A Mistaken Identity

It was extremely hard for me to ever lead a normal life, particularly when I was a seventeen year-old orphan. According to the stories I had heard from the head of the orphanage, Mr. Burton, I was dropped off in front of the orphanage I grew up in when I was maybe two days-old. During the past seventeen years, I had grown up in that orphanage, mainly because no one wanted to adopt me. By the time I was twelve, I had all but given hope on being adopted. Knowing this, I would always seclude myself from everyone, seldom venturing out to associate with the other orphans. I couldn’t bring myself to do so.

For the most part, I would usually stay in my room listening to techno music in order to get my mind off of the fact that I was the only one here at the orphanage that had yet to be adopted. Of everyone here, it was me who had been at the orphanage the longest. No one seemed to want me, not even my birth parents. That was why I had forgone today’s adoption day, instead preferring to sit up in my room listening to music. There was absolutely no way in hell that I was willing to sit around and watch as yet another one of my friends got adopted while I had to stay here at the orphanage, yet again.

Not wanting to go downstairs, I stayed up in my room for hours on end, just listening to music and wondering what might have happened in my life if my parents never gave me up. My life wouldn’t be like this; I’d never have to lose any of my friends the way I did while I was here in the orphanage. Other than that though, I had a hard time imagining what my life would be like if I never came to the orphanage. It was pure fantasy, something that I didn’t believe in. With all of the unfortunately things that had happened in my life, there was absolutely no way for me to ever bring myself to believe in things like fantasy. Reality was the only thing I could put any faith in. Life wasn’t fair and I was proof of that.

At around five o’clock, all of the orphans came bounding upstairs. Most of them had huge grins plastered on their faces, a clear indication of the fact that they had been adopted. It pissed me off. To know that I had once again been passed over in regards to being adopted annoyed the hell out of me. The only consolation I had was the fact that there were other kids that didn’t get adopted. I would be the only one still here at the orphanage; there would be others. None of them were my friends though. And, that bothered me.

“Kimber, why didn’t you come down?” one asked.

“I didn’t really feel like it,” I told them.

“Why?” they asked.

“How about because I’m seventeen,” I reminded them. “No family in the world would ever want to adopt a seventeen year-old orphan. So, why should I even go down there when I already know that I’m going to get rejected? I would rather stay up here listening to music than going downstairs only to discover that I’m not going to get adopted.”

“Well, if you’re going to play some music, you should be playing some good music,” one of the girls said as she brought out a Jonas Brothers CD and put it into the CD player on the table. “This music that you’ve been listening to is just plain annoying. I mean, why anyone would actually want to listen to that techno crap is absolutely beyond me.”

“Because, unlike the music you guys like listening to, techno actually has a good beat. The Jonas Brothers are crap and you need to know that,” I told them. I absolutely despised listening to the Jonas Brothers; it was the worst possible music that I could be listening to. Just about every girl here was completely and utterly in love with the boys. Of course, I couldn’t care less. Listening to the Jonas Brothers was utter torture; I could stand hearing any of that crap. Because of that, I spent all my time away from the other girls who were obsessing over the boys. It was pathetic to see all the girls obsessing over them when there was no chance of them meeting any of the boys. Why would they always get their hopes up when it came to meeting celebrities like that? Sure we were in California, but there was a very slim shot of such a thing ever occurring. It wasn’t going to happen.

Knowing that the girls were going to start playing the Jonas Brothers, I groaned and stormed out of the room so as to avoid hearing that. It was the only thing that I could do to keep myself from listening to that crap. Why would they listen to that crap? I wondered. What the hell is so fascinating about these boys that every girl here is in love with them? Unfortunately, I was never going to find out and I really didn’t care. The whole thing was pretty pointless; it was pointless, nonsensical dribble I didn’t want to deal with.

When I got down to the ground floor, I found Mr. Burton standing there, talking with what looked like the maid. He then turned and spotted me. “Kimberleigh, why didn’t you come down earlier for Adoption Day? There was a chance you could have been adopted.”

“No, there wasn’t,” I insisted.

“How do you know?” he asked.

“I’m seventeen,” I said. “No family in the world would ever want to adopt me. I’ve spent my entire life here I this orphanage and that’s exactly how it is going to stay. I know that. No one understands that better than me. Not even you seem to realize this. I’m never going to get adopted and will ultimately leave this place, only when I turn eighteen next year. I’ve given up hope in being adopted. I have no family and the fact is that I never will.”

Mr. Burton rolled his eyes at what I said. “You’re too negative, Kimberleigh. There is still a chance for you. There is still a chance for a family to adopt you,” Mr. Burton said.

“No, there isn’t,” I said.

“You’ll soon see,” Mr. Burton said.

I nodded. Yeah, we’ll see. Then, you’ll understand how right I was. I sighed and wiped the tears that were threatening to cascade. Never knowing who my parents were, never knowing if I had any siblings; that bothered me. Instead, I was stuck here at the orphanage while whatever family I had when I was a baby lived in the lap of luxury. Finding them would be nice, but I had no way of knowing where they were, or if they were even alive. I knew that I would have to find out though. I needed to know if my parents were alive and, if they were, where they were and why they gave up raising their daughter. They sent me off to an orphanage to be raised, and I needed to understand why that had happened. What was running through their mind when they gave up raising their own child?

A reason for all of this had to have existed and I needed to know what it was. What was it about my life that caused my parents to not want me? I had to know what it was.