Chapter 5
“Wow, it’s great to hear about the success you’re having with your endeavors here in Fort Wayne, Darren,” Charles said. The insurance agent patted his new-made friend on the back. “I mean, really, that’s amazing.”
Darren smiled and confidently held his drink up in the air, gesturing for a toast with Charles and Anthony. The insurance agent and accountant clacked the rims of their glasses against Darren’s then held them up to their lips and sipped. The renovations Darren had been showing his brother John during his visit were completed and far ahead of schedule. His efforts to get units filled were going so well there was no doubt in his mind the four-building complex would be filled within the next couple of months. To celebrate, he invited the first couple of friends he made in Fort Wayne out for drinks.
Darren, Charles, and Anthony chatted for the next hour or so as they drunk their beers. Darren talked about some of the landscaping he wanted to do with the complex, as well as some of the other investment properties he and his family purchased around the city. Charles griped about his wife, almost in such a way that his two comrades could tell he was in no rush to get home to her. Anthony talked about a new firm coming to Ft. Wayne and how his ultimate goal was to network so he could get them to get a CPA contract with them. Darren nodded, listening to it all and feeling more “at home” than he did before. Finally, he’d gotten around to building a social life of sorts.
Around 8 o’clock, Darren paid the bill then the three men stood up and headed for the door. Outside, they chatted as they walked down the snowy sidewalk. The wind picked up, putting a little pep in their step. At the corner, Charles and Anthony thanked Darren for the celebratory invitation then each went their separate ways, disappearing into the cluster of buildings and the darkening night. Darren quickly paced back to his car, which was parked a couple of blocks over. Still in good spirits, he hopped behind the wheel and rubbed his hands together in anticipation for tonight. For nearly a year, he’d be so focused on building his new life that he cut back on having fun like he used to back in Chicago. Tonight, however, he was going to break his good boy stride.
***
For the last few weeks, Darren struck up conversation at bars with different guys to see where was a good place to go and see the ladies. The names of a handful of clubs came his way, but one name came up repeatedly, enticing him to find out where it was and give it a try: The Crown. Located in a somewhat industrial area, on the southwest side of the city, the strip club was somewhat secluded. Darren finally pulled into the parking lot after driving down a road that was mostly bordered by warehouses then passing through some trees and urban blight. The parking lot swelled with cars; music seeped out of the entrance. Darren relaxed in his car for a few minutes more and finally went on inside at 11 o’clock.
Darren contained his excitement at the entrance. The bouncer – a big, brawny guy who looked like he could knock a guy out with one punch – patted him down then allowed him to proceed. Darren was a bit impressed. The Crown wasn’t anything close to the sort of sophistication he would normally see in Chicago; the place certainly wasn’t a dump, though. The carpet was clean, the bar was stained glass with more than enough drinks to choose from, and the women were clearly in their prime and eager for a man’s attention. Darren licked his lips shortly after getting himself some gin. A hot blonde walked by. She purposely made eye contact with him and pulling his attention with her as she moved seductively toward the other side of the room.
Darren stood up at the bar, enjoying his drink and shaking off the first dancer he saw. He decided he would chill out a bit and see how the place’s vibes felt. Every so often, he couldn’t help but to snicker at some of the guys. Judging by their mannerisms and how hungry they were for the dancers’ attention, they weren’t used to having such sexually appealing women at their fingertips. Nonetheless, Darren played it cool. Sure, a few dancers looked at him. He was obviously better groomed and probably less “worked” than some of the 9-to-5 guys walking around, but he acted as if he didn’t notice them. This was a tactic he used frequently during his college years. Ignore the most attractive women then they will be begging for your attention.
An hour passed and a girl they called Hot Rocks, whose name was supposedly Roxy, finished up dancing on the pole at the front of the club. A sea of men, most with drinks in their hands, watched her climb off the stage make her way through the crowd. There had already been a few other dancers who danced since Darren got there, but there was something about her he found particularly attractive. He had always considered himself a leg man, and Roxy certainly had legs he’d love to hold up while on the bed and have his way. Her long black hair was a little thicker than he was used to; her makeup was done well and not caked on like some of the other dancers.
As the next dancer walked out onto the stage in red pumps, the sea of men turned back toward the stage. Darren moseyed around the club, ordering drink after drink and enjoying the scantly dressed waitresses serving the tables in the far corner. Out of nowhere, Roxy came walking between two big guys who were standing about twenty feet away from Darren. He sipped his drink, trying to pretend as if he didn’t see her. His efforts were useless, however. At first, he’d only seen her from afar – from out in the crowd with the other man. Now, though, she was so close that he really got a good look at her. She was hot, she was feisty, and she had eyes for Darren in a way she didn’t have for other men in the club. Darren decided to go ahead and play along with this particular dancer. After all, this was his night to celebrate.
