The Kid: What Happened After My Boyfriend and I Decided to Go Get Pregnant

by Dan Savage

  I'd come to Tom and Pam's wedding prepared to go nuclear, but I couldn't get excited about the low-grade stuff we encountered. After being introduced as “This is . . . Dan” for the thousandth time, I started telling people I was the caterer. I let my guard down, and as I sat with my boyfriend's young cousins, D.J. was passed around the room. Everybody loves babies, and no one loves 'em quite so desperately as those fundamentalist Christians. Everyone at the wedding wanted to hold D.J., just as everyone did at the shower Terry's coworkers held for us after we brought him home, and at the baptism we'd just been to in Chicago. Babies at parties get passed around, no big deal.

  But when I looked around and couldn't see D.J. anywhere, I got a little panicky. Terry was at another table, talking with his uncle, but no baby. I remembered where we were: fundamentalist Christians, American Family Association, Operation Rescue literature . . . Oh, my God—what if someone had left with our baby? What if one of the other guests, some wacko fundy, couldn't stand the thought of this cute baby being raised by homos and decided to . . . rescue him? I stormed over to Terry, grabbed his arm, and whispered, “Where's the fucking baby?” loud enough for fundies praying two counties away to hear.

  We found D.J. on the other side of the room, sitting on some fundy's lap, smiling. We retrieved him and didn't let him out of our sight or our arms again. Everyone at the wedding was nice, but this was the kind of church clinic bombers, doctor killers, and Buchanan voters are drawn from. After the scare we'd just had, however short it was, we weren't letting the pasta salad and bad dress sense lull us into lowering our defenses. D.J. stayed on my lap for the rest of the day.

  Carol and Jack came over to check out our new place and see D.J. Jack had met him the day after we brought him home, but Carol's job had taken her out of town for months. When we all sat down, a smiling D.J. on Carol's lap, they told us they had news.

  “You don't have to feel guilty anymore—” Jack said.

  “You guys were picked!” Terry shouted.

  Carol nodded, Jack laughed, and I could feel the guilt lift from my shoulders.

  “We're going to Portland to meet our birth mom tomorrow.” Carol said, “and I only hope we get a baby half as cute as yours.”

  In late July, a month after she turned twenty-one, Melissa came up to Seattle. We'd spoken with her a couple of times since Terry brought the baby down to Portland. When I asked when she was coming up, so we could make plans for a visit, she sighed and explained that it didn't work that way. She would get to Seattle when she could—she wanted to get up here for Folklife, the music festival her father attended every year—but she didn't have much luck hitchhiking with her animals. She would have to find a ride or jump a train, which meant she didn't have much control over when she got to town. Then one day a few weeks later, as I rode my bicycle down Broadway, I saw Melissa sitting on the ground outside a Jack in the Box, with her dog and her cat, spare-changin' with another gutter punk. I kept riding.

  When I got home and told Terry I'd seen Melissa, he asked why I didn't stop and talk to her. I didn't know. It was good to see her, but somehow I'd felt that stopping and talking with her in front of her friends might be an invasion of her privacy. Did they know she'd given birth? Did they know she'd given the baby to fags? If not, what would she tell them about the big fag on the bike who rode up to say hello and asked her to come over for a visit?

  Later that night, she called to say she was in town.

  “Do you want to come see D.J.?” Terry asked.

  “Yeah, I guess. Is that all right?”

  “Of course. You want to come for dinner?”

  “I don't know, whatever.”

  Terry went to pick Melissa up in a car Carol and Jack lent us, and I went to the store and bought some steaks.

  As soon as Melissa was in the house, we stopped calling the baby D.J.; he was “the kid” again. Melissa didn't call him anything, either, and I felt like we were back at OHSU. We gave Melissa a tour, showing her the baby's room and, finally, the baby, asleep in his crib. It was time for a feeding, so we got him up, changed him, and warmed a bottle. While Terry cooked dinner, Melissa and I sat in the living room with the baby.

