I don’t know if it was loyalty or stubbornness that had motivated me to still go with it. Loyalty or stubbornness that made me continue my quest to adopt a child.

John always used to say that he didn’t trust charities. “Money laundering, that’s what they bloody do, money laundering and nothing more,” He always used to say that whenever commercials about donations would come on TV. There wasn’t any malice in his unwillingness to donate to humanitarian causes, he just thought that all organizations were corrupt in some way and eventually he decided to stop donating his hard-earned money to what he considered useless organizations. The fact that he also didn’t believe in just slightly improving the living conditions of a few people also played in choice. Despite his decision, he actually cared a lot about those kind of causes, way too much even, I would always see him with tears in his eyes whenever commercials about hungry children would play on TV.

When we learned that he couldn’t father any children two years ago, it didn’t surprise me when he started talking about adoption. To be honest, I was cold to the idea. I was only 25 and I considered myself way too young to take care of a human being. Yes, I was and still am in the perfect age to have children but being able to do it didn’t mean I wanted to do it. After a few months of deliberating, I had to finally acquiesce seeing how much the lack of children was affecting him. We started the process and our quest began. We looked at different countries and orphanages, spent countless hours talking at the phone with many agencies and then spent the same amount of hours filling paperwork. It was tiring, but our quest had made us much closer than we were before. A month ago, I got a call saying that we could book a plane because the paperwork was done and we could come pick up our child. I was about to call John to announce him the great news, but before I could I got a call telling me that my 34 year old husband had just died from a brain aneurysm.

Common sense would have told me to stop the adoption process, yet I didn’t. Here I was, standing in front of an orphanage under the blazing sun about to pick up our kid. The kid we had spent an innumerable number of hours trying to get to. A kid that John would never meet in person, a kid that I was picking up because I needed a new reason to keep living. John had been my life and he passing away had tainted my existence grey, or perhaps even black. Saving a kid from a life of hardships was my way to cope, I knew that it probably wasn’t the smartest way to cope, but it was too late now I already rang the doorbell to the orphanage and I was hearing someone coming for me.
The orphanage gate opened and rather large middle-aged woman came out of it. She took a good look at me and came closer to me.

“Are you Mrs. Mirabelle Flannagan?” Asked the lady.

“Yes.”

“Welcome then, I am Alicia. I have heard about your husband and I am sorry for your loss. I found it quite amazing that you decided to continue with the process, it’s unusual for us to let a single woman adopt a child, but seeing the amount of money you inherited from your late husband we believe that you would have no trouble taking care of your new child. Hopefully, if your embassy gives you the right papers in time you will be out of here by next week. ”

I nodded at Alicia’s sentence. I was hoping that I could be out of this country as soon as possible because my mother called me to tell that there was talk last night in the news of a possible war brewing in the region. She wanted me out of this place for the precedent reason and because she still had many apprehensions about calling family a youngster that wouldn’t look like her .

Alicia opened the door to the dilapidated building and as I entered I bumped into a kid and we both fell to the ground. I didn’t have time to say anything, because the very thin child who bumped into was gone mere nanosecond after the incident.

Alicia frowned. “That kid really needs to learn how to deal with people!”

“Is he problematic?” I asked while getting up.

“Nameless? Yes, but it’s not his fault. He has had a hard life and he has trouble communicating with others. They found him near the northern border with a rifle in his hand and a bullet wound near his right kidney about a year ago. ”

I was shocked by what she had just said. How could anyone shoot such a frail looking child and how could anyone let him fight? I heard of child soldiers but I never expected they would use kids as young as him. I mean he looked barely ten!

Alicia saw my confusion and continued talking. “He probably was a child soldier that got hurt in battle. They surely thought he was done for so they just let him to die. ”

“How did he get here?”

“A few government officials found him, saved him and then took him here after his remission. That was about two years ago, but he still hasn’t found his place in the orphanage. The other children have has much trouble dealing with him and that he has dealing with them. He has been trying to solve everything with violence which hasn’t made him any friends. I am afraid that he might run away one day if we don’t do something,” She pronounced her last sentence looking directly in my eyes.

Was she insinuating something? Was she trying to get rid of that poor child by giving him too me? If she did the answer would be no. I hardly knew if I could handle a child that had no serious problems, how could I handle a kid with a history of violence? A child soldier named Nameless in my house… mom would laugh at me and probably try to have me declared insane. What kind of name was Nameless anyway? Was it really his name or was it a nickname? I wanted to know, no parent would ever call their kids like that would they?

“Is he really called Nameless?”

“That what we call him. Officially he doesn’t exist. He has no papers. We only know what he want to tell us. ”

I felt bad, that kid probably didn’t have any family and would have difficulty finding one if he didn’t have any legal documents. If I could do something I would but I really didn’t think that I could do anything for him. I guess I could hope that war doesn’t break out again in his infancy, but wishful thinking won’t change anything… I guess I could make a donation directly to the orphanage hoping they would be alright. It might not be much, but I was already going to be keeping a child out of the horrors to come. Elizabeth, god, I forgot about her! It’s for her that I am here, not for Nameless.

“Where is Elizabeth, my daughter-to-be?”

Alicia looked at the ground and started talking. “I don’t know how to say this, but you can’t adopt her... ”

I gave her a puzzled look.

“What?”

“It’s not allowed,” She said looking me in the eyes this time.

“What do you mean it’s not allowed? John and I were sent pictures, we signed paperwork and we spent thousands of dollars! You can’t tell we did all of this and now I can’t adopt!”

Alicia looked at me with guilt in her eyes. “You can adopt a child, but it isn’t called Elizabeth, it doesn’t have a name.”

I gave her a second puzzled look. “Nameless? You want me to adopt him? ”

She nodded.

“How? You told me he didn’t have any papers? ”

“The agency, the orphanage and the local government have been talking with your embassy since the moment we found out about your husband’s death in order to produce a few papers for him.”

“Why?” I asked very confused by all of this.

“Like I told you, we don’t let single people adopt children, not because we don’t want to, but because there are international adoption conventions and they don’t allow us to do it. We can let you adopt because Nameless is a special case, if he isn’t adopted soon we don’t know what’s going to happen with him. He only has enemies around here, the villagers don’t trust him. There was an incident a few years ago where a child soldier posed as an orphan and then proceeded to poison the water supply, the villagers think that Nameless might have been planted here to do the same. The kids in the orphanage don’t like his attitude and the local government thinks the same way as the villagers. I know that Nameless isn’t bad, but the others don’t trust him. There is been attempts on his life since his first day here and a month ago the villagers gave me a time limit to get rid of him. There is no way a local might adopt him and even less chances that a foreigner will. You on the other hand, wanted to adopt a child, but suddenly you didn’t have the qualifications anymore, so we had hoped that you would be desperate enough for a child that you might want to adopt Nameless. Some officials of your government and some of mine discussed it with me and decided that if you wanted it, we would quietly break the convention and let you have him. I had to lie to you to get you here and for that I’m sorry, but please save him! ”

I was flabbergasted by everything she told me. “Can’t you send him to another orphanage?” I asked.

