My stomach drops. What the fuck? "What?! I..I don't get it, I don't understand. She's now sober?" Walter nods but he isn't smiling or looking excited. "So, I'm living with her again?"
"Nothing has been set in stone, it hasn't be finalised that we could even allow for you to be in her supervision yet so there'll have to be a urine test and house test.. you get the idea. But say if she was to pass that, then with daily visits from me and other workers you'd stay with her for a month or so? And we'd review your stay and see if you could potentially stay there until you turn eighteen, so that'd be what? Ten months-ish?"
..
I don't have many memories of my mum. I remember her laughing. A lot. I was told at seven why I was in the system : My mother had let a lifestyle of alcohol prevent her for taking adequate care of me and my brother. We were taken away at three years old and due to some fuck up, Jayden and I couldn't be fostered together. I asked Walter why, it was one of the first things I asked him but since he wasn't my social worker when I was three he never got any insider information and the folder has not got any statements as to why.
I know three things about my brother and two of those are practically useless:
-He's my twin, we share a birthday
-He lives with a foster family somewhere in the south
-His name is Jayden
The system ensures that families which are separated whilst in the foster system cannot find each other. Surnames are changed to fit with the family they are living with, and sometimes the middle names can be changed or kept depending on what is the safest for the child.
Jayden and I's real, first surname is-was Houghton. When you turn sixteen, the system allows you to go through certain sections of your folder, your social worker has to be with you to ensure you don't go through any addresses, as many attempt to try and find their mum or dad's home.
Last year, Walter went through the allowed sections of my folder.
My mother, Maria Williams, was born in 1973, in Poland, she later moved to London and met my father. There are no records of him either than his name was Mark Houghton, and him and Maria got married within the first four months of her living there. Maria gave birth eleven months later. Maria and Mark never got divorced, or at least they couldn't find any records saying so. There wasn't any mention of any other family, Maria supposedly wasn't in contact with her parents who still lived in Poland, and Mark had disappeared. Walter told me it was one of the most perplexing cases they had studied in a while. It was assumed that Mark had ran when Maria told him he was pregnant.
When the social services came, 14 years ago, Maria was passed out on the couch with a opened wine bottle in her hand and a cigarette in the other. Jayden was sleeping on the floor with a overfilled diaper and a towel as a blanket, I was crying and hungry, stuck in a highchair. Maria was charged with child neglect, and when it found out she was a alcoholic the court case didn't go easily.
Maria has been sober for eighteen months, and Walter told me that she passed the home test; being able to provide evidence for a stable home life that is drug and alcohol free. It's quite ironic how many of the actual foster homes didn't even provide that - Walter scolded me when I told him this. I think he thought I was joking.