I have a friend, Marina, or maybe I was. I’ve known her for ten years. My friend was brought up by my grandfather, because Marina’s mother drank, and my friend doesn’t recognize her, says that she is a stranger to her.
I am five years older than my friend. I have a grown-up 20-year-old daughter, I myself am divorced. Marina is not from our city, we met 10 years ago at work, at that time I was in the middle of a divorce. At first Marina rented a room, then I invited her to live with me so she wouldn’t have to pay rent.
After a few years she started going on shift work and on one of those visits she came back pregnant. Her friend started asking me for money for an abortion (she had me for both her mother and her friend). I did not give it, I talked her out of it, I told her that she would soon be 40 years old, she had to have a baby for herself. I offered to live with me and my help.
Marina had a baby, rented a room, moved out. Now I understand, maybe I should have given her money. Marina has no maternal feelings, the child she never takes in her arms, does not rock, sings songs, shouts as an adult. She called me a week ago and said: “I hate him, I don’t want to raise him, I’m tired, I’m going to give him up to an orphanage.
I couldn’t talk her into it, but she wouldn’t let me. She keeps saying, “I don’t love him, I don’t need him. I shared this problem with my relatives, as it happened, it was hard to keep this burden inside me. One of my relatives suggested that maybe we should take the child to live with us.
I told her about it, and Marina started yelling at me, that I had told my relatives everything. But I meant well! Especially since I can really see that she doesn’t need the baby.