Alicia started crying. “He wouldn’t make it there. The villagers want him either adopted out of the country or dead. If they see him leave to go to another orphanage, they might try to grab him and lynch him. ”

“Can’t you do something else?” I asked anxiously.

“No,” She said with a river of tears dripping out of her face. “He is either leaving with you tonight or leaving in a body bag tomorrow. I have reached the maximum time allowed by the village elders to get rid of him.”

I was overwhelmed. I essentially had the power of life and death over a child I barely knew. Could I do that, leave an unwanted child to die? Could I become an accessory to child murder? I doubted it, but adopting a child with a history of violence wasn’t really something I wanted to do. John would have said yes without any hesitation, but I wasn’t as impulsive as him.

“May I talk to him before making my decision?”

“Of course you can,” She said cleaning the little bit of make-up she had on and then taking a stairway. I heard her scream and then heard the sound of dozens of kids taking off. I wanted to go upstairs but Alicia came back a few seconds afterwards with the orphan. Nameless looked quite bruised and tired.

Alicia cleaned the boy clothes and started talking with him “This is Mrs. Mirabelle Flannagan she wants to talk with you,” The child nodded and Alicia took us to her office were she made us sit. “If there is anything call for me,” She said presumably talking to the both of us while blowing her nose and leaving the room.
Nameless was looking at me, waiting for me to talk. I had to gather my thoughts, so I didn’t say anything for perhaps 30 seconds, while I was thinking the youth kept staring at me.

“Is this as awkward for you as it is for me?” I asked.

“Awkward?”

“Uncomfortable. Is this situation uncomfortable for you?”

The child looked at me curiously and then started talking. “No, you look don’t look like a mean lady and I like silence. Silence means calm and I like calm. ”
The way he responded surprised me, I wasn’t expecting that.

“Alicia tells me you get in trouble all the time for fighting, if you like tranquility why do you fight?”

“The others attack and insult me, so I fight back,” He paused and then restarted talking “Thomas…” He shed a few tears. “Thomas told me to always fight back if I was insulted or attacked,” He sniffed as he finished his sentence.

“Who is Thomas?”

“Thomas was my best friend, my big brother, he discovered me and raised me. Thomas taught me how to survive, and how to read and talk French, Spanish and English,”
I was surprised by the amount of knowledge held by that Thomas, but I decided to not comment on it.

“He discovered you? Where? ”

“Thomas told me that he found me on a battlefield, he told me that when he saw me he thought of a great warrior he read about who was found in his dead mother’s womb just like I was.”

“You were found in your dead mother’s womb?” I asked in disbelief.

“That was what Thomas told me.”

“And you believe him?”

“Yes, Thomas would never lie to me. Thomas told me that lying was bad even if it was necessary sometimes.”

I gave him a look.

“And fighting isn’t bad?”

“Fighting is essential to survive. If Thomas and I didn’t fight we wouldn’t have been fed.”

Fighting to survive at such a young age, really?

“Why? Why would you need to fight to survive?” I asked, getting upset.

“The General told us that if we wanted to be fed we had to be useful.”

I wanted to ask if fighting was the only way his general considered his child followers to be useful, but I realized in a matter of a few nanoseconds the possible implications of a negative answer. I didn’t want to know that, I really didn’t, I didn’t want him to relive the trauma if it was there and I just decided to keep that possible part of his past out of my head. Or at least I intended too, but curiosity got the best of me.

I got up, told nameless to wait here for a while and I went to see Alicia.

She was in the kitchen preparing food. She saw the look in my face and asked somebody else to take care of it.

“Did he ever tell you if he was …” Alicia interrupted me.

“Sexually abused? He wasn’t, but from what he told me about his personal hero, Thomas, I could assume he was and that he died from it. Nameless told me that Thomas went to see the leaders at night for the both of them to have extra food.”

“How did he die from it?”

“I don’t know, probably AIDS.”

I understood the sadness in the lad’s eyes now…“Do you know anything about that Thomas?”

“Nameless doesn’t like talking about him, but I heard him say that Thomas was 11 years old when he discovered him.”
An eleven year old kid raising another child while they were both fighting for a militia… this story only kept getting more and more miserable and I started to see what I had to do. I had to take nameless me didn’t I? I had to… It was the moral thing to do, the right thing to do. It perhaps was burden too big for me but it probably was a bigger one in his prepubescent little shoulders.

I got up and went back to Alicia’s office where Nameless hadn’t moved a centimeter since I was gone. I sat in the chair next to him and I asked a few more questions to confirm my choice.

“If I asked you to stop fighting would you?”

“Would people beat me or insult me?”

“No.”

“Would I get food?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to take me home with you?”

“Yes.”

He made a faint smile, looked at me and said “Then I wouldn’t have a reason to fight anymore.”

I hugged him.

That was the right answer and he seemed truthful. I guess now I didn’t have any excuses to not adopt him. If I were to leave him here to die I would probably end up killing myself because of the guilt. I was going to have to call my mom to tell her that she was getting a new grandson instead of a new granddaughter. She might slightly freak out when she hears about his past, but judging the way Nameless spoke and judging by the way he answered my questions, he simply seemed to be a kid who grew up in a bad situation. I am sure that mom would get that, or at least I hope she did. Because I would need her help to raise him after all. I guess now I have to announce to Alicia the good news. I hoped the authorities would get me the right papers in time because a kid’s life was in danger or should I say my child’s life was in danger.

I invited Nameless to take my hand and we both went to see Alicia to tell her the good news. Alicia seemed to tense up as she saw me coming, but then relaxed when she saw that I was holding my protégé’s hand.

“I’m bringing him home with me.” I affirmed.

“Thank you so much Mrs. Flannagan, thank you so much...” She said in tears “I am going to search for the birth certificate given to me by the Canadian embassy.”

“Birth certificate?”

“Yes, seeing how we can’t legally let him being adopted by you, the Canadian embassy and my government decided to play it off has if you were his naturally born mother. He would be a Canadian citizen and you would only have to say that you lost his passport.”

I agreed with the plan, if my government was OK with it then so was I, but really? Making me pass as Nameless birth mother? We contrasted so much no one would believe it, his milk chocolate skin was the opposite of my ghostly one, my straight blond hair couldn’t in any way shape or form look genetically related to his extra-curly jet black hair and my pale grey eyes didn’t seem to have any relation either with his obsidian ones.

I commented my observation to Alicia who laughed it off, saying: “Maybe you have weak genes.”

