Chương 5
Silence settled over the room.
Grace closed her eyes.
Dr. Shah glanced at her, then back at me.
“All right.”
It was the calmest possible response to an insane sentence.
“If you’re willing, we can begin with HLA typing.”
“I’m willing.”
Grace finally looked at me.
I held her gaze.
“I’ll do anything.”
Her expression did not soften.
“That’s easy to say on the first day.”
I almost snapped back.
Then Noah made Rex climb onto my shoe.
I looked down.
He made a growling sound.
Grace watched him.
“What