Chương 2
The flight attendant walked away.
Ethan took a sip of water.
Then Mia’s blanket slipped.
A small hospital tag fell from inside the fabric and landed near his shoe.
He quickly reached for it.
The woman behind him saw it.
Her face changed.
Not dramatically.
Just enough.
“You got that from St. Anne’s?”
Ethan stopped.
The tag was old and faded.
“Yes.”
The woman stared at it.
“Why?”
“What do you mean?”
She looked away too quickly.
“Nothing.”
Ethan felt something shift.
It was small.
Almost nothing.
But he had spent two weeks noticing every tiny change in Mia’s breathing, every new expression, every different sound.
He knew when something was wrong.
“Why did you ask?”
The woman did not answer immediately.
The baby slept between them.
The plane hummed above the clouds.
Finally, she spoke.
“Because I recognize the bracelet.”
Ethan looked at the tag in his hand.
“You worked there?”
“No.”
“Then how?”
The woman’s eyes moved to Mia.
“I think you need to talk to me after we land.”
Ethan felt his stomach tighten.
“About my daughter?”
The woman did not respond.
That silence was an answer.
He held Mia closer.
Not because he was afraid of the woman.
Because he was suddenly afraid of how much he did not know.
The woman kept the phone in her hand for several seconds after the message appeared, as if moving would make the words more real.
Ethan watched her face instead of the screen.
He had spent two weeks learning every expression Mia made, but he had not expected to become an expert at reading strangers.
Lena looked less like someone holding a secret and more like someone who had just been reminded that the secret could hurt people.
“Who sent that?”
Her thumb moved over the screen and then stopped.
“I don’t know.”
Ethan let out a quiet breath that sounded closer to disbelief than anger.
“You just got a message telling you not to talk to me, and you don’t know who sent it?”
“No.”
“Then why do you believe it matters?”
Lena looked at him.
“Because three days ago, someone sent me a copy of a file that was supposed to disappear.”
The answer was not what he expected.
He glanced down at Mia, who slept with one hand curled against his shirt.
“What file?”
Lena lowered her voice.
“Before I explain that, I need you to understand something.”
Ethan almost interrupted.
He stopped himself.
Something about her expression made him wait.
“I am not trying to take your daughter away from you.”
The sentence hit harder than he expected because it was exactly the fear he had not wanted to say aloud.
“You brought up hospital records.”
“I know.”
“You told me someone questioned whether my daughter is really mine.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Lena looked down.
“You’re right.”
Again, she did not fight him.
That made it harder to stay angry.
“My name is Lena Parker,” she said.
“I know.”
“I was admitted to St. Anne’s twelve days before Mia was born.”
Ethan stayed quiet.
“My daughter Ava was born there on March fourth.”
He frowned.
“Mia was born on March eighteenth.”
Lena nodded.
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because the file I received had both dates.”
The words made him straighten.
“What file?”
Lena looked around the cabin.
The plane had started its final descent.
People were pulling bags from under seats and checking watches.
A flight attendant reminded someone to raise a tray table.
The world around them was ordinary.
Ethan hated that.
“I was part of a patient support group after Ava died,” Lena said.
“It was run through the hospital’s family services department.”
Ethan listened carefully.
Not because he trusted her.
Because he needed to know where the cracks were.
“Months after Ava died, I started requesting copies of my records.”
“Why?”
“Because the hospital gave me different explanations at different times.”
Her fingers tightened around the phone.
“One doctor told me Ava’s condition changed quickly.”
“He said there was nothing anyone could do.”
“Then another person told me the paperwork had been corrected after the fact.”
Ethan looked at her.
“Corrected?”
“Changed.”
The plane dropped slightly.
A few people gasped.
Lena grabbed the armrest.
For a moment, the fear on her face was not about the message.
It was about the plane.
About being trapped somewhere she could not control.
Ethan noticed.
He reached over and steadied the edge of the seat tray beside her.
The gesture surprised both of them.
“Sorry,” she whispered.
“You don’t have to apologize for turbulence.”
“I wasn’t talking about the plane.”
Ethan looked away.
Lena continued.
“I filed a request through the hospital’s records office last month.”
“Why would they send you something about my daughter?”
“They didn’t.”
That answer made him look back.
“What?”
“I never got Mia’s file.”
“Then what did you get?”
“A billing summary.”
Ethan waited.
“It was attached by mistake.”
A cold feeling moved through him.
“Attached to what?”
“My daughter’s old records.”
Lena swallowed.
“It had another patient identifier on one page.”
“Mine?”
“No.”
She looked at Mia.
“Your daughter’s.”
Ethan’s first instinct was to reject it.
Not because it sounded impossible.
Because believing it would change everything.
“An identifier mistake doesn’t mean anything.”
“I thought the same thing.”
“So what did you do?”
“I called the records office.”
“And?”
“They apologized.”
“That’s it?”
“They said the attachment had been removed.”
Ethan stared at her.
“That doesn’t explain why you’re talking to me.”
“No.”
Her voice became quieter.
“It didn’t.”
She opened her bag and removed a folded piece of paper.
The edges were worn from being handled too many times.
She did not hand it to him.
She kept it between her fingers.
“What is that?”
“A note from the records office.”
“Why do you have it?”
“Because I printed it before they removed access.”
Ethan looked at the paper.
“Can I see it?”
May you like
Lena hesitated.
Then she passed it across the gap.