I laughed at the absurdity of her comment while we went back to Alicia’s office. She gave me a pen and the Québec birth certificate and I started filling it out.

“I don’t think it would be a good idea to call you Nameless, is there a name you want?”

My son hesitated for a while and then he squeaked “Céleste.”

“Oh, beautiful name, but it sounds quite feminine to me. Why would you want that? ”

“It was the name of the French doctor who saved me and that allowed to meet you Mrs. Flannagan.” He said sounding quite embarrassed.

“Hum... Call me Mira for now, Mrs. Flannagan is a way too formal way to address your new mother. Now about your name, I can understand the reasons of why you chose it, but it might get you in trouble, it’s quite a feminine sounding name after all. ”

My son’s spirit seemed to drop.

“But I guess a boy can still bear it, it’s not one hundred percent feminine.”

The child smiled and so Céleste became my child.

I gave him Montreal as birth place and then asked him when he thought he was born.

“I don’t know.”

“Ok, let’s say you are ten or at least your age should be near ten years old, that give us 2000 as your year of birth. Hum… today we are the 20th May and we should be home by next week so let’s say that Céleste Flanagan was born on the 27th May 2000. Meaning that you will be getting gifts as soon as we reach home because it would be your tenth birthday. ”

Céleste smiled.

“Good,” I said.

Alicia who had been observing us started talking. “Now, I will fax this to the embassy and ask for someone to escort you. I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble with the villagers before Céleste got a chance to truly live,” The corpulent woman got out of her office.

“Céleste, do you have anything personal you want to take with you?” I asked him.

He took a collar with a tooth out of his pocket and showed it to me.

“This is a lion tooth collar that Thomas made for me, it is the only thing from Nameless that will survive me becoming Céleste.”

“Are you sure? Alicia doesn’t want us to come back here ever again meaning that you will be losing forever whatever stays here.”

“Yes, I am sure of it, today Nameless died and Céleste was born.”

It was harsh, but I guess it was true. Nameless would cease to exist in the last place where they would know about him. Knowing my new son’s past I couldn’t help but agree with his decision to forget the past and accept the future with all that it entails.

Alicia came back with two letters. “Little Céleste, it was an honour knowing you, I hope you fare well, in your new house. Even though I don’t want you to ever try to come, back here for your own sake, I want you to know that I will always be thinking about you.”

Alicia then addressed me, “Mrs. Flannagan, I want to thank you very much for what you are doing. Saving and adopting a child you barely know isn’t something that most people would do, furthermore, doing it after being deceived like you were, shows that you are an absolutely respectable person. I’m sorry for all of this Mrs. Flannagan, I would never be able to repay what you have just done.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I just nodded. Alicia hugged the both of us and then waited with us for our embassy escort to come pick us up. When the bell rang we hugged again and she gave us the two letters, one for Céleste and one for me and told us to wait until we were in our hotel room to open it and we decided to oblige.
The embassy’s men surrounded me and Céleste and told us to advance. I understood there was need for precaution, but wasn’t this a little bit too much. “We are going to have to be careful, I think that half the village is here,” Said one of the men.

What? How? He was lying, right? How could anyone know that I was exiting the orphanage? Had a child managed to skip the information outside? Did the villagers get tipped off, by the arrival of our transport? I didn’t matter, because we had to advance.

As soon as we exited the gates of the orphanage, I realised that he wasn’t exaggerating, there was a sea of people between us and the embassy’s vehicles. They were chanting for Céleste blood and I was scared, very scared. I felt like I was about to get hit by a Maglev train or mauled by a bear. Worse actually, those were accidents or acts of nature, there wasn’t any hatred in those events. Here, hate was as common in the air as nitrogen.

Thump-thump…

My heartbeat started ringing in my ear.

Thump-thump…

I held Céleste has close to me as possible.

Thump-thump…

I started advancing as fast as possible.

Thump-thump… thump-thump… thump-thump…

A hand grabs me and I am dragged away towards the vicious crowd.

My heart skipped several beats.

I get more and more scratches and while looking for a way out I see two of my bodyguards, probably dead, trampled on the ground.

Thump-thump… thump-thump… thump-thump…

I am about to accept my fate…

Thump-thump… thump-thump… thump-thump… thump-thump…

Somebody tries to take Céleste out of my hands and as the adrenaline circuits through my body I am brought back to reality.

I lifted my child and carried him in my hands as I ran towards the cars. I opened the door clumsily while still holding him and then shoved him in the vehicle. I enter the vehicle and I then I try to close it as people try to get in. I try to kick a man out of the car but he grabs my leg and, with a machete, he proceeds to cut clean my limb under the knee. I kick him with the other leg and then my thoughts went blank, the adrenaline, which had kicked in a few minutes before, had attenuated my pain until now, but the shock of losing a limb was getting to me. Céleste, noticing my state of shock, jumped on my side of the car and closed the door before anyone else could get in.
I ushered Céleste to lie down in order for him to avoid any weapon’s fire that the villagers could direct toward us. But…

Too late… six shots were fired through the window. The bullets avoided me and my son, but the glass that flew everywhere highly damaged him. I pulled Céleste near me to avoid him getting pulled through the window and kicked the front seat. Where the driver had been in stupor since we entered the car. The chauffer regained his senses and accelerated. But the driver had not even made 20 meters that a bullet went through his window and killed him instantaneously. The shards this time managed to lodge themselves into my left arm. I wanted to check the damage on Céleste but, he was already in front of the car trying to avoid a fatal crash. I went through the front and put him aside.

“I’m going to drive Céleste, you don’t know how. Cut the man’s shirt and make bandages or we might bleed out to death! ”
While I was driving and fighting pain like a berserker, Céleste had managed to stop the bleeding of my stump leg, as well as the bleeding of both of our arms. I had lost quite a bit of blood, but I was still functional unlike my new son who was getting slower and sleepier by the minute I didn’t understand until I saw his bloody pants and realized that the lower half bleeding profusely the result of the glass shards.

“Céleste, please stay with me, don’t fall asleep, not now! You are too young to die!”

Céleste opened his eyes and then closed them again.

I felt weak, I went off-road, stopped the car and my world went black.

I would open my eyes every few hours to realize that even if I was too tired to move, I was still alive… and I didn’t know how I felt about that. John was dead and I assumed that it was the same for Céleste. I had probably lost a limb, possibly two, and that would make a few things harder for me… Life had really been kind to me.

I had lost all notion of time and I just slept, slept and …

One day, I opened my eyes after a dream I had where I saw myself hiking with Céleste and John. I wanted to cry because I thought that those events would never happen.

“She is awake!” Screamed a woman in an accent I knew very well.

