is like yours… Your normal is their normal.”
“What about your parents?”
“They know but we don’t talk about it, but they know. As in, I can bring someone home and like, introduce everyone and I can say this is…  someone.”
“You met a guy named ‘Someone’?”
“You know what I mean! But, yeah, I never really came out to them and unless they, unless they, but they never ask me about that. Maybe sometimes if I’m seeing someone and he’s at the house they’ll say, they’ll ask if he’s gonna eat with us.”
“That doesn’t sound so bad. Maybe you, maybe you don’t have to talk about it like that. It sounds like they…”
“I’m cool with it. If they wanna talk we can, but, I just do me and they haven’t said anything about it. I guess I’m just lucky cos I know that not every family’s like that.”
“My family’s not like that at all. What happened was, basically my mom found my dad’s porn. Gay porn. And she thought it was mine. It’s funny cos I knew that if I ever did anything like that… If I ever like, looked at some videos, that they would find out somehow. So I never did. When my mom found his, when she found the, the stuff, he didn’t say ‘It’s mine’. And that’s how it happened. After years of them telling me about how god sent me to them, and that he wanted us to be a family when it came down to it, they, and they both knew, my adopted mom too. She knew, but they kicked me out of the house. I’ve been on my own since I was seventeen. All this time I never had citizenship either. I didn’t even know it, for years. I’m trying to see if I can stay here, if I can get citizenship but I might not get it, and if I don’t it’ll be another thing for me to figure out.”

Written by Isaiah Lopaz, Anthology / Appendix 2021