  She'd arrived in Seattle five days earlier, after hopping a train with a friend, a kid she met in Portland after the baby was born. She spoke of this boy in the same tone we'd heard her use when she talked about David. He wasn't too bright, and hadn't been on the streets for very long. Without Melissa to look out for him, he wouldn't make it. She'd seen her father at the festival, but he didn't see her, and she didn't go up to say hello. She was planning on staying in Seattle for a few weeks; then she wanted to head east, out to New York, for the rest of the summer.

  There were gutter punks in New York, of course, homeless young kids who begged for change. But New York is a meaner place than Seattle or Portland, and I warned Melissa that she might not find life on the streets there the same as life on the streets of Portland or Seattle.

  “I'll be fine,” she assured us, as she slowly ate her steak. “I've got a dog.”

  By the time Father's Day rolled around in June, I'd changed a lot of diapers, and spent a few long nights sitting up with the baby, but I didn't feel like a dad. I felt bonded, more than I had at the hospital, but I didn't feel like Daddy. Terry, on the other hand, was Superdad. Shortly after the baby came, he'd left his job. What bottles were washed, what diapers purchased, what formula was made was almost all thanks to Terry. He bitched and moaned about having to do “everything,” and I countered by bitching and moaning about having to make the money to pay for “ everything.” If Terry was going to stay home with the baby, which was what he wanted to do, that didn't mean I could work less. It meant the opposite. I was working for three now.

  While I got out of a lot of baby grunt work, I also missed out on the bonding that grunt work inspires. Terry was doing more daddying than I was, and naturally felt more a daddy than I did after three months. Biological parents are parents whether or not they lift a finger; they don't even have to be present. Their parent status is a genetic fact, as evidenced by the many adopted children who go out in search of their biological parents. Adoption is an act of will, and despite the placement papers we'd signed and the birth certificate we would get in the mail when the adoption was finalized (with Terry and me listed as “Mother” and “Father”), only the work of parenting would earn us the right to view ourselves, and be viewed by others, as D.J.'s fathers.

  Most important, the work of parenthood would make D.J. see us as his parents. Sitting up with D.J. one night during a feeding, I realized that if I died the next day, D.J. wouldn't think of me as his father. I would be some guy who'd adopted him and had taken care of him for a short time. He wouldn't remember me, and no pictures of me holding him at the baptism, or at the wedding, would make him feel I was his father. So not only did I need to perform daily acts of parenthood to cement my daddy identity, enough time had to pass so that D.J. could recall these acts as an adult. I had to keep it up and stick around into D.J.'s living memory to earn my daddy identity.

  When adoptive couples get nervous about who their kid's “real” parents are, or when strangers ask who the “real” parents are, the adoption books and the adoption counselors reassure us: the real parents are the people there in the middle of the night, the people taking care of the kid, and, most important, the people the kid calls Dad.

  On our first Father's Day, D.J. was a little shy of three months; he wasn't calling us anything yet. I wasn't sure he could even tell us apart. But he did seem to know that the large, moving things that scooped him up usually did something that made him feel better—fed him, changed him, held him—and sometimes did things that made him feel worse—cleaned his umbilical cord stump with ice-cold alcohol wipes, sucked snot out of his nose with a blue bulb, gave him a bath. But on our first Father's Day, he wasn't sure what we were. He didn't know we were dads, or even what dads were.

  He would soon, though. He'd understand that he ha
d parents, two dads, and he'd know that we were the guys who were always there for him. And then he'd call me Dad. And that was when, I thought, I'd finally start to feel like one.

  I hoped.

  Bacchus

  Melissa left Seattle in late July. She'd been to see the baby several-more times, and on my way to work, I sometimes saw her sitting on Broadway, spare-changin' people. We didn't hear from her for a few weeks after she'd left; then, in mid-August, we got a call. She was in Lincoln, Nebraska, and the spare-changin' was easy; in fact, the money was so good that she and her animals would be working there for a couple of weeks before heading on to Minneapolis.

