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Kendall était assise en sanglots sur le trottoir devant la maison jusqu’à ce que son père adoptif sorte avec un sac à dos. « Ta sœur a emballé quelques affaires pour toi », dit-il en lui tendant un petit rouleau de billets de banque. « Je suis désolé, Kendall… Mais tu connais ta mère… »
Kendall s’essuya les yeux et leva les yeux vers lui. « Elle n’est pas ma mère ! » cria-t-elle. « Et tu n’es pas mon père ! Tu as promis de m’aimer quoi qu’il arrive, c’est ce que font les VRAIS parents ! » Il s’éloigna alors, l’air honteux, et Kendall prit ses quelques affaires et s’éloigna.
Elle avait été adoptée alors qu’elle était bébé et avait grandi dans la maison des Jordan avec quatre autres enfants. Les Jordan étaient de bonnes personnes, mais c’étaient des fanatiques religieux qui ne célébraient pas les anniversaires ou Noël parce que c’était un péché.
La vie de Kendall et de ses frères et sœurs se limitait à aller à l’école la semaine et à l’église le dimanche. Comme toute autre adolescente, elle avait commencé à se rebeller. Elle voulait aller au cinéma, porter de beaux vêtements et du rouge à lèvres.
Elle voulait aller à des fêtes, embrasser un garçon et tomber amoureuse, mais comme tout cela lui était refusé, elle avait perdu tout sens des limites. Elle avait fini par sortir avec le mauvais garçon de l’école et quelques mois plus tard, elle était enceinte.
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“No miracles now!” she said to herself bitterly. “No guardian angel to watch over you!” It was Kendall’s fondest fantasy, that she had a guardian angel who watched over her and sometimes dropped gifts magically into her life.
On her birthday, she’d always received gifts that were delivered through the school and which she hid in her locker and never took home. At Christmas time, she’d find candy canes hanging from the tree outside her window and a bright Christmas stocking filled with forbidden goodies.
Kendall had watched for her guardian angel, but she never caught even a glimpse of the mysterious presence. Now that she was alone in the world with a baby in her belly was when she most needed that angel.
She walked to the nearby park and sat down with her backpack on her lap. She counted out the money her adoptive dad had given her. Just over $56. It wasn’t enough for even one night at a sleazy motel.
No matter how dark and desperate things look, remember there is always a guardian angel watching over us.
Kendall started to sob again then she heard a friendly voice. “Hey there, girl, what can be so bad? Maybe momma Mila can help you out!”
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Kendall looked up at a tall woman with a friendly smile. She was wearing a brightly colored flowery apron and he was carrying pruning sheers in one hand and a bunch of roses in the other.
“I’m…OK…” Kendall sniffed.
The woman shook her head and sat down next to Kendall. “No, honey, you’re not,” she said. “But you know you can tell me. I don’t judge.”
So Kendall poured out her whole miserable story and said, “So I have no money, no job, nowhere to go, and a baby to take care of.”
“I’ll give you a job,” Mila said calmly. “And I have a little place you can stay but you gonna have to take care of the baby yourself!”
“You’ll give me a job?” gasped Kendall. “Really”?
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“Yes,” Mila said. “I have a flower stand at this end of the park, but I’ve been wanting to open another close to the business district. I’ll teach you how to do the flower arrangements and we’ll see how it goes.”
Kendall was smiling through her tears. “I can do that! I love flowers!”
“Well then,” Mila said. “Come along and see the little apartment I can set you up in.”
The apartment wasn’t far away. It was tiny but very clean and cozy and Kendall couldn’t believe her luck. Maybe her guardian angel was watching out for her after all!
Over the next few months, things got better and better. The flower stand in the business district was a huge success, and Mila was very pleased with Kendall. The doctor Mila took her to declared that both she and the baby were healthy.
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Five months later, Kendall gave birth to a lovely baby boy she named Michael. Mila gave Kendall three months’ leave before she had to go back to work, and adapting to a newborn was really hard.
Micahel cried all the time, and Kendall was constantly changing his diapers. He seemed to never sleep more than ten minutes at a time and Kendall was utterly exhausted. Then one morning, she woke up with the sun streaming into her bedroom.
“Michael!” she cried and ran over to her baby’s tiny room. Michael was fast asleep, his tiny fists under his chin, looking like an absolute angel. Kendall couldn’t believe her son had slept all night without feeding or wetting his diaper!
Then she noticed that the bottle she’d prepared for his night feed was empty and that his diaper was clean and dry. “That’s so weird!” she said to herself. “Did I feed and change him in my sleep?”
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That night, Michael didn’t cry again and when Kendall woke up in the morning he was fed and dry and sleeping peacefully. “This is getting really creepy!” Kendall thought. “Maybe I’m sleepwalking or something. Tonight I’m not sleeping!”
Kendall lay awake waiting for the slightest sound from Michael’s room, and at three in the morning, she heard a soft cry followed by hushed sounds. There was someone in Michael’s room!
Kendall peeked into the room. There was a woman bending over Michael’s crib talking to him softly and changing his diaper. Kendall hit the light switch. “Who are you?” she screamed. “Get away from my baby!”
The woman gasped and Michael started screaming. Then the woman picked up Michael and started soothing him. “Hello Kendall,” she said calmly. “I’m Martha Douglas and I’m your mother.”
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Martha told Kendall her story. Like Kendall, Martha had fallen pregnant very young, at sixteen. “My mother wanted me to have an abortion but I refused,” Martha explained. “So she kicked me out, and I had to give you up.
“It was the hardest thing I ever did and it broke my heart. I was determined to stay in your life, Kendall, so I saw you as often as I could and I sent you birthday presents and Christmas treats.”
“Later I finished high school and started my own business. I have a series of flower shops in the city — over thirty — so it was easy to get one of my employees, Mila, to offer you a job. This house was my late mother’s…”
“But why didn’t you say something? Why were you hiding?” Kendall asked.
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Martha shrugged. “I was ashamed,” she whispered. “I know what you must think of me, especially since you’re keeping your baby… I didn’t mean for you to find out, I just wanted you to get a few good night’s sleep.”
“I’m lucky,” Kendall said hugging Martha. “I have you and Mila helping me, otherwise I’d have to give Michael up too! How could I think badly of you?”
Martha had her daughter back and her grandson too, and the two of them moved into her beautiful house. Finally, Kendall had a loving and understanding mother who loved and supported her unconditionally.
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What can we learn from this story?
- No matter how dark and desperate things look, remember there is always a guardian angel watching over us. Kendall was homeless, broke, and pregnant until Mila and Martha gave her a job and a place to live.
- Good parents love and support their children unconditionally. Kendall’s adoptive mother threw her out because she was a ‘sinner’ but her real mother stepped up to protect her.
