The Beginning Of The End | Cosmic Love Series

thirty - mission accomplished

The only way I could get any sort of information about my biological parents was if I could get my hands on my adoption file. Needless to say, that would have to be done behind the adoption agency's backs.

How was I going to do that?

That's where Ben comes in.

We had come up with a rough plan when I'd brought the idea to him, one that would be quick and easy and wouldn't raise too many questions.

However, when we were just about to get inside the building, we managed to smooth some edges and come up with a final plan of action that would work perfectly.

I knew that the woman responsible for my adoption process was Mrs. Alicia Gregory, who Ben had booked an appointment with. At first, we didn't think she'd agree to meet with two teenagers, but the subject of a group project about adoption for our social studies class seemed to do the trick, and we were booked in for two o'clock.

"You know what to do, right?" I asked Ben in a low tone while we sat in the waiting room, looking up at the clock on the wall and watching the pointers tick by.

"Yeah." He dragged his voice. "And you know your part, right?"

"Yes." I took a deep breath. "I'll be quick, I promise."

"Ben Jones?" The woman opened the door and called his name. She was in her mid-forties, looked nice and looked like the kind of person that wouldn't mind for us to do what we were about to do, as long as it was for a good reason (which it was!), and even if it was behind her back.

Ben jolted up out of his seat with a smile and I followed him inside her office. My eyes immediately looked to the wall on the right, where there was a massive board, filled with pictures of babies, some with their (adoptive, I would assume) parents, some by themselves.

"Thank you so much for meeting us today."

"You're more than welcome." She gestured for us to take a seat across from her, and we did. "I was quite surprised when you said you were doing a school project about adoption, but I couldn't be happier that you're raising awareness within the younger generation about this very important matter."

"It's our pleasure." Ben tossed one leg on top of the other while he laid back against the back of the chair.

"Plus we're getting extra credit for thinking outside the box with this subject!" I added before letting out a small chuckle.

Ben and I exchanged a glance, before looking at the woman with wide smiles plastered on our faces.

"So... how can I help you?"

"We've got some questions about the world of adoption. Could you guide us through the process?"

With that and a few more random questions, we showed Alicia that we were interested in how adoptions work, enough so that she would say yes to giving us a tour around the agency.

Halfway through the hallway, my part of the plan was about to start. "Yikes, sorry..." I held my phone up. "I need to take this, it's my doctor. It's kind of a private conversation, could I take the call in your office?"

When Alicia hesitated for a second, I thought that I had just wrecked our plan.

"It'll be quick, less than five minutes!" I added, trying not to sound too desperate, but knowing from the look on Ben's face that that's exactly what I probably sounded like.

But when Alicia smiled, I let out a shaky breath of relief. "We'll wait for you so you don't miss the tour."

Alicia and Ben sat on some empty chairs resting on the left side of the hallway, and I quickly thanked her before going inside her office, closing the door behind me and making a beeline for the archive drawers she had on the opposite wall of the one with baby pictures and happy families.