Christmas Shopping

Just like every Christmas Eve, Mom pulled out the photo album of my trip home from the hospital. “My best Christmas present ever,” she would say as she showed me pictures of a tiny, pink edition of me, stuffed into a Christmas stocking with a little hospital hat upon my bald scalp, and red and green yarn tied around the hat to close the top of it.

There was always one thing curiously missing in those pictures though; my dad. He left us when I was eighteen months old, so I have no memory, but I’ve heard lots of things about him, none of it good. Since I’m sixteen now I decided I was mature enough to ask Mom about the curiosity of my father’s never present image. “We’ll discuss that later,” she said, with very little feeling in her voice. Heartbroken I retreated to my room where I could ponder his demise alone.

Approaching the mirror at my vanity table I sit down and really examined my face. How is my face different than Mom’s? My crooked nose, with a bump at the bridge and slightly turning to the left, that’s different from Mom. My eyes, they have an ocean blue quality, where Mom’s eyes are more of an emerald green. My lips, fuller than Mom’s, and often cause for confusion from classmates about my ethnicity. Though I’m whiter than Mom, many say my father must be African-American. I don’t see it, but the fullness of my lips are a bit different from Mom’s lips.

I stand up and venture to my full-length mirror; I’m skinny, where Mom is a bit plumper. She has “ghetto booty” and I have no booty at all. I try to imagine what my father might look like, he must be tall, because I am and Mom is not.

My thoughts were interrupted by a text on my cell phone. “Mall?” was all Tina had to say for me to know she wanted to meet me there. “Time?” I texted back. “Now,” she said.

“Mom,” I hollered out, “can you take me to the mall?”

“When?”

“Right now.”

“Okay, just give me a few minutes,” she responded.

***

As Tina and I walked the mall we saw some very cute sneakers in Lady Foot Locker, we headed into the store, but out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of a very tall man, about one hundred feet away. “Tina, wait, come here,” I said as I took off after the man. He was moving at a fast pace, and I was forced to run through the crowd to catch up to him as he zinged through the crowds of last minute holiday shoppers.

Tina tried to keep up with me, “What are you doing?” she asked.

“Just follow me, I’ll tell you in a minute,” I continued running through the crowds, bumping into one disgruntled shopper after another. “Excuse me, pardon me, I’m sorry.” I could hear the shoppers complaining, but I couldn’t let that man get away, I just couldn’t.

I saw him pause up ahead and I continued on my trek. As I got closer I realized he isn’t as tall as I thought, he is on a Segway, and he’s a mall cop. He turned toward me and I saw the bump on the bridge of his nose, with a curiously crooked nose, to the left. His lips are full, and he has no butt! “Tina, I think that is my biological dad!” I shouted over my shoulder as I approached the nameless man.

“Can I help you?” he asked, seeming a bit startled at my hurried approach.

“I hope so,” I said in a rushed manner, “Are you my Dad?”

Clearing his throat he gave a slight cough, “What is your name?” he asked.

“Gina Marie Harding,” I said, with a smile so large my cheeks were beginning to hurt. He pointed to his name tag, “C.E. Harding” it said.

There, in the middle of the mall I was overwhelmed with a feeling of happiness at finding him, but sadness and confusion, why did he leave and never try to contact me?

“I am your father,” he said. And as quick as the words escaped his full lips he turned the Segway and left me standing there with just as many questions as I had before.

Tina and I stood, staring after him as he zoomed away. “I guess it wasn’t meant to be,” she said to me.

“He didn’t even tell me Happy Birthday, Merry Christmas, I remember you in your little stocking. What did I do to deserve such ignorance?” I asked anyone that would listen, but no one was listening, no one at all.