Chicken Soup for Every Mom's Soul Read Free

the lady who was taking care of her at the moment. No more intimate than “Waiter” or “Stewardess.” All the meaning had been drained from that word the night her “real mom” took the garbage out and never came back.
    After her biological mother left, Samantha lived with a steady succession of mothers. Some were just temporary care for a night or two; others were longer “trial visits.” One, Samantha’s mother for five months, told Samantha they were going to adopt her into their family soon, that the other children were her “sister” and her “brother.” When Samantha came to us, one of her few possessions was a little purple sweatshirt, hand decorated with craft paint spelling out the words “Little Sister.” But, one night, when Samantha had said something inappropriate in front of the biological kids, she was abruptly stripped of her title and sent away. A dishonorable discharge for the littlest soldier.
    Now at our house, Samantha was somebody else’s daughter, somebody else’s little sister. Matthew’s initial fears about a new sibling thrusting him into the limelight were replaced with relief; his new sister looked remarkably like him and the rest of the family. There would be no undue attention, no compulsory rice.
    At first he treated Samantha like a cute new pet. “Want to come in and see my new sister? Look what she can do!” After a few days the novelty wore off, and routine set in.
    But Sam remained enthralled with Matthew. She lingered over the many pictures of him that covered the walls of our house: Matthew in a soccer uniform, Matthew at the beach, Matthew with Grandpa. On her third day with us, Samantha found some old catalogues and asked for scissors. Patiently she cut out pictures of two dolls, a boy and a girl. She turned over one of the silver frames and lifted the back. With great care she arranged her boy and girl on the mat and replaced the frame, beaming. “Look, Mom! Look at the picture of me and Matthew!”
    For reassurance, or maybe just to remind herself who he was, Samantha had taken to calling our son “Matthewmybrother.” When she had been with us about a week, she called to him at bedtime. With her wide blue eyes shining up at him, she said, “Matthewmybrother, I’m glad your room is next to mine so that you can protect me from the monsters.” For a boy of ten, not that far removed from believing in monsters himself, this was high praise. He swaggered out of her room like he had just been knighted.
    My husband, too, had bonded with Sam. The little blondie who wrapped around his legs was just as tightly wrapped around his heart. He did not need to fear a parental tug-of-war over this child. Her biological parents had neglected and abandoned her, having fallen so deep into their dark, destructive world that there was no hope—or risk—of them climbing out.
    We saw glimpses of their lives through Samantha. One day, she deftly took a rubber plastic blood-pressure hose out of a play doctor’s set and tied it around her forearm, pulling it tight with her teeth. Then she tapped on her veins as though feeling for “a good one.” The father who had shot up in front of Samantha never once came looking for her.
    As the weeks passed, Samantha worked hard to learn the names of all of her new relatives. “Is it Uncle Dale and Aunt Kelly, or Uncle Kale and Aunt Delly?” She knew Grandma and Poppa and numerous cousins. And I was Mom.
    She called me “Mommy,” “Mama,” and sometimes, “Mumsy,” because Matthewmybrother did too. I knew that if Samantha were to draw a picture of her mom it would be my face she would draw, my stick hand holding her stick hand. But I had been a mother for ten years. I knew the difference between the word and the relationship it represented. Once, when I left Samantha with my parents for an evening, she asked my mother, “If she doesn’t come back, are you my new mom?”
    Weeks turned into months. We were progressing as quickly as