“What?”
She smiled.
“The baby.”
I put my fork down.
“You should leave.”
She laughed.
“Oh, don’t be dramatic.”
“Leave.”
“This is my house.”
We were at her house.
Right.
I stood.
She said:
“I only ask because men can be naïve when they’re excited.”
I left.
I told my husband.
He was furious.
At her.
He called.
I heard enough from the hallway to know it was real anger.
For several weeks, she stayed away.
I thought we had won something.
Then our son was born.
Tiny.
Healthy.
Perfect.
My husband held him with an expression so open it almost hurt to watch.
His mother stood at the hospital window and cried.
For one moment, I believed everything would soften.
Babies make fools of adults.
They also make adults reveal themselves.
My son was three weeks old when his mother raised the paternity question again.
Not directly.
She told my husband one of the baby’s features “didn’t resemble anyone in the family.”
He told her to stop.
She said:
“Then prove me wrong.”
He came home angry.
Not at me.
At her.
But doubt had entered.
That is the cruel thing about accusations.
You do not need someone to believe them completely.
Only enough to begin looking for confirmation.
I noticed him studying the baby.
Then feeling ashamed for studying.
Then becoming defensive because I noticed.
I asked:
“Do you want a test?”
He said no.
I asked again.
He said:
“I shouldn’t need one.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
He looked at me.
I was exhausted.
Still healing.
Nursing every two hours.
My body did not feel like mine.
And now the man I loved was standing in our kitchen trying not to ask whether our son belonged to him.
I said:
“Do the test.”
He said:
“I trust you.”
“Then do it anyway.”
He stared.
“Why?”
“Because I will not spend the next eighteen years watching your mother put this question into every room.”
That was the first paternity test.
We went together.
Accredited laboratory.
Chain of custody.
His sample.
Mine.
The baby’s.
The report would be mailed because that was the option his family attorney recommended.
I wanted electronic delivery.
His mother insisted mailed certified copies were “more official.”
I remember that.
Of course I do.
We were temporarily staying at the family estate because a pipe burst in our house and repairs took three weeks.
The report arrived there.
Or what we believed was the report.
My husband opened it.
He did not speak.
I was holding our son.
“What?”
He stared at the page.
Then at the baby.
His face looked dead.
“What?”