“Hey,” Roxy said, looking Darren up and down.
Darren smiled then nodded. “Hey there,” he said. He got a good look at Roxy’s behind and knew he wanted a dance from this woman. Not wanting to waste any time, he pushed his hand into his pocket and pulled out money – $1,000. He looked into Roxy’s eyes and, without saying anything, she grabbed his hand. Darren chuckled, looking at nearby guys whose eyes clearly congratulated him on practically being picked out of the crowd by the club’s hottest dancer.
Going with the flow, Darren found himself being pulled over to a booth just on the other side of the bar. “Sit right here,” Roxy said. She pressed Darren’s chest until he sat back with his legs open and spread apart. Roxy liked how he looked on anxiously; she flung her hair back and forth across her upper back a she bent over with her behind in his face.
“Shit,” Darren said. His eyes were glued to Roxy’s wide hips. She then moved her hips, making her ass jiggle The dancer then leaned back, slapped her ass hard, and sat on Darren’s lap. “Uh oh,” Darren said, sounding like a college frat boy. He smiled ear to ear.
Guys standing close by turned away from the stage and focused on the action going on in the booth. They hooped and hollered, egging Roxy on as she gave Darren a lap dance. Darren made sure to do his part. He pulled money out of his pocket and gently placed a hundred-dollar bill underneath her garter. With his eyes bulging like a kid coming downstairs on Christmas to find the living room so filled with presents he could barely make it across the room, he slapped Roxy’s ass. Before he could lean back again and enjoy the view, Roxy had suddenly lifted her hips up. Her ass slammed again Darren’s face. Onlookers roared with excitement.
Darren continued stuffing money into various parts of Roxy’s outfit, slapping her ass and telling her how sexy she was as he gulped down his drink. Ten minutes or so into the private dance, a small cluster of guys standing over to the right suddenly moved out of the way. Darren had just finished his drink, running his hand through his sweaty hair, when a guy who looked to be 6’5 and every bit of 300 pounds shoved through onlookers. Tattoos crawled up his arms; his face was that of a man who clearly had a rough upbringing. Nobody would be surprised if the guy had been to prison and done time.
“Roxy, what the fuck are you doing?” the guy yelled.
Suddenly, Darren snapped out of his intoxicating daze. Roxy quickly stood up and stepped away. Darren picked up on what was going on – on how Roxy jumped away like someone being caught red handed. “Teddy, what are you doin’ here?”
“What am I doin’ here?” Teddy asked.
“Oh shit,” Darren said, rising to his feet. He stood there, not sure what to do. Even if he wanted to head for the door, this big, angry guy stood between him and it. “What the fuck?”
“Roxy, so this is where you been workin’?” Teddy asked, balling his fists. “I’ve been hearing about it and shit, but I didn’t wanna think it’s true. You really been up in here dancing half naked and stuff for other guys?”
The other men standing around who had been watching Darren’s private lap dance turned away like nothing was happening. They looked up at the stage, slowly mingling away from the scene while Roxy stood in front of the Teddy guy. She put her hands on his chest in a pleading kind of way. Darren got a strong vibe this Teddy guy was Roxy’s boyfriend, or maybe even husband. The way she stood in front of him was indicative of a woman who knew her significant other was the jealous type and was trying to stop him from losing his temper.
“Please, not here, Teddy,” Roxy said. “Seriously, this isn’t the place. You know you can’t get locked up again. You just got that job over at Mullen's, making good money...making fifteen dollars an hour. Don’t, Teddy. Please, not here. I was just doin’ this to help out around the house with the bills.”
“Are you fuckin’ serious?” Teddy asked. “Roxy, you really gonna come up with some bullshit to justify me catching you up in here like this? Baby, you probably got half the town talking about this or somethin’...all behind my back. I don’t fuckin’ believe this.”
Darren’s noticed his palms moisten. The relaxing effects of the alcohol – the buzz – suddenly didn’t feel so good. Roxie begged this Teddy guy to calm down and not cause any kind of situation in the club. Her efforts went unnoticed, however. When Teddy finally looked over at the guy (Darren) who Roxy had been giving a lap dance, he looked him up and down then scuffed.
“These are the kinds of guys you up in here giving a lap dance to?” Teddy asked, approaching Darren. “These ole pretty boy types, huh?”
Darren held his hands up, signaling he didn’t want any confrontation. Roxy pulled Teddy’s big, bulky arms, trying to pull him back. Darren backed away a bit, toward the back of the club. Teddy turned as if his goal was to grab the guy. Roxy yelled for security then the two bouncers who had been at the club’s entrance pushed guys aside in the club to hurry up and get to Teddy. Onlookers pulled their phones out and started recording, anticipating a fight would break out or possibly a one-against-two brawl between the Teddy guy and the bouncers.