“She is? How? It’s not even been 3 days! ”

“She is strong and so is her daughter, Céleste, who woke up yesterday, must run in the family.”

I felt my strength surging back… Céleste was alive! But what was that about him being my daughter? Last time I checked, Céleste was a boy… I then remembered the damage to his crotch … Oh, god! They didn’t do what I just think they did, right? Don’t tell me that seeing his name they thought that he felt like a she…Somebody is getting sued!

Please comment, I really appreciate it.

“What have you done?!” I screamed at the people who had put me in my distraught state.

They were both startled and then the doctor looked at me confused and he started talking. “Well… huh… we disinfected your bruises and installed your newly arrived prostheses into your leg and your arm.”

What they were talking about? Prostheses? I didn’t have one of those did I? I looked at my arm that had been damaged and I was startled by the almost futuristic sight. How didn’t I noticed that when I woke up? They had said I had one of those in my legs didn’t they? I tried to move muscles of my leg who had gone missing during the incident and by doing so I moved my sheets letting me see my new metallic appendage.

“How did you...” I was interrupted by the nurse.

“Get it here? Well as soon as we phoned your mother and told her about your incident, she ordered us to get some measures done because she was going to get one of her friends to produce you prosthetic limbs as soon as possible. You got quite lucky ma’am, it entered the country in the last commercial flight this country will get for a while. With the war there doesn’t risk to have many commercial flights coming here. ”

I was confused “War?”

“The incident you were in was the spark in the powder keg that lead to a civil war ma’am. The villagers spread the word that the government was helping enemy foreign fighters through the West and things degenerated from there. There is a civil war going on right now and as soon as we deem you fit enough e we will be sending you and your daughter back to your country.”

Here again that word daughter, I had been sidetracked and I had forgotten to ask about Céleste. What the hell had happened in the last week?

“You keep saying that Céleste is my daughter, but he is or at least was male.” I said trying to understand if my suspicions were true.

The doctor answered that question. “We took care of that problem, ma’am. When trying to identify your daughter we called your mother called who told us that she had a granddaughter named Elizabeth. We called the embassy to make sure of that and they told us that they had her as boy named Céleste. We were confused by all of this, but your mother was very insistent about the fact that she was a girl named Elizabeth, so much in fact that she got the embassy to change her records to Elizabeth Céleste Flannagan, female. She also said that she got them to send the papers to your country right away in case they screwed up again. She asked us why were so confused about the sex of a little girl and when we told her that her grandchild had both sets of genitals and that she had damaged the male ones, she told us to get rid of them because she had only heard of her as a girl.”

My head was hurting… If I had well understood my mother had confused Céleste with the girl I was supposed to adopt and thinking that she identified as a girl she proceeded to ask the embassy to change Céleste papers. Afterwards seeing that she was intersex the surgeons thought it would be a good idea to just get rid of the damaged male parts. Alicia didn’t tell me about this part of the Nameless problem. Did she even know about it? Was Céleste ok with essentially being a girl now? I had to ask the nurse and the physician.

“How did Céleste react to the removal of her… you know…” I asked blushing.

“She was surprised about it but she didn’t seem to be displeased. I would have expected her to be more excited to be a normal little girl now. But I guess she already saw herself as a normal girl just with extra-bits. ”

How was Céleste really feeling inside? Was his reaction genuine or was he simply too confused to act angry or sad? I hadn’t really had the time to talk to him and the only interaction that we had that showed him to be even a little bit feminine was when he or she told me about his or her name. Did the name mean that Céleste was a girl? That would be convenient as I had a room ready for the Little Elizabeth. I would have to change it for the boy version of Céleste because I didn’t know of many little boys who liked pink. Or would I? Perhaps the boy version of Céleste would be Ok with having a pink room? I didn’t know much about intersex kids? Would they be more Ok with androgyny? God this was confusing! I will have to have a discussion with him.

When Dr. Okiro told me that I was now a girl without the extra parts I was confused. I wasn’t supposed to be a girl. Thomas told me that me that being a girl was dangerous and that because of that I had to be a boy and fight anyone who said the contrary. Why? I don’t know, Thomas told me that I would understand one day and that I would be thankful for his sage words. I still don’t understand why he said that… and anyway being a girl didn’t feel bad. Or at least it didn’t feel that bad inside because on the outside… OUCH! Walking was hard and I honestly would prefer to just stay in my bed and try to learn how to use my arm. I have this fancy new metal arm now and it makes me feel powerful. I am not very good at using it, so I can’t do precise stuff but Mrs. Cyr-Lavallée, the nurse from my new country, told me that I would eventually learn to when I went to a ki…ki… I forgot the word, anyway, to someone who teaches you how to use your new metallic parts. Anyway, my new grandmother had sent the metal arm for me and Mrs. Cyr-Lavallée told me that I will have the chance to meet her soon because we would be flying soon after Mrs. Flannagan wakes. Flying… I have never done that before… How can those huge metallic birdy thingies do that? I really want to learn how they do that. Where was I? … Oh, yes the nurse told me that this country wasn’t safe for me or my mother and that we would be going home. Home… It was strange thinking about home… How did a home feel? I never really had a home until now… I would just follow Thomas around, because he was my family, and he would just follow whoever would give us food or a place to sleep. We never really stayed at the same place for long. In a way I felt at home wherever I was with Thomas… I miss Thomas…I really miss him… I would love to have my big brother coming home with me…
I started crying and I lied down in the hospital bed closing my eyes.

Home was going to be with Mrs. Flannagan, would she like me being a girl? Would she be afraid? Would she say that I was an abomination like in the first orphanage where I went? Would she let me here? I didn’t know what she would do, but I would have to accept it because I couldn’t really run away in the state I was in.

I didn’t really know how to feel about what my mother had done. On one hand: she had good intentions, it sounded like she had accepted Céleste, and she didn’t know any better. On another hand: she might have caused a lifetime of emotional damage to Céleste. I needed to call her to arrange some kind of help around my house because even If I had these fancy new prostheses I would still be tired for weeks and I would need re-education to deal with my new limbs. Céleste wouldn’t be able to help me in any way or form and I would need to take good care of … her? I decided to just roll with the female pronouns as it would be less confusing with dealing with my mom, who I wouldn’t talk about her mistake until I had conclusive proof that Céleste felt like a boy.

I asked the nurse if she had a phone I could use to call my mother and she brought me one. I then proceeded to phone my mother’s cellphone as she was probably overseas. I rang about three times and I was about to abandon when she answered back.

“Hello?”

“Hi, mom?”

“Oh, Mira, how are you and my new granddaughter doing?”

“Fine…” I went silent for a few seconds and then I restarted talking “Mom… I will need help at home I am not really in a state to do anything right now.”

“And whose fault is that?” She said in a slightly accusing tone.

