Later that night, once the whole house got quiet, I sat waiting at the kitchen table with the medical report sitting next to a cold mug of coffee. My heart was pounding so hard I could literally feel it in my jaw.
“Tom? Why are you still awake?” Helen pulled her sweater a little tighter around herself.
I slid the paper across the table toward her. “Whose kids are they, Helen?”
She turned ghost white. She didn’t even try to fight it or lie. Instead, she walked out to the hallway, turned the dial on our wall safe, and pulled out this old, faded envelope that my mother had always insisted we keep locked up.
She placed it on the table and slumped into the chair right across from me.
“It was never my idea,” she whispered. “You have to read that.”
I stared at the envelope, seeing my name written on the front in my mom’s handwriting. Tucked inside was a bill from a fertility clinic, a donor ID number, and a handwritten letter.
“Helen, If Tom ever finds out the truth, tell him I did this for him. He was meant to be a father. You are not to breathe a word of this to anyone. Protect him. Protect our family name. — Barbara”
I gripped the letter so hard my knuckles turned white. “How long have you known about this?”
After we spent a year trying for a baby, your mom stepped in. At first, she acted like she was just worried about us. She said we needed to get checked to make sure I wasn’t the problem. She booked the appointment and drove me there herself.