“Come on, get outta here!” once bouncer said, pulling Teddy by his arm. “C’mon, dude. Let it go.”
Teddy resisted at first, but Roxy continued bringing up how he could lose his job if he went to jail again. Darren stood back, somewhat in the shadows, while Teddy was pulled out of the club. He looked around, his buzz officially ruined, and looked at the situation for what it was. Why am I here? Why am I still doing this?
Darren set his drink down, ignoring the curious eyes of the men standing around. He made his way across the club as everyone got back to enjoying themselves. For ten minutes or so, enough time for the Teddy guy to hopefully get into his car and pull out of the parking lot, Darren stood in an obscure part of the club and watched other men enjoy the dancers by throwing dollars at them as if money grew on trees. Once the anxiety calmed down, Darren made his way for the parking lot. He watched his back as he crossed the parking lot until finally climbing into his MKZ and pulling back out onto the road.
“Time to leave that behind,” Darren said to himself, reflecting on how badly that situation could have turned out. Sure, he’d been in some sketchy bars and clubs in Chicago, especially in his early twenties. If he had been 21 again, he probably would’ve been in that club with some of his friends and they would’ve taken the guy on. Now, though, as turning forty was virtually within eyesight, he looked at things a little more subjectively. And it didn’t help that he was in some new place, far away from home and his family and network of friends. He breathed easy as he rode into downtown, thankful that things didn’t get worse.
As Darren lay in his bed that night, still shaken up more than he would want to admit, he thought about life and how at various points, things signaled that it was time for a change. The apartment complex was up and running. The property management company kept him up-to-date through email about perspective tenants. The other investment properties were cash cows in themselves. His social life was finally starting to flourish, thanks to a little effort on his part. Still, there was a missing void in his life. As the saying goes, it is indeed lonely at the top; however, even with the few friends Darren did keep in touch with from back in Chicago, their having families is what kept a sort of un-discussed divide between them that didn’t exist once upon a time.
***
There was something about waking up to the sound of birds chirping rather than the hum of traffic and sirens that gave Darren the peace of mind he could never have in Chicago, even in many of the suburbs. When he woke up in the morning, he lay in the bed for twenty minutes before finally sliding out. He shrugged off what happened at the strip club last night and chalked it up to being a lesson learned that at this point in his life, he just didn’t need to be in certain kinds of places. As usual, Darren grabbed his robe, slid it on, and approached the window to open the blinds.
There, he stood for a few minutes surveying the narrow tree-lined avenue of refurbished and well-maintained Victorian homes. Just as he’d been turning away so he could head downstairs and get started with his day, he noticed a guy walking a kid down the street to a corner where a small group of other kids stood, backpacks in hand and waiting on the school bus. A chuckle slipped out of his lips, for some reason. He watched as the guy stood with the kids at the corner, scrolling through his phone anxiously.
For whatever reason, Darren’s mind went back to a bachelor’s party he’d gone to in Los Angeles – a friend of the family’s son. He had joked to the groom that he would be “popping out” babies soon. The groom denied it, but within two years, his mother had forwarded to him and his brother pictures of the wife pregnant with the groom’s hand on her stomach. Darren remembered how he shook his head, swearing it wouldn’t be him. Now, though, as life was settling in and he was starting to feel left out, his feelings were changing. The void in his life was becoming harder and harder to ignore.
Darren made his coffee then set out on the terrace. He grinned a bit every time he sat out back, thinking about how expensive all of this would be back in Chicago. Beyond that, he also imagined for a moment that most people around here who had this much of a backyard probably had children running around. His brother John’s recounts of a single man adopting children crept back into his mind. Marriage still seemed too much of a risky endeavor for a man of his means. Darren set his coffee down then stood up. “Lemme look into this.”
A few minutes later, the 32-year-old had gone to get his laptop and was now sitting back out on the terrace. He entered various keywords and phrases into Google to see what kinds of results came up related to single men adopting children. A few websites spoke positively of it, then Darren noticed they were usually adoption agency or foster home kinds of places selling a product or service. Then, there were of course news stories. Darren skimmed over a few, coming across the one his brother John spoke of at the bar.