“Huh…Mine I guess? But I still would do it, by coming here I saved a life. A child’ life. So it was worth it.”

Or at least I hoped so… This whole prosthetics things would mean that people would treat me differently than otherwise…

Mom talked back. “You still don’t know if it was worth it, you didn’t even spend half a day with your child yet, you have been in bed for the last 5 days.”

“Mom, it doesn’t matter how Celeste might act in the future, I took hi…her in and she’s hopefully going to stay with me until she is at least 18.”

“And if she’s turns out to be a terrible person what would you do then?”

Her question, as rightful as it was, made me angry, so I uttered my next sentence full of wrath.

“Céleste is not terrible, mom! If you dare imply that again, you are not invited to ever meet her.”

My mom’s side of the line went silent for a minute.

“I am sorry Mira. What I just said was out of line,” her tone implied guilt, so I just let it go.

“Anyway, mom, I need a favour.”

“You need a hand?” She said trying to lighten the mood. Her pun was slightly funny I admit it but this wasn’t a good time to joke around.

“Mom, I’m going to need someone at home to take care of the house, Céleste and I guess… me.” Saying that last part made me feel so weak and useless… I had always been independent and self-sufficient. I started working as soon as possible because I didn’t want to depend on my mother to buy me stuff. I would always try to do everything by myself because I could and still can handle anything. And even though John made enough dough for me to not need to work, I still couldn’t resist the need to make my own money. I took some loans made some clever investments and then lived lavishly from my funds and not his… I tried to do everything myself, this adoption being proof of that, and now I needed someone to take care of my household and me… Ah…Look how far I’ve fallen.

Mom answered me in an avoiding tone. “You know that your sister, your dad and I are overseas, right?”

I knew about my twin, Marie-Ève, and my dad being in India, but mom?

“Yes, I do know about Marie-Ève and dad, mom. But you? Aren’t you supposed to be at home?”

“I am in Florida for a business trip. Looking at few facilities a friend of mine as bought.”

“Ok, mom but I just need you to post a job offer online and hire someone as soon as possible. Céleste and I are getting discharged as soon as they judge us ready and we would need someone to be at the house for us.”

“Can’t you do it yourself?” She asked again trying to avoid any responsibility at all.

“Mom, I don’t have a computer nearby and even if I did I am not in the right state of mind to conduct an interview.”

My mom seemed to go silent for a while. But I could her whisper to someone.

“I have already sent a prostheses couldn’t you take care of the house with that, you usually always try to do every by yourself,” She said in a very suspicious way.

She normally hated the fact I was independent it drove her nuts normally… What was happening? I didn’t want to cause a scene, so I ignored it.

“I need re-education before using the prostheses, mom. They can do a lot but they are not fully comparable to real limbs and they don’t exactly feel the same way. Anyway, I am really tired, I bled a lot last week.”
Mom went silent again.

“Can’t you call your sister?”

She was getting on my nerves what’s so hard about what I’m asking her? I answered mom: “She is doing an excavation in India, mom. She doesn’t really have time for little old me. Dad can’t either they don’t have computers in the village where is doing is anthropological study. Anyway, what are you doing of so important that you can’t afford a few hours to lend me a hand?” I used the last bit of my sentence to remind her of the state I was in.

Before she answered I heard a man’s voice talking to her in Spanish.

The voice was deep and from the little I knew about Spanish accents, I could pin the man as Spaniard. I heard him say “Cariño, déjala, vallamos a la cama. Es grande se puede ocupar de ella misma.”
I understood cariño and cama, bed and dear. Was my mom having an affair behind my father’s back? I mean, yes, he had been gone for 6 months now but still, merde! It wasn’t a good reason.

“Who was that, mom?”

“A server, I am eating at a restaurant.”

Liar…

“Anyway, mom can you do what I asked for?”

She gave up in her avoidance. “Yes, now I have to go bye!” She closed her phone as she uttered the last word.

What was that about? Would my family split as it got a new member? I really didn’t need this. John’s death and Céleste’s were sufficient sources of sorrow and stress. Talking about Céleste I really didn’t know how I was going to discuss with … her. If the doctors were wrong and that Céleste was really a boy on the inside would he forgive me for letting this happen to him?

Mrs. Flannagan woke up two days ago and she still hasn’t come see me. Does she dislike me now that she has lost so much, now that she knows what I was? Will she be going home without me? I don’t want her to leave without me… I am dead if I stay here. Where would I go? What would I eat? There was nothing I could do…

I cried again… Like I had been going regularly since I woke up from the incident. When I dream I see them trying to kill me, so I can’t keep calm. I am scared of what is going to happen to me.

Louise, the nurse keeps telling me that everything is Ok and that Mrs. Flannagan doesn’t hate me, but I am no too sure about that. Everybody has reasons to hate me, I am pretty sure that I only hurt those who take care of me. Mrs. Flannagan got hurt, Thomas got sick and many of the people that were there to keep me safe while going back to Mrs. Flannagan hotel are dead.

Why wouldn’t everyone hate me?

I woke up two days ago and I still haven’t talked to Céleste. I am probably the lamest of mothers (mine excluded). Today, it’s the day we are going back home as well as Céleste’s birthday. I have been terrible to her, how terrible does it have to feel when the person who is supposed to be taking care of you has been purposely avoiding you?

Louise Cyr-Lavallée, our nurse, has given me a teddy bear that she had bought in NYC a few years before. She hopes that by giving it to her we might start to discuss about what had just happened. I thought it was a great idea… a really great idea… But I didn’t know if I would be able to go through it.

Louise will be our live-in nurse for a while, she wasn’t expecting to have to go home so soon and she didn’t really have anywhere to live so I asked her move in with us. She used to do physical therapy before doing nursing so that was convenient.

I haven’t really talked to her that much, but she seems trustworthy enough. Not everyone is ready to go work in a poor country for almost nothing.

Louise put me into a wheelchair. She and Mrs. Flannagan were going home and it looked like I was going with them too.

We made it out of the hospital and Louise loaded me into the car. A while later, Mrs. Flannagan is loaded in with the help of a male nurse.

She had a large box with her and she was avoiding looking at me.

I cried and she put her arms around me.

“I’m sorry, Céleste, so, so, sorry for the last two days. Louise has told me about the way you have been feeling and I want to say that I don’t hate you sweetie. I would still repeat what I did last week for you if only to make sure that you are safe. I want you to stay with me as my child and I still would want to do it even if I had to fight hordes of demons every night. I have just been so ashamed with what happened to your maleness,” Tears started going down her face.

I decided to say to truth and just live with the consequences.

“Mrs. Flannagan, its ok, I want to be a girl.”

She looked at me with tears in her eyes.

“Are you sure?”

I nodded.

“Really, really sure?”

I nodded again.

