That Guy

I was rummaging around in the spare room looking for something to wear tomorrow. I’d just tried on an emerald-green shirt that I bought today and was giving myself a sideways glance in the full length mirror.

“Mama?” His voice called out from the bathroom, indicating he was done with his shower. I walked across the hallway to the bathroom, catching another glimpse of myself in the mirror there. Long green flow-y shirt, underwear. Distinctly not chic. I frowned slightly, thinking that the shirt made me look pregnant.

“Yes?” I answered. He stood there, all 80 pounds of him, fresh from the shower, chocolate-brown curls dripping. His towel was wrapped tightly around him.

“Did I ever have a Dad?” he asked, looking up through his thick eyelashes, cheeks red from the heat of the shower.

I froze for a second. I had been anticipating this question for a long time, had imagined it in my head, had initiated its beginning only to be met with a frown and “No;” when I asked if he wanted any information.

“Well..,” I began. “There is something that comes out of guys and that gets put into a woman and the combination of those two things are what makes a baby. And I wanted to get pregnant so I went somewhere where I could get some of that stuff”. He looked at me inquisitively.

“So I did have a Dad?” he asked.

“Um… well, the man who the stuff came out of is technically your biological dad, the donor. He donated the stuff that went inside of me that made you”. I thought better of my sudden inspiration to compare it to a trip to the Goodwill. “The ‘stuff’,” I went on, “is called sperm. That’s what comes out of the man”. I smiled at him, thinking I had about wrapped it up.

He was sucking his thumb, his eyes wide, interested. “Do you know his name?” he asked.

“No, Baby, I don’t. He only had a number. I don’t know much about him at all. I know that he had brown hair and brown eyes, and that he liked sports a lot… and that he was German”.

“Well I have brown hair and brown eyes,” he said, smiling. “So I must have gotten it from that guy.”

“Yes, Honey, I think you did,” I said, grinning.