Forum discussions were interesting, to say the least. There seemed to be this arguing back and forth as to whether or not a single man should be allowed to adopt a child. Of course, other male commentators applauded the idea, further reinforcing Darren’s current train of thought because they emphasized the desire to raise children without the control and upper advantage given to women in society. As to be expected, female commentators weren’t so supportive of the idea. Rather, the female commentators talked about how a man who wants children should find a wife, with much of their wording insinuating that a man isn’t fit to raise children on his own. Darren chuckled at one woman’s response to a male commentator who asked if a woman should be allowed to adopt a child without a husband or male partner. Of course, the woman poster did not see a problem with such a scenario.
Darren perused the internet for a while, soaking in as much information as possible. Now having seen kind of what the world thinks of his desire to adopt a child, he contemplated for a while. His mind analyzed the reality he would face when adopting a child and integrating it into his life. Would I want a boy? A girl? What if there are some twins that need to be adopted?
Darren leaned back in his chair and looked out at the cityscape as he pondered the answers to those questions as well as many others. Thirty minutes passed; the sun had risen up into the sky and the city buzzed a bit more as traffic on a nearby busy streets hummed with a steady flow into downtown. Darren eventually jumped up and went back into the house. He leaned over the kitchen island just as 9 o’clock rolled around.
“Fuck it,” he said. “I can try and the worst that can happen is no.”
Darren felt like he could probably be a little more confident than the average guy. After all, he did come from a family of means and influence – two things that opened doors for him in more ways that many could imagine. He pulled up his lawyer Gilbert Hicks’ number, took a couple of moments to contemplate a couple things, then pressed DIAL and pressed the phone up to the side of his face.
“Morning, this is Gilbert Hicks,” the attorney answered.
The fact that Hicks wasn’t an adoption attorney was at the front of Darren’s mind, but he knew he would at least be a place to start locally. “Good Morning, Mister Hicks. This is Darren McWaters. How are you?”
“Oh, I’m well, Mister McWaters,” Hicks replied. “How are you?”
Darren told the lawyer he was fine then listened as Hicks gave a spill about having just gotten into the office and to his desk. “That’s good to hear. Well, the reason for my calling is I’ve done some thinking and I want to adopt a child.”
“Oh, is that so?” Hicks asked.
Darren picked up on the surprise in the attorney’s voice. The guy obviously wasn’t used to hearing something like that from a man. “Yes. And I’m calling you because even though you don’t practice family law, I figured you would probably know where to start around here, since I’m not from here as you know. I wanted to know… What do you think would be the chances of me, a single man, working with agencies around here to adopt a child?”
“Well, you’re right, Mister McWaters,” Hicks said. “I don’t practice this kind of law, but I do know some lawyers who could help you with something like that. As for your question, I have to be honest with you. Is it illegal for a single man do adopt a child? No, it’s not illegal. As for whether or not you’ll be able to do it, I suppose you would. But I must warn you that you may have an uphill battle ahead of you. Excuse me for saying this, but the major thing you do have working in your favor is the fact that you are a man of means. This will change things a bit for you compared to a guy who just works a nine-to-five.”
Darren’s glanced around the kitchen as he processed what his lawyer was saying to him. He then asked for more information on his uphill battle Hicks spoke of.
“Well...” Hicks said, clearly gathering his thoughts. “As you can probably already imagine, not too many men actively seek out to adopt a child on their own. In fact, I think the numbers would probably be very small. Also, the cold reality is that there is a stigma to a man that wants to adopt a child on his own… you know, that he may be adopting the child for sexual purposes, trafficking, and stuff like that. I know that’s a hard pill to swallow, but there are segments of society who certainly do think that and may even look at you suspiciously because you’re a single man.” Hicks cleared his throat. “Then, there’s the woman thing.”
“The woman thing?” Darren asked. He chuckled, recalling some of the female responses on the forum.
“Yes,” Hicks said then chuckling himself. “The song used to go it’s a man world, but now that’s changing, as I’m sure you know. I would imagine many adoption agencies would obviously prefer a man to have a wife. But the other struggle I imagine you would come up against is not only have to deal with this stigma and suspicion, but also the fact that women virtually control like ninety-nine percent of the adoption process...which means all along the way, you’ll probably be encountering a woman who thinks you shouldn’t be trying to adopt a child as a single man. The rules just aren’t the same as it is for a single woman. A single man trying to adopt is looked at with suspicion, on many levels. A single woman trying to adopt will probably be treated sympathetically and as if she’d not had good luck with finding a husband, so she’s taking this route to start a family for herself.”
Darren started pacing around the kitchen as he processed it all. Just as he’d been about to speak, he heard beeping in his phone signaling a call was coming through. He pulled the phone away from his face and saw it was his mother on the other line. A groan slipped out of his lips and he shook his head.
“Okay, I understand what you’re saying,” Darren said to Hicks. “But I think I really wanna go ahead and take the chance and start the process. Who can you get me in touch with around here, Mister Hicks?”