“Then I guess it is appropriate to give you this.” She gave me a box and I opened it.

There was a stuffed black and white animal in it and as well as a note that said: Sorry and Happy birthday, Céleste! From your mommy who wishes to be forgiven.

I…I…I didn’t know what to say or do. So I just uttered the first words that came into my mind “Thanks, mommy.”

She held me close to her until I fell asleep.

Please comment, there is nothing that I appreciate more than feedback.

After being away from home for more than a week, I flew to Canada and finally arrived home.

As we arrived at the Flannagan Mansion, I showed Louise the room where she would be staying. It was one of the numerous guestrooms, John and I had renovated before his death. We were planning on perhaps turning the mansion in some kind of inn because he was starting to have enough of his company and the stress it brought to him. I on the other hand needed to do something more than just playing with stocks all day seeing as it wasn’t as fulfilling as I thought it would be.
Louise’s room was large, with royal purple walls and with a king size for sleeping accommodations. It was richly decorated with some Indian pieces my husband had bought on the recommendation of the family anthropologists.

“Are you sure about this? “Asked Louise.

“Quite, there’s only three other rooms done and one is for Céleste and the others are as lavish as this one.”

“Very different from where I lived overseas.”

“I can imagine,” I answered back

I let her place her things on her room and then asked her to help me get Céleste in her room.

It was girly, extremely girly in fact, but I was expecting a very stereotypical little girl, not one that had repressed her true self for years. Céleste was clearly uncomfortable with her room.

“Do you want to stay in another room?” I asked her.

She signed no with her head.

“It’s going to be alright Mira.” She said smiling.

I was slightly sad that she wasn’t calling me mommy like before we took the plane. But hey she wasn’t calling me Mrs. Flannagan like before so at least it was progress…

We should have unpacked our things but we were all very tired, so we called it a day. I showed the bath to both girls and then presented a new pyjama set to Céleste. It was very pink but she didn’t say anything this time either.

I brushed my teeth and with Louise’s help I prepped myself to go to sleep, I hadn’t slept at all during the flight and neither did my flight companions. We hadn’t talked much, we all just sat there, monologuing to ourselves, thinking about our lives. Personally, everything between taking the plane and arriving home was a blur, I was too preoccupied by the turn my life had taken in the last few months. I was now handicapped, a widow and if my intuition was right the daughter of divorced parents. On the positive side I was now a mother but I didn’t know if I would be able to handle everything the future would throw at me.

I tried to sleep, but I couldn’t … I sat on my bed and I decided to check my emails.

I had received a message from my mom telling me that she had found a maid from me and that hopefully I could interview her myself tomorrow afternoon. I sent an email back thanking her and then just browsed the Internet until I fell asleep.

I woke up at about 5:30 am, I had managed to sleep about 5 hours which wasn’t that bad. I took my crutches and with difficulty I took the stairs to go to the ground floor where the kitchen was in order to have breakfast. As arrived to the kitchen, I met Louise with her long black hair down sipping on coffee.

“Early riser?” I asked.

“Jet lagged, I have been on the same time zone for ten years so you can imagine how hard it is.”

I was shocked by what she had just said… How old was Louise? We didn’t talk much right but from her looks she seemed to be in her mid-twenties. She acted mature but I didn’t think anything about it.

Louise probably saw the surprise in my face, so she questioned me. “Are you surprised by the amount of time I spent overseas?”

“Yes, you don’t seem to be old enough for that to be possible.”

She pouted and then we both laughed. “I am in my early thirties so you shouldn’t be that surprised by it.”

“Well, you don’t look nowhere near that age.”

“Thanks for the compliment,” She said smiling.

She helped me take whatever was edible in my pantry and I then she helped me sit on my couch in the living room where I turned on the T.V.

“How long do you think that Céleste and I would need your help?” I asked while she went back to the kitchen.

“You already want to get rid of me?” Louise asked jokingly as she sat at the dining table.

“No, not really but I want to know how long before I get some of my autonomy me back,” I said honestly. Louise had been a good friend to me a complete stranger even willing to separate herself from what seemed to be an object with emotional value.

She seemed to think. “First, I should be done with my nursing duties in two weeks, hopefully. Second, I am not a doctor… I never managed to finish med school … So I can’t really tell when you are going to be completely healed… but from my experience as physiotherapist I can tell you that if we started restarted re-education tomorrow you and your daughter should be able to use your new limbs at full potential by the start of August.”

“We are what? May 29? So about two months?” I asked

“Yes and I hope that I can find a place to stay by then.”

“Don’t worry about that, you have done enough in the last few days to guarantee a long stay in my little home.”

She gave me a look. “There’s about twenty rooms in here I wouldn’t call it small.”

I giggled. “Ok, then my not so small little home.”

Louise chuckled.

“Say, Louise, do you have any experience with intersex kids? I don’t really know how I’m going to handle Céleste’s case. ”

“Well, I don’t have experience dealing with intersex kids, but transgender kids kind of…”

“Kind of?”

“I didn’t take care of the kid, the kid was me…”

I was surprised I didn’t expect that… I mean there wasn’t anything mannish about her she was thin slightly curvy and she a very round face. Nothing that presumed that she was born anything but a woman. I didn’t believe her.

“You are…” I couldn’t finish my sentence because she stopped me before I was done.

“Transgender? Yes, but I don’t really let that define me… I couldn’t have survived the last ten years were if I defined myself by my status anyway. As kind as people were overseas they still have this very bigoted opinion about LGBT rights. Are you bothered by my status? ”

“Surprised, but no that bothered by it. You are a real woman by my books seeing how you handle my situation with Céleste. ”

“Thanks … I don’t want to break any boundaries, but can I hug you? What you just said really touched me.” Said Louise.

I think that we both deserved it, so I accepted her proposition. She stood up, sat beside me on the couch and hugged me.

“I don’t want to ask too many personal questions, but is your status why you decided to move to another continent and is it the reason why no one wants to take you-in?”

She nodded.

“Some people really are awful.”

She nodded again.

“Do you have anyone to take care of the house while you are in this state?” Asked Louise.

“Well, I am supposed to interview a maid later today.” I said.

“Well, if you don’t find her appropriate I might as well do the job, seeing as you want to overpay me.”

“Overpay? I think that your salary is well deserved for an in-house nurse and a physiotherapist.”

“You want to pay me the double of the normal rate and you are letting me live in one of the guest rooms of your mansion like it was my home, you are overpaying me.”

“Hum... Perhaps but if you keep counselling me and Céleste like you did before you are totally going to deserve your salary. ”

Afterwards we just sat there chitchatting and watching the morning news until sleep finally came back to us.

