A Chance in the World

Steve shares a recurring memory, where he is in the backseat of a car that is moving, and another child sits next to him. He cannot identify the people in the front seat. The car arrives at a hospital, where a woman in white leads the other child down a hallway. The child looks back at Steve, who does not want the other child to leave with the woman. They return to the car and he is taken to another building, where he lies in a warm, comfortable bed. He says that later he will understand “[t]hese memories were from the day I was taken from my mother” (4). It was the last time he ever saw her. 

Steve describes studying his features in a mirror, from his childhood into his teenage years. He is most interested in his afro, nose, forehead, blue eyes, and skin tone. He is “very fair—not white, but close” (5). He has scars on his rib cage, on one of his fingers, and on one foot. He does not know where they came from. He studies himself in the mirror because he is trying to answer certain questions. He wants to know who his parents were, and how he got the last name, Klakowicz.