Jack: Do you want to look for them?
Jack: I can hire someone to track them down.
Jack: It’s a long shot, but we never know.
Prudence: I need to process all this.
Jack: Yeah…
Jack: Do you think they knew?
Prudence: What do you mean?
Jack: What kind of place our parents were adopting from?
Prudence: I hope they didn’t.
Prudence: But if they did choose you from some kind of “ratings”, I’m guessing they knew enough.
JACK
I’m stuck.
My chair is in the hotel room and I’m stuck, not physically but mentally, in front of the bathroom mirror.
She wasstolen.
How much more fucked up can it be? Her parents are probably still out there. Heartbroken for almost twenty eight years.
Stolen.
I really don’t want to know my own story, but what if they’ve stolen me too? I just know that I was born in Sweden, and adopted here at three months old. And that I apparently had a good “rating”.
Fucked up.
“Jack?” Ikram’s voice calls softly from behind the door.
“I’m coming.”
“Do you… Do you need any help?”
“I’m fine.”
I force my hand to release their grasp on the lip of the sink and lift my head only to be faced with my reflection.
My fair skin, freckles, green eyes, blond hair.
Is there someone out there who looks just like me? Is there a chance that I’d walk the streets in some town in Sweden and meet my own eyes? Would that person stop and stare at me in confusion, thinking “That guy looks familiar”?
Or maybe my initial thoughts are correct, and they’re dead anyway.
I don’t need to know. It would only bring more preoccupations and questions that I don’t have the time to solve.
I turn my face away and take the step separating me to the door. The second it opens, I see the worry in Ikram’s eyes.
“Jack—”
“I’m fine,” I say, stepsiding him to go unpack.