Flying yesterday was weird, but this place is weirder. Everything here is so different. The roads are way smoother and cleaner than back home, the people dress so nicely and the houses are so nice. Talking about houses my new house is gigantic it’s probably as big as the orphanage but with more floors. This house as three floors and a lot of rooms. They are not all decorated but the ones that are look amazing. Is Mira rich? I don’t know if it’s the case, but honestly I don’t care she already wants to be mommy so I couldn’t care less about anything else.

Going back to the house, my room is really something else… Pink everywhere, filled with dolls and a closet filled with dresses and skirts. Sure there are pants and less feminine things in the room, but this is weird. I remember Mira saying that she was originally expecting to take another girl home but that Mrs. Alicia asked her to take me instead. That made me a little bit for the girl that was supposed to go here in my place but it’s done and nothing can be done about it.

I slept quite well yesterday, my new bed is the most comfortable bed I ever slept in and I couldn’t help but to dream about how wonderful my new life would be. Morning came too fast way too fast actually, I would have wanted to stay more in bed. I tried to go back to sleep, but it didn’t really work.

I took my crutches and even if it hurt so much to move I decided to go downstairs to eat something. I made it to the stairs before realizing that trying going downstairs with my crutches was like a zebra walking in front of lions and not expecting to be eaten, it was a bad idea, a really bad bad idea. I thought that but seconds afterwards I was rolling down the stairs because I took a wrong step trying to move from the stairs.

“Ouch!” I screamed.

Mira screamed back. “Are you O.K sweetie?”

I didn’t have time to answer because Mrs. Louise came to see me seconds after my new mother’s question.

She cleaned me up and made me stand with my crutches and then started scolding me.

“Young lady! You took a very great risk trying to go downstairs in your condition, you should be more careful in the future, me and your mother would be very sad if anything were to happen to you. ”

I was going to say it was an accident, but I thought that she might think I was lying so I decided to not say it. I didn’t want Mrs. Louise or Mira to think I was liar and then give me away, not after seeing how Mira lived anyways.

“Sorry, Mrs. Louise…”

“Just call me Louise and just be careful next time. Sit on the stairs, I’m going to search your wheel chair”

She disappeared for two minutes and then came back a few minutes later with my wheelchair.

“Let’s go eat breakfast.”

We moved to the kitchen, that was a very a large room filled with things that were either white, metallic or that looked like they were made of wood. At the back of the room there was a glass wall that in which you could see a very big table were maybe about 20 people could see. Advancing in the room, I saw that on the left there was a room that had a television that took all the wall. Mira was seated on a chair watching the television.

“I heard your fall, be careful next time please.”

She took her crutches with difficulty, came near me and hugged me before indicating me to sit in a stool near her.

“So what do you want to eat for breakfast, there is not a lot of things because I haven’t been here in a while, but Louise bought a few things in the convenience store a few minutes ago.”

I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what kind of fancy things North Americans ate for Breakfast.

Mira saw my confusion and just decided to make Louise give me cereals and milk.

It was good stuff and Louise and Mira didn’t stop talking with me. They said that we would have someone coming later today to help with cleaning the house, the cooking and other stuff that didn’t have to do with nursing and Louise’s other job. They also said that this morning me and Louise and would be taking a walk while Mira would see about getting me a place in school in September, Louise would drive us around and then Mommy Mira would be dropped at my new school on her wheelchair were she would sign a few stuff. Apparently, the only thing that she had to there was changing their records, because she had made arrangements for Elizabeth to go there.

After eating Louise took me to take a bath and coming out of there I had to have a second taste of womanhood: I had to dress myself. There were only girly stuff in my closet and having only been a girl for a few days and having spent most of those days in a hospital gown I didn’t yet fell comfortable with dressing like a girl. I finally decided to with some shorts and purple shirt that had an animal on it, some kind of horse with a horn and a horn, cartoon style.

After dressing up, Mommy came and took care of my hair, she made two pigtails out of my long curly hair and then put a hairband on my head.

“O.K, all set up! Louise after taking us downstairs could you please take one of the cars and wait us in the front of the please?” Asked mommy.

“Sure, Mirabelle.” Louise answered back.

Louise didn’t take long a few minutes afterwards she was helping us enter the car. She was smiling a lot and she looked like she was about to tease my mother which is what she did a few seconds afterwards.

“You sure have a lot of cars for someone with a little house,” She giggled and mom pouted for a few seconds before joining in her giggle, I don’t why, but I joined the laughter a few moments later and it kind of got out of control, we would have probably looked like a bunch of crazy girls if the house front of the house wasn’t separated from the street by a crazy long road.

After our laughing fit, Louise took the road and we were on our way.

It’s weird, but this morning I am seeing a lot of new things that I didn’t see yesterday when we arrived home by taxi. Before going to the city that Mommy calls Montreal you have to take a blue metal bridge that is really big. The numbers of cars on that bridge was incredibly and it made me ask myself how could it take such a large amount of cars and not be destroyed. Anyway along the way, I saw an island filled with weird metallic trains and filled with people. I decided to ask mom what that was.

“What are those train-like things Mira?” Calling her mommy was really, really embarrassing even if I felt that she deserved that title. I don’t why but since calling her mommy before taking the plane I couldn’t call her that.

Mommy pointed at the stuff I was talking about. “Those are roller-coasters, things that move quite fast and that go quite high, not much a fan of them, but I might take you to one of them if you feel like it later this summer.”

She winked in direction of Louise. Who saw it on the rear-view mirror.

“Not happening, Mira. I hate those things.”

“Oh, well at least I tried.” Mommy said smiling

Montreal is a strange place, it’s filled with churches, yet Mommy tells me that very few people actually go to them, something about the Church giving the jimmies to a lot of people. It looks rich to me, yet there’s people sleeping on the streets who don’t look as clean as I was when I used to wander the lands with my brother Thomas. All of this is strange, very strange. Shouldn’t those people have houses if they lived in a rich country? Why weren’t people helping them? Weird stuff really.

Louise Brought Mommy to a building that looked very old compared to the glass towers that I had seen on this city, there was a large park in front of it and a sign that read: Académie Nouvelle- France, école de filles. Like my brother would have said, crap! I would be going to a girl’s school!

I panicked, I started having trouble breathing and had cold sweats. Mommy and Louise both saw that I wasn’t feeling that great so they parked the car.

Mommy held me embraced me, like she had done so many times already since becoming my mother and I started to calm down.

“I am sorry, Céleste. I didn’t think about asking you if you wanted to go to this school, Elizabeth was supposed to go here, so I just thought that since you were now a girl, I could take you to the school where she was supposed to go. If you don’t want to go here, I am sure I can find another place.”

She held me for close to five minutes before I stopped panicking, I thought about all the trouble I would be causing to mommy if I decided to go to another school and I simply decided that I didn’t want cause that much already to the woman who had already saved my life.

