They Took Brent Because We Were Gay
By: James Finn
Tags: Family, Equality, LGBTQ, Parenting, Politics

This is what her appointment means —

I woke up to rats chewing on my intestines. Making breakfast for Brent in that condition wasn’t easy. French toast and bacon smells terrible when you’re agonizing over losing somebody you love. He ate a few bites, soft eyes more fixed on me than on his food.

“Not hungry, buddy?”

He sighed and pushed his plate away. “Let’s not do this, OK? Let’s get in the car and drive to the cabin in Maine and never come back. Huh? Can we?”

“Hey, it’s gonna be all right. We’ll just ask Gloria to extend our temporary custody. You’re 14 years old. What you want has to count for something.”

“Oh, yeah? Then how come we have to go to the office instead of her coming here? When kids go there, they don’t come back. I know. I seen it too many times.”

Those rats started chewing even harder. “Can you put on your new white shirt and tie for me, man? Let’s show her what a good looking kid you are. Let’s knock her socks off, OK?”

“Let’s just drive to Maine and stay with Steve and Don. Please?”

All I could do was shake my head and pretend to be optimistic.

He pushed back from the table and headed for his room. “I better bring comfortable clothes with me. Just in case.”

My heart hurt to know how practical the boy had become, even as young as he was. He was facing up to reality better than I was managing.

We didn’t take the car. We hopped on the subway and rattled off toward the child welfare offices where Brent’s caseworker was expecting us as her first appointment of the morning.

I thought back to the night a few months before when it had all started. A blizzard was raging outside as my partner and I were slipping into bed to kindle a little anti-winter fire. His arms wrapped around me, and he’d just begun to nuzzle the nape of my neck with the tip of his nose when the phone startled us out from under the blankets.

“Hello?” I mumbled into the mouthpiece.

The caribbean cadences of Gloria’s grandmotherly voice greeted me for the first time. An emergency, she explained. Brent, a boy whose family we knew, was in danger at home. He’d burned through several foster families already. She needed temporary shelter for him. Could we take him? The parents already agreed. Just for a few nights until she found some option other than juvenile detention?

A few nights turned into a few weeks, then a few months.

Brent shocked Gloria by settling down and thriving with us. He quit skipping school. He stopped beating up and bullying younger kids. He ran home every day full of stories and smiles. I started teaching him how to cook. My partner taught him how to throw down rad dance moves and even “radder” tricks on a skateboard. He brought a stray kitten home. We adopted her too.

Only we hadn’t really adopted Brent.

Gloria made us an appointment at the private agency that started handling his case after he came to live with us. “They need to sign off,” she explained. “He’s on their caseload now, so they need to approve a permanent fostering arrangement or maybe an adoption. I can’t just keep telling them the boy’s staying with family friends.”

My partner and I had walked into their office wondering if they’d make us choose between fostering and adoption. That’s not what happened.

“Can I ask about your living arrangements?” the director wanted to know. She squinted at us over the top of reading glasses after taking forever to leaf through the case file.

I didn’t know what she meant. “Um, we have a three bedroom on the Plateau. the whole second floor. Brent has his own room with a balcony. We rent, but you can see in the file that we’re financially solvent.”

“I see. Can I ask you what you mean exactly by “we?”

“Um, David and me. Us. We’re a couple. We’ve been together for years. Isn’t that in there?”

“By couple, can I take it you mean a gay couple?”

“Of course. Gloria and Brent and the family and all — well, everybody knows that.”

She started scribbling rapidly. “I see.”

She stood up a moment later. “Thank you for coming in. We’ll be in touch.”

“What? That’s it? Don’t you have any questions? Gloria said you’d need to arrange more home visits and so forth.”

“We’ll send you our decision in the mail, sir.”

It came three days letter. Brent brought it up with the power bill and a pizza circular.

One page. One paragraph. After opening pleasantries, this is what it said.

We regret to inform you that United Catholic Children’s Services does not certify foster or adoptive parents if they are involved in same-sex partnerships. While we appreciate and commend your desire to contribute to the community, we are unable to approve placement of the minor child in your home.

Gloria called me three days later and asked me to bring Brent to her office. She’d never done that before. She didn’t want to tell me why.

Thus, the rats in my gut.

Brent was very small for 14, but he took great care to maintain his teenage dignity. So, I was pretty shocked when he grabbed my hand after we got off the train. He clenched it tight all the way across the square and up to the revolving doors of the huge government building.

He took a deep breath before we stepped inside. “It’s not too late for Maine.” His voice cracked at the end.

My heart broke for him. If only he could understand how badly I wanted to run away too. It sucked being an adult — knowing we had no good answers and no good options.

Gloria hugged both of us tight. Her accent and a lavender head scarf set off a dress that reminded me of a month I’d once spent in Jamaica. “Come into my office, will you, please?”

We followed her.

“No, Brent. Can you wait for us out here?”

She broke the bad news fast. Without agency certification, she’s out of options. She can’t let Brent continue to live with us.

“But! They turned us down because we’re gay! They can’t do that! I don’t follow all the news or anything, but I know this state allows gay people to foster and adopt.”

“They also allow contracting agencies to opt out for religious reasons.”

“Fine. Whatever. We’ll use a different agency.”

“I tried that. My supervisor says, ‘No agency shopping.’ Brent is with United Catholic. Luck of the draw. With United Catholic he stays. Between you and me? She agrees with them. She’s not going to make an exception.”

“Oh, my God. This can’t be happening. So, what do we do now?”

She didn’t say anything for a long minute, just turned her big brown eyes on me mournfully.

“Gloria, please.”

“What you do now is say goodbye. I’m sorry. It’s easier when it’s fast. I have a group-home placement for him. The driver’s already waiting.”

Brent wouldn’t even look at me when I stepped back into the lobby. I tried to hug him when they took him away, but he jerked out of my grasp and marched off with his head down, eyes glued to the industrial tiling on the floor.