Umbilicus: An autobiographical novel

TRACK AND TRACE

'SO, WAS THERE A specific moment when you decided you wanted to find me, or was it just something in the back of your mind for a long time?'

'It was always in the back of my mind when I was younger, but when Angela's mom committed suicide, everything changed. I suddenly had this sense of urgency, that I must find you, before it was too late.'

'Oh, Charlotte, I am so sorry. How old were you when your friend's mom died?'

'It happened on 13th June 1989. We were fourteen, halfway through Standard Seven at the time.'

Her face pales. 'Oh my word, my one step-son, Judson, died on 13th June the very next year. In a motorbike accident.'

'That's too terrible. I'm so sorry, Beth.'

Untimely death is always the hardest to reconcile. Angela's mom was only thirty-six when she died. The same age as Marilyn Monroe. Like Marilyn, she was also blonde and beautiful. But unlike Marilyn, she left three children behind. The resemblance between Angela and her mom is uncanny. The gene pool runs deep.

After that catastrophic event, Mom had tried to dissuade you from spending time at Angela's house. But you were insistent on maintaining the friendship, even if it meant lying to your folks and sneaking around behind their backs. You knew all too well what it felt like to be abandoned and ostracised.

'So, how and when did you find me exactly?' she says, steering the conversation in another direction.

'Well, the day before my twenty-first last month, I phoned Child Welfare and got put through to the manager of the Adoption Unit, a woman named Margaret. I asked her when I could come fetch my file, and she said it would take about a week, to retrieve it and compile the report.' You pause, trying to contain your anger at the memory of what happened next.

'Yes?' she presses gently, sensing you are upset.

'For the next five weeks I phoned and phoned, and the bloody Nazi gatekeepers kept telling me it still wasn't ready, still wasn't ready.'

Her brow furrows.

'Eventually, when I couldn't take it any longer, Gray's mom, whose house I phoned you from yesterday, got Margaret on the phone, and told her it was totally unacceptable messing around with a young girl's life like this. She literally demanded someone see me and give me my file. She set up a meeting between Margaret and me, for Thursday morning, last week, before their offices closed for the long weekend.'

'So what happened next?' Her eyes are bright and eager.

'Well, I went and saw Margaret.' You realise the information you are about to impart is just as important to her as the information you are hoping she will give up to you. Like two trains that have been travelling on parallel tracks for more than two decades, your paths have finally intersected, and you have the opportunity to share some of the pivotal moments and milestones of your separate, yet interconnected journeys.

'I caught the Mynah to their building on Windermere Road, and went through to Margaret's office. She gave me my file and we went through it together. It was just a computer printout of basic information, like your and Dylan's full names and dates of birth, your heights, your complexions, what you did for a living at the time of my adoption, that kind of stuff. Plus both your parents' names and what they did for a living.'

You try and think back to everything that was in that thick A4 envelope you took home. 'Oh, and there were also some photostats of information for adoptees in my position — thinking about starting the search for their biological families — and all the worst-case scenarios to be prepared for. Plus this photo of you, and this letter you wrote to me five years ago and left on file.' You pull them out of your bag and place them on the table in front of her. You will never forget the warm, fuzzy feeling that rose in your belly when you saw her face, your mother's face, for the very first time. A stranger with features so eerily similar to your own.