The Puzzle Child

The gate was always wide open. The writings on it were in capital letters and in white, to be visible to all.

The building was huge since it housed offices, children's rooms, a few classes, and the dining hall.

Dreams Children Home was the name.

The place was always full of children left by parents who were unable to take care of their kids in one way or the other.

It was also the home for orphans. It was always looking out for volunteers to help out in taking care of the kids.

It was always looking out for Non-Governmental Organizations to help finance their activities.

That's where Arnold worked. He loved his work there and never once had it crossed his mind to leave the place.

He thought no other job was fulfilling enough, and despite the fact that the earnings were meagre, he was content in life.

He also had the love and support of Val. All was good for him, as far as he was concerned.

One afternoon, he was in the office, going through the files of a 12-year-old child who needed urgent medical attention.

Carina, the girl, had been taken to the children's home by neighbors who claimed that they hadn't seen the kid's mom for days.

The mother had been living alone, and the neighbors had never known her husband or boyfriend.

A few officers from the children's home had accompanied the neighbors back into Carina's house to try and retrieve important documents like her birth certificate, which they did find.

Using the mother's name (Camila Carter) on the certificate, the officers looked through files in the registration of person offices, but no such person had been registered by the government.

In fact, no such person existed.

As was the policy at the children's home, doctors carried out medical tests on Carina, and she was found to be healthy.

She had always been. At 12, she was a bubbly girl. She had full cheeks and lips, watery brown eyes, and curly black hair.

But she had started complaining of severe headaches, she had a fever all the time, and it would take days before her temperature was normal.

She would wake up in the middle of the night sweating profusely and crying.

She complained of seeing things in her sleep. She had mood swings and had become very temperamental.

"She will need to be admitted for specialized care. I think our nurses can't handle her case," Mercy, another officer at the children's home, told Arnold.

"Let me go through her files. Maybe, there is something that we overlooked that could be the key to her problem," Arnold said.

"I think that would be a waste of time given the fact that I have been going through the files over and over since she started complaining," Mercy said.

"Maybe we did overlook something. Who did her tests?"

"I don't know. Maybe you will find them in the files you're going through," Mercy said.

Arnold had been going through the files when he suddenly heard a cry from outside the office.

He sat still and listened again, and he heard more cries, louder this time. It was a baby crying, and Arnold knew that yet another baby had been brought to their care.

He took a pen and placed it on the page he was reading, then opened the door and went to the main door of the building where a baby had been left in a baby carrier.

He looked left-right to see if the baby's parent was in sight, but the compound was clear.

There was no sight of anyone, and so Arnold bent down and took the kid in his arms, and he kept quiet. He carried it back into the building and closed the door behind him.

He then called in one of the nurses and told her that they had another soul to look after.

"When will this ever stop? When will some parents ever stop abandoning their kids?" the nurse asked, looking at the cute baby before her. He was sucking his fingers.

"Maybe never. You can't tell," Arnold answered.

"Then why do they give birth? Why can't they…?" she started talking but went quiet for lack of a better word.

"If you ask me, leaving the kids in our care is much better than having abortions or anything," Arnold answered after a while.

The nurse was silent for a while as if thinking about what to say. She then nodded and said she would clean the child and feed it.

"Thank you," Arnold said as he walked back to his office.

He got to the door of his office and found it closed. He opened it and got to his seat. His mind was so clouded on the little baby that had been left in their care that he didn't even notice that some pages in the files he was going through were missing.

Someone had gotten into his office, and maybe, just maybe, that baby had been a distraction.