  “I'll be in Minnesota for a month, probably,” Melissa said, “ before I go to New York.”

  “You want us to come over so you can see the baby?” I asked. “He's a lot more entertaining now that he's crawling around.”

  “Sure, if you want. I'd like to see D.J.”

  It was the first time Melissa had used the name we'd given her kid. She was apparently aware of the name game we'd all been playing, and decided it was time to call it off.

  “Call us and let us know when you get to Minneapolis, and we'll make arrangements to come over.”

  “I'll call. Tell Terry I say hi, and D.J., too, not that he'll understand hi.”

  “I'll tell him anyway, practice for when he does understand.”

  August ended; September came and went; we didn't hear from Melissa. By the end of October, we were in a panic. Riding rails was dangerous, dog or no dog, and Melissa knew it. She was aware that white supremacist serial killers rode the rails—we'd seen them on 20/20 —picking off people and moving on. And if she fell between trains, she wouldn't be the first gutter punk killed that way. Terry knew a girl who'd lost both her legs riding the rails, and she hadn't been jumping on a moving train with a dog, a cat, and a pack. We had talked with Melissa about all this, but she told us we shouldn't pay attention to what the TV said about riding rails. She was the expert; she had the scar to prove it and considered riding the rails at least as safe as hitchhiking.

  By mid-November, we were sure she was dead, and if that weren't nightmare enough, my worst-case-scenario software kicked in. The only personal papers Melissa carried were some I.D., D.J's original birth certificate, and the small photo album we'd given her at the hospital. If her body turned up somewhere, it would be returned to her parents, along with her personal effects. They would learn they had a grandchild from the birth certificate; they'd see Melissa and D.J. and me and Terry in the photo album. They could call OHSU, and that might lead them to the agency. While birth grandparents had no rights in Oregon, that didn't mean Melissa's parents couldn't sue for custody. They'd lose, but they could still sue. It would be grieving grandparents vs. dumb young fags, and it wasn't hard to figure out whose side 20/20, Dateline, and Hard Copy would come down on.

  We'd agreed during mediation to introduce D.J. to Melissa's parents once she reconciled with her family. We wanted to meet her parents one day, but not in court.

  Then, one night in late December, the phone rang. Melissa was alive and well and living in New Orleans, by way of Minneapolis, Chicago, Cleveland, New York, Vermont, and Florida. She was sorry she hadn't called, but she'd been on the move since leaving Lincoln, and the piece of paper our phone number was on got wet and she couldn't read it. We weren't listed, and it wasn't until she got to New Orleans that she realized she could call the agency, get our number again, and call us.

  “We thought you were dead! We were so worried!” I said, sounding like my mother.

  “You don't have to worry about me,” Melissa said. “I'm always fine.”

  Then she laughed, and it was different from her usual weary laugh. She sounded pleased. When we first met, Melissa had told us that her family knew she was on the streets in Portland and they never came looking for her. She would never say so, but I think it made her feel good to know that we worried, and that someone out there wanted to know where she was.

  “You guys aren't my family,” Melissa said. “You don't have to worry about me, you know.”

  “You're our kid's mom, and that makes you family,” I said, echoing what we'd been told at the seminar. “And our moms ask how you're doing whenever they call, and that really makes you family.”

  “Worry about me, then,” Melissa said, “if it makes you happy.”

  Melissa would be staying in New Orleans for a while. She had a new boyfriend, Ten Spot was his street name, and a friend had given them a van. It didn't run, but they were getting the money together to fix it. Like her animals, the van seemed to be more trouble than it was worth: the first time she and Ten Spot moved it, they got into an accident. Then, after weeks of pushing the van around town to avoid having it impounded, they finally found someone who'd let them park in their yard. They were living in the van, and would be in New Orleans at least two months. Ten Spot was doing some landscaping work, and Melissa was spare-changin'. Once they got the van running, they'd be leaving for California, but if we wanted to come see her, we could.

  We ordered tickets and made hotel reservations for the last weekend in January.

  A few days later, Terry was at home with the baby and got a collect call.

  “Guess who I ran into,” Melissa said. “Bacchus.”

  Before Terry could say anything, she passed the phone off.

  “Hey, this is Bacchus, D.J's father.”

  Ten minutes later, Terry was on the phone with me, practically hysterical. He couldn't remember much they had talked about, only that Bacchus asked him to send pictures of “his” son, and kept telling Terry how excited he was to be a father.

  “What did he sound like?” I asked.

  “Like, I don't know, like Melissa. Like a stoner, or a street kid. What do you think he wants?”

  “Well, whatever he wants, he can't have the kid—does he know that?”

  “I don't know.”

  “What did Melissa tell him?”

  “He knows we're coming to New Orleans in three weeks, and he wants to meet ‘his son’ when we come down. She also gave him our address and phone number. He knows everything, basically.”

  We were upset with Melissa—why had she given him our phone number? What was she thinking? We got more upset as calls from Bacchus continued to come in every night. It was December; we were gone most of the month, and weren't home when he called. With each message, he sounded more frustrated, as if he assumed we were avoiding or screening his calls. We weren't. We did want to talk to him: we wanted to tell him not to call us. Before we would see him, he needed to talk to the agency.

  Melissa called to apologize. She ran into Bacchus in the street, and before she realized it might be a mistake, she'd given him our phone number.

  Then Bacchus's father called.

  “This is Kevin's father, D.J.'s grandfather. I just wanted to thank you guys for looking after D.J. It's a good thing you're all doin',” the stranger on the phone said, his tone a combination of sentiment and menace. “And I can't wait to meet the little guy. You two take care of my grandson until then.”

  Now we were really in a panic. Bacchus's father sounded drunk, and we didn't know where he lived. Was he in Seattle? Did he have our address?

  We'd called Laurie, asking her to contact Bacchus. Our agency offers lifelong mediation with the birthparents, both of them, at no extra charge. Before we spoke with Bacchus again, we wanted him and his father to understand their legal rights to this child— i.e., their lack of any—and we didn't feel comfortable explaining this to Bacchus ourselves. Laurie suggested we write Bacchus a letter, and send it and a photo of D.J. to the agency. She wrote him a letter on agency letterhead, and sent everything off to Bacchus in New Orleans. In our letter, we assured Bacchus that we were open to his having contact with “our son,” but told him he would have to speak with Laurie first.

  “We feel strongly that the agency should be involved in our first meetings,” I wrote, “just as they handled our first mee
tings with Melissa. We're glad you called, and we're looking forward to building a relationship with you, and we know that D.J. will want to know you as he gets older. But for right now, please don't call us at home, call the agency.”

  After calling us every day for two weeks, Bacchus suddenly stopped. He'd gotten our letter.

  A few days before we were leaving for New Orleans, Laurie called. She'd spoken with Bacchus.

  “He wants to have contact with D.J. While he has no legal rights, we believe birth fathers should have contact with their children, too, if possible, and we would encourage you and Terry to consider it,” Laurie said. “He knows it's up to you guys.”

  Laurie filled us in: Bacchus was twenty, a year younger than Melissa. His mother lived in Arkansas, he had a sister in Reno, and his father didn't live in Seattle as we had feared, but in Dallas, Texas. Bacchus would be living in New Orleans at least until May.

  “He told me he thought Melissa made a good decision, and that he would have gone along with everything if he was with her at the time.”

  “Did he have anything to say about us being gay?”

  “All he wanted to know was if you were good parents. His dad is supportive of the decision, and his mom is mad the whole thing happened—upset that he got someone pregnant—but not about the child being adopted by gay men. I explained that adoption is permanent, and that you guys are D.J.'s parents. I told him you chose an open adoption because you wanted D.J. to know his birthparents, but that no adoptive parent wants to invite dysfunction into their lives. I told him he would have contact with D.J., but at this stage it was too early to say what form that contact might take, or how frequent it would be.”