I took a deep breath and prepared myself to tell a lie which I hoped sounded true. “I want to try to go there Mommy *Exhale* I don’t want to cause you any trouble.”
My mommy frowned. “Don’t lie, please Céleste, just be honest with me.”

Honestly? I didn’t know… I didn’t know why I didn’t want to go to that school? What were my reasons to not wanting to go to that school? Was is the fear of being different? The school looked rich and I although I was now rich through Mira, that didn’t mean anything when you realized that I was street kid, an educated street kid but still kid. How could I communicate with those girls that had been rich all their lives? Not only was I different because I came from a poor place, I had only become a girl about a week ago people would notice that right? And my arm? People would notice that too right? I told how I felt to the adults.

Louise talked first. “Céleste, don’t worry about the girl thing or the cultural stuff. Girls can act in all kind of ways,so even if you had a few masculine mannerisms, pun intended, I am sure no one would question your feminity. Also Quebecers, even the rich ones, are very acceptant of difference, you will fit right in.”

Mom said something under breath, something about Anglophones, and Louise looked a little bit embarrassed. I didn’t want to ask what that was about, because it was not about my problem.

“Céleste, Louise is mostly right, I don’t think that you will have problems going to this school I went here when I was younger and no one was bullied when I went there.”

I thought about what Louise and mommy had said and I decided to give a chance to the girl’s school.

“I will go to the school Mira.”

“Sure?

“Yes, sure.”

“Good, because I am about ten minutes late.”

I felt bad about that.

“Sorry, mommy.”

“Don’t, it’s my fault for not talking about it with you, now go have fun with Louise while I deal with the boring stuff.”

Louise and I went to a place that she called the Vieux-Port. You could see the water there and there were multiple tens and a road that had a rail-road nearby. Louise and I started was walking, while I was rolling on the waterfront when a ball landed on me. A girl with yellow hair that was arranged in a high ponytail and that seemed to be my age came to search the ball. She was dressed in what looked like a football kit (proper football, not that American stuff).

“I’m so sorry, I hope I didn’t hurt you.” Said the girl with guilt in her eyes

Louise looked like she was ready to explode on the girl, so I decided to talk before she did.

“It’s Ok it didn’t hurt.” I said trying to make the girl feel less guilty. I gave the girl her ball back but she didn’t run off immediately. The girl looked curious, she was looking at my arm.

“Did you have an accident or something?” Asked the blonde girl.

Once again Louise looked angry. But I didn’t mind talking to someone new. I tried to communicate that message to Louise with my eyes like mommy did and she seemed to understand. I told the girl that my story was a long one and I could tell here if she was curious and she told me that why not she just had to tell her friends.
She went away for a minute or two and then she came back with two other girls, one with orange hair and the other with brown hair.
“This is the girl with the cool arm, her name is ...Uh... What is your name?” Asked the blonde.

“Céleste, my name is Céleste.” I answered back.

The girl looked happy at my response.

“Céleste, eh, what a coincidence my name is Océane! You are the sky and I am the sea. We should so totally become friends! Which is school do you go to? ”

“I will go to Académie Nouvelle-France next year.” I said with hopeful eyes.

Océane expression seemed to drop and I was sad until her orange haired friend gave her a nudge.

“Océ, don’t troll the poor girl! Céleste, my name is Magalie and the quiet one with brown hair and glasses is Dominique. The three of us go to your new school, so don’t worry about befriending us.”

Dominique, the official quiet girl whispered something that Océane proceeded to say at loud.

“Can you tell us what put you in that state?”

I wanted to tell them the true, or at least a cleaner version of the truth I didn’t want them to know about my past that much.

“My mom and I got in an accident the day she adopted me. Louise the woman who was just here before is my nurse.”

The girls looked shocked and then their shocked expression went to a sad one, Océane talked this time. “Is your mother Ok?”

I knew why they were worried now.

“Mommy is alright, she actually in the school right now making sure I will still be able to go in September.”

The girls relaxed. “Cool then. Hey, we have a flying disc we can throw around a little and that probably shouldn’t be that hard to launch even if you are missing an arm, want to try it?”

“I have to call my nurse first, but if she O.Ks it, then sure,” I said smiling at my newest friends.

Louise ended up Okaying it and she even decided to join us in our little game. It was quite fun, really fun, the most fun I ever had. When Thomas was alive we used to play like this, but It was always only the both of us and no one else. Here I was with multiple friends playing and not having to worry of how we would find food or were we would sleep. I wished that our moment together lasted forever but sadly it came to an end.

The girls ended up giving me their phone numbers and their email addresses and told me we could probably chat either on the phone or the computer. I didn’t know how to do either of those but I’m sure Louise or mommy could show me how to do that.

I can’t wait to tell mommy about what had just happened.

Céleste looked really happy as we were making our way to the house. I asked her about it and she had just made some new friends that just happened to go to the school were she would be going in September that was nice. Very nice indeed, friends are the easiest way to integrate in a new place and in her case a new role. Louise might be an awesome friend but she a little bit too old to be best friends with Céleste. My daughter already doesn’t act her age and Louise and I being Céleste’s only friends wouldn’t help Céleste adapt at all.

Anyways, the changes to the school records were made so Céleste could indeed start in November so everything was going well nice.
Along our journey home I made Louise stop for us in front of my favourite Spanish restaurant for lunch. There me, Louise and Céleste talked more about her new friends specially Océane who seemed to be the leader of the group. I made a joke about how Céleste and Océane were meant to be friends seeing as they were the sky and the sea, but apparently that joke was already done.

“Great, I can’t even tell an original joke!” After saying that, I pouted and simulated a fit.

Louise and Céleste both started laughing.

“I look like I am twenty five even if I am seven years older than that, you on the other hand look like your age but act way younger.” Said Louise, laughing.
“How much younger?” I asked to Louise.

“About twenty years!”

Another laughing burst.

We arrived home a little bit later than we were supposed to. Luckily our interviewee hadn’t arrived yet, so Louise and I, in a minor way, cleared my office and prepared ourselves for the interview. Yes, I said ourselves because seeing the way Louise and I had acted all the day we were more like friends than boss and employee, not a bad relationship change seeing how Céleste liked being Louise. It would have been hard to keep boundaries anyways, I like to befriend people. Anyway the door rang so Louise helped me go to the door to meet our potential new maid.

Louise opened the door and who I saw shocked me, not because of who she was, I had never met her before, but because of the state she was in.

She was a Hispanic girl, who didn’t look a day older than 14 and that looked like she was in the early stages of her pregnancy.

I was flabbergasted by that sight. Was she in the wrong place? I hoped so…

The girl started speaking in broken English interceded with a few Spanish words. “Is this the casa of señorita Mirabelle Flannagan?”

Did my mom even bother to look at the interviewees profiles?