-B

Blaine doesn’t remember being born. He doesn’t remember the first time he realized that it was just him and his mom and that he didn’t know what a father was. He doesn’t remember the first day he tied his shoes and he doesn’t remember what it felt like to get his first tooth. He doesn’t remember what his bed felt like or even what it smelled like in his house.

But he does remember his mother’s face. The way she would smile at him until she thought he wasn’t looking and then turn her face away to cover her mouth, her forehead scrunching up in a sadness he didn’t understand. He remembers the way she would cradle him in her arms each night and never let him go, opting to sleep in the same bed as he did so she could “smell the shampoo in his hair and listen to him breathe” as the soundtrack to her dreams.

He doesn’t remember what he looked like as a toddler or what he was for Halloween in second grade. He doesn’t remember how much he weighed at the end of fifth grade.

He does remember what they looked like, though. Grey suits and sunglasses like a spy movie. He had answered the door and they had asked for his mom. She had appeared in the kitchen doorway, arms soapy from the dishwater in the sink, hair in a bun at the top of her head. He remembers how her jaw had tightened as she pulled herself to her full height and welcomed them into the house, gesturing for them to take a seat on the hunter green couch with its plushy soft pillows that Blaine had made into forts just two years before on his tenth birthday.

He remembers being ushered into his bedroom and blinking owlishly at his door as his mother closed it behind her to talk with their guests. Guests he had never met nor seen before.

He remembers sneaking down the hall on his hands and knees, pretending to be a spy like the men in his house even though yeah, twelve was a little old for spy stuff but, he had reasoned, no one would ever know.

He doesn’t remember what he was wearing that day or the dinner that they had eaten.

But he does remember his mother crying, begging.

He remembers hearing her swear - his mother had never swore - about being foolish and young and her saying that Marcus was never worth it.

Marcus?

He remembers the men; their calm voices and the one sentence that carried over to him.

“You’ll be taken care of.”

He remembers the clear, stinging sound of his mother’s hand slapping the man’s face. Her words to him.

“I don’t care about me. He’s my baby. He’s what I have.”

He remembers most, now, the man’s last words.

“Then enjoy the time you have left, ma'am.”

***

They aren’t allowed contact. The families. It’s too hard, too much for them to control. Too many times parents have tried to find, hold, keep, and threatened to upset the balance.

An experiment gone wrong, they said. A “genetic mishap” that affected so few, they explained.

Blaine didn’t really care about that part. He didn’t really understand the nature of his condition. He just knew that his life operated in cycles. Each day was a cycle.

Wake up.
Assess the environment.
Determine gender.
Determine Safety.
Never get too attached.
Avoid being Noticed.
Do not interfere.

Today he had been Mikkel, final year student at Niels Steensens Gymnasium in Copenhagen, Denmark. Mikkel, with his blond hair and green eyes, a younger brother who obviously adored him and parents who cared for him as well, trusted him enough to go to his girlfriend’s house alone.

He had been in Copenhagen for nearly four months now.

His mind sifted through the faces he had been over the past four months here, flipping through every imaginable difference: black, white, brown, disabled, mentally challenged. Those days were remembered not because he couldn’t think on his own but because he had to be mindful to act as though he didn’t know a thing, trapped inside the body of someone not accustomed to movement.

There were no emails to himself on those days because, well, it would’ve seemed odd to the parents even if he could come across a computer.

Before Copenhagen had been Sydney for a meager two weeks, and Pakistan for two months before that.

The email address was always the same, the place he was sitting was just different. Except for the five-month blackout in Ghana when he was 14. But he didn’t need emails to remember that.

Blaine settled into Mikkel’s bed, wondering for the millionth time what his counterpart would think when he awoke the next morning. Would he remember Blaine’s day? Would he think he slept the whole time? Would his girlfriend talk about the sex they had had only to have Mikkel scold her?

Blaine would never know - could never know, as he had never had the opportunity to ask.

Just one more of the mysteries of being him.

As he drifted to sleep he wondered where he would awake in the morning.

***
”But why, mommy? Why will this happen?”

Blaine’s mother rocked her son in the pale light streaming in from the streetlamps, the slow groan of old wood the only sound for a moment.

“Blaine, you know what we talked about? About how children are made?”

Blaine blushed at the memory of the conversation, having had it only a few months ago after his first time on the middle and high school bus.

“Ye-ees,” he replied tentatively, not wanting to rehash the embarrassing conversation.

“Well, your daddy was like this, like you, and I didn’t really know it. I just knew that he came into my life and then was...gone. He...he didn’t know that I was a carrier for this gene and neither did I. But here I am, with you. You’re wonderful, Blaine. You’re perfect. It’s all going to be alright. The- the men, they told me ways you can adapt. Ways you can keep yourself together and-”

“But why can’t I just stay with you, mom? Or at least talk to you? I just-” Blaine interrupted, wet eyes staining his mother’s thin pajamas.”

“No, Blaine. It’s...It’s just forbidden. I wouldn’t be able to find you anyway and people have...people have hurt themselves, hurt others, even, trying to find their children. We just-” His mother had stopped then, her shoulders slumping, kisses pressed to Blaine’s forehead and tears mingling with his on his cheeks. They held each other like this for a while, silent but for the occasional shuddery sigh or sniffle before Blaine attempted to speak again.

“I know the rules, mommy. I know them. I don’t think I’ll ever really understand why but...I’ll try. For you, mom. Because I’m brave. I can do this and maybe someday something will change and-”

His mom had sighed, the wish so sharp it ached.

“Let’s not talk about this anymore tonight, Blaine. Let’s just...be together.” She smoothed his hair and held his face in her palms, his eyebrows knitted together, as she began to hum Brahm’s Lullaby, his favorite, his long limbs hanging far beyond her lap, neither of them caring one bit as his arms tightened around her neck.

They breathe.