There was something about waking up to the sound of birds chirping rather than the hum of traffic and sirens that gave Darren the peace of mind he could never have in Chicago, even in many of the suburbs. When he woke up in the morning, he lay in the bed for twenty minutes before finally sliding out. He shrugged off what happened at the strip club last night and chalked it up to being a lesson learned that at this point in his life, he just didn’t need to be in certain kinds of places. As usual, Darren grabbed his robe, slid it on, and approached the window to open the blinds.
There, he stood for a few minutes surveying the narrow tree-lined avenue of refurbished and well-maintained Victorian homes. Just as he’d been turning away so he could head downstairs and get started with his day, he noticed a guy walking a kid down the street to a corner where a small group of other kids stood, backpacks in hand and waiting on the school bus. A chuckle slipped out of his lips, for some reason. He watched as the guy stood with the kids at the corner, scrolling through his phone anxiously.
For whatever reason, Darren’s mind went back to a bachelor’s party he’d gone to in Los Angeles – a friend of the family’s son. He had joked to the groom that he would be “popping out” babies soon. The groom denied it, but within two years, his mother had forwarded to him and his brother pictures of the wife pregnant with the groom’s hand on her stomach. Darren remembered how he shook his head, swearing it wouldn’t be him. Now, though, as life was settling in and he was starting to feel left out, his feelings were changing. The void in his life was becoming harder and harder to ignore.
Darren made his coffee then set out on the terrace. He grinned a bit every time he sat out back, thinking about how expensive all of this would be back in Chicago. Beyond that, he also imagined for a moment that most people around here who had this much of a backyard probably had children running around. His brother John’s recounts of a single man adopting children crept back into his mind. Marriage still seemed too much of a risky endeavor for a man of his means. Darren set his coffee down then stood up. “Lemme look into this.”
A few minutes later, the 32-year-old had gone to get his laptop and was now sitting back out on the terrace. He entered various keywords and phrases into Google to see what kinds of results came up related to single men adopting children. A few websites spoke positively of it, then Darren noticed they were usually adoption agency or foster home kinds of places selling a product or service. Then, there were of course news stories. Darren skimmed over a few, coming across the one his brother John spoke of at the bar.
Forum discussions were interesting, to say the least. There seemed to be this arguing back and forth as to whether or not a single man should be allowed to adopt a child. Of course, other male commentators applauded the idea, further reinforcing Darren’s current train of thought because they emphasized the desire to raise children without the control and upper advantage given to women in society. As to be expected, female commentators weren’t so supportive of the idea. Rather, the female commentators talked about how a man who wants children should find a wife, with much of their wording insinuating that a man isn’t fit to raise children on his own. Darren chuckled at one woman’s response to a male commentator who asked if a woman should be allowed to adopt a child without a husband or male partner. Of course, the woman poster did not see a problem with such a scenario.
Darren perused the internet for a while, soaking in as much information as possible. Now having seen kind of what the world thinks of his desire to adopt a child, he contemplated for a while. His mind analyzed the reality he would face when adopting a child and integrating it into his life. Would I want a boy? A girl? What if there are some twins that need to be adopted?
Darren leaned back in his chair and looked out at the cityscape as he pondered the answers to those questions as well as many others. Thirty minutes passed; the sun had risen up into the sky and the city buzzed a bit more as traffic on a nearby busy streets hummed with a steady flow into downtown. Darren eventually jumped up and went back into the house. He leaned over the kitchen island just as 9 o’clock rolled around.
“Fuck it,” he said. “I can try and the worst that can happen is no.”
Darren felt like he could probably be a little more confident than the average guy. After all, he did come from a family of means and influence – two things that opened doors for him in more ways that many could imagine. He pulled up his lawyer Gilbert Hicks’ number, took a couple of moments to contemplate a couple things, then pressed DIAL and pressed the phone up to the side of his face.
“Morning, this is Gilbert Hicks,” the attorney answered.
The fact that Hicks wasn’t an adoption attorney was at the front of Darren’s mind, but he knew he would at least be a place to start locally. “Good Morning, Mister Hicks. This is Darren McWaters. How are you?”
“Oh, I’m well, Mister McWaters,” Hicks replied. “How are you?”
Darren told the lawyer he was fine then listened as Hicks gave a spill about having just gotten into the office and to his desk. “That’s good to hear. Well, the reason for my calling is I’ve done some thinking and I want to adopt a child.”
“Oh, is that so?” Hicks asked.
Darren picked up on the surprise in the attorney’s voice. The guy obviously wasn’t used to hearing something like that from a man. “Yes. And I’m calling you because even though you don’t practice family law, I figured you would probably know where to start around here, since I’m not from here as you know. I wanted to know… What do you think would be the chances of me, a single man, working with agencies around here to adopt a child?”
“Well, you’re right, Mister McWaters,” Hicks said. “I don’t practice this kind of law, but I do know some lawyers who could help you with something like that. As for your question, I have to be honest with you. Is it illegal for a single man do adopt a child? No, it’s n
ot illegal. As for whether or not you’ll be able to do it, I suppose you would. But I must warn you that you may have an uphill battle ahead of you. Excuse me for saying this, but the major thing you do have working in your favor is the fact that you are a man of means. This will change things a bit for you compared to a guy who just works a nine-to-five.”
Darren’s glanced around the kitchen as he processed what his lawyer was saying to him. He then asked for more information on his uphill battle Hicks spoke of.
“Well...” Hicks said, clearly gathering his thoughts. “As you can probably already imagine, not too many men actively seek out to adopt a child on their own. In fact, I think the numbers would probably be very small. Also, the cold reality is that there is a stigma to a man that wants to adopt a child on his own… you know, that he may be adopting the child for sexual purposes, trafficking, and stuff like that. I know that’s a hard pill to swallow, but there are segments of society who certainly do think that and may even look at you suspiciously because you’re a single man.” Hicks cleared his throat. “Then, there’s the woman thing.”
“The woman thing?” Darren asked. He chuckled, recalling some of the female responses on the forum.
“Yes,” Hicks said then chuckling himself. “The song used to go it’s a man world, but now that’s changing, as I’m sure you know. I would imagine many adoption agencies would obviously prefer a man to have a wife. But the other struggle I imagine you would come up against is not only have to deal with this stigma and suspicion, but also the fact that women virtually control like ninety-nine percent of the adoption process...which means all along the way, you’ll probably be encountering a woman who thinks you shouldn’t be trying to adopt a child as a single man. The rules just aren’t the same as it is for a single woman. A single man trying to adopt is looked at with suspicion, on many levels. A single woman trying to adopt will probably be treated sympathetically and as if she’d not had good luck with finding a husband, so she’s taking this route to start a family for herself.”
Darren started pacing around the kitchen as he processed it all. Just as he’d been about to speak, he heard beeping in his phone signaling a call was coming through. He pulled the phone away from his face and saw it was his mother on the other line. A groan slipped out of his lips and he shook his head.
“Okay, I understand what you’re saying,” Darren said to Hicks. “But I think I really wanna go ahead and take the chance and start the process. Who can you get me in touch with around here, Mister Hicks?”
Chapter 6: Three Months Later
Darren woke up on a crisp September morning with heavy eyes and a crook in his neck. He stretched then grabbed his head and cracked his neck as he turned over to face the window. The sun was slowly rising above the houses across the street. Darren wondered what time it was, but didn’t feel like getting up to find his phone. He spread his arm out across the bed in search of it before realizing that he had heard it thump against the floor in the night. Instead, Darren lay there in thought.
Last night had been a true test of fatherhood for the single man. Gabriel, the beautiful two year-old he officially adopted a little less than a month ago, woke up in the night waling at the top of his lungs. A storm had passed over the area last night. Huge bolts of lightening reached out of the sky with so much fury. Thunder rumbled in the clouds for several hours straight. Shortly after a loud thunder shook the windows and woke Darren up out of his sleep, he heard the baby crying from the crib, which was in the adjacent bedroom – a bedroom which had a connecting door that Gabriel left ajar through the night. Quickly, instincts kick-started in ways he never would’ve imagined when he jumped out of bed and ran into the room where he stood at the side of the crib. He comforted Gabriel, talking to him like any father wanting to calm his frightened son. The 6-months-old eventually stopped yelling and Darren watched him as his tiny eyes closed and he fell back to sleep in his father’s arms.
Darren smirked as he thought about last night. It was one thing to think about adopting a child; it was totally different to have the child at home and in his possession. He finally turned away from the window and looked toward the ajar door. Gabriel was sound asleep...and the new father wanted it to stay that way. He turned back toward the window, hearing the screeching school bus brakes like he did every morning as they made their way down the street, stopping every couple of blocks to pick up a group of kids.
After fading in and out of sleep for the next twenty minutes, Darren realized it was finally time to get started with his day. Business was going well, his social life was much better than it had been when he first got to Ft. Wayne, and now he was the single father of a beautiful baby boy. Time was of the essence, so he sprung out of bed and went to use the bathroom. When he finished up, he washed his hands, then rushed excitedly into the Gabriel’s room. There, he stood at the side of the crib. Darren smiled, analyzing the child for no particular reason.
Darren stood at the crib’s side for a while as he reminisced vividly on the adoption process. Regretfully, he found his family’s means and influence in the real estate world didn’t exactly translate into making the adoption process for a single man any easier. Sure, his financial situation was certainly favorable; however, just as Gilbert Hicks warned on the phone that morning Darren finally decided to do something about filling the void in his life, the stigma of a single man wanting to adopt a child was certainly very real.