Aaron

They say life is full of defining moments: moments that lead you down the path to becoming the person you were intended to be—live the life you were intended to live—fall in love with person you were destined to be with. I used to think those moments were easily identifiable. I'd know when I met my soul mate. I'd meet her, fall in love, and then we'd have many more defining moments together. It was exactly how it happened for me and Mia, my girlfriend of over ten years. I'd been with her since high school. We'd shared plenty of other defining moments over the years. She's a great girl, my best friend, and I had every intention of marrying her. After everything she and I had gone through over the years, I was convinced there'd be no more defining moments for me with any other women.

Until that unforgettable moment I had with Henrietta Magaña.

The first time I met her had been as insignificant as any of the other times I'd met one of my kid sister's new friends. I'd barely noticed her that first time and for good reason. I had no business or interest eyeballing my sister's friends. Bea was more than ten years younger than I, and though she'd just turned nineteen, I still considered her my baby sister. Her friends were all as young as she was. While I was well aware that at nineteen they were hardly babies, I still couldn't help but think of them at the very least as little girls. Besides, my heart belonged to one girl and one girl only, and I knew that no other girl could change that. Least of all one of my sister's friends.

Then New Year's Eve happened. It started as innocent, trivial small talk. But the small talk turned into one of the most unforgettable conversations I'd ever had. Henrietta was no trivial little girl. Months later, the experience still had me reeling and questioning everything I've ever believed about defining moments and knowing when you'd met the one.

A good friend knows all your best and worst stories.

A best friend has lived them with you.

Henri

Age 15

“Don't leave me . . . please." My lips quivered despite my attempts to be brave and try to be understanding as I'd promised I would be.

Celia reached out and hugged me. “I am not leaving you," she whispered against my temple then kissed my forehead. “We've been through this before. It's better if I go. There'll be more room for you now. You may even get your own bed."

“I don't care about my own bed!" I said, straining to fight the sobs, but knew I was losing the battle. “I don't want my own bed! I won't be able to sleep without you in it anyway."

I cried openly now. My sister, Celia, was all I'd ever had ever since our mother had dropped us off at a homeless shelter and never returned. I'd only been six at the time and Celia was nine. But even before then, our drugged-out mom was never around, or if she was, she was out of her mind. Celia was who I turned to for any comfort and, as far as I knew, the only family I'd ever had. Her leaving me now hurt a million times more than our mother ditching us.

“Henri." She cupped my face in her hands. “We've been over this already. I'm eighteen. I can't stay in foster care anymore. I need to get out of this place. But I am not abandoning you. Do you understand that? I'll be back to visit you often. I'll get a phone as soon as I'm able to and call you every day. Be strong, baby sissy. Three years will fly by, and before you know it, you can come live with me, and we'll be together again, okay?"

I nodded, but the enormous knot in my throat didn't allow for any words. She could've opted to stay until she was twenty-one. They would've let her. Instead, she chose to leave—leave me. My heart was completely crushed. When she walked out that door, I'd be all alone. She'd warned me for years she wouldn't make it here a day past her eighteenth birthday in foster care, and I'd had that long to prepare. But nothing could've prepared me for what I felt when she finally left. Collapsing onto my bed, I cried as I'd never cried in my life and for weeks was so inconsolable I made myself sick.

Even months later, each time she came to visit, I'd feel a little better, but then she'd leave again, and it'd be days before I could recover. My foster parents became so concerned about my depression they put me in therapy where I learned my issues ran so much deeper than anyone had ever imagined.

~~~

Age 16

Celia was now living with her boyfriend of just over six months. It'd been a year since she left me behind at our other foster care home. She and her boyfriend lived in a small apartment over the tattoo shop he worked at in the heart of East L.A: a noisy place where his loud and obnoxious friends often came over and hung out and partied all night. They were over so often Celia was getting sick of it, and she said it was no place for me.

I got it. I was sixteen and determined to graduate in two years with honors. A noisy apartment with rowdy guys partying into the night really was no place for me. The foster care system would never allow it anyway, but my foster parents realized how much I missed her, so they did say I could spend a weekend with her every now and again. Even that Celia balked at. She insisted it just wasn't a good idea, even if only for an overnight thing, because of all his rowdy friends being there at all hours.

Celia, on the other hand, had no other options or rather she did but said staying with Kevin was the best one she had. The hope had been that together we'd be able to afford an apartment of our own once I was eighteen. Celia said she didn't get along with some of the other women at the transitional home she'd first been set up in by the state and just couldn't stand it anymore. But I knew she just wanted to be with Kevin. She'd now have to pay rent and bills. Any chance of putting money aside for when it came time for us to move in together was squashed.

Once again, the feelings of abandonment were brutal.

I'd finally worked through some of my most pressing anxieties and self-loathing issues about feeling undeserving and unwanted by anyone. Then her rejection of me and her refusal to have me over even for one night started up. Symbolically, she'd left me all over again. Still, I never told her, but I cried more, then, than when we were abandoned as children. More than when we got the news that our mother had been found dead in a crack house in downtown Los Angeles. Of all the tragedies I'd been through in my short life, Celia's leaving me was the one thing I didn't think I'd ever get over. It was only then that the memories were triggered. Memories I'd worked so hard to block out. Memories of the horrid people I once referred to as my parents. Celia's abandonment was now a reminder that these monsters were who created me. Their blood ran through my sister's veins and mine. We weren't much different from our parents. Obviously, Celia was proving this to be the case.

Then we got the call from my social worker, and I was able to once again block the memories—for the time being anyway. They'd found a long-lost aunt of mine willing to take me in. I'd be moving once again. This time I knew it would be different from all the other times I'd moved. This time my sister wouldn't be with me for the change. Celia assured me I'd be fine.

“This is our aunt." She pressed her lips together in reaction to my exasperated frown. “Okay, so we've never met her, but how bad can she be? And it'll be just you and her in her house, not you and ten other foster kids cramped up in one tiny house. Think of all the quiet time you'll get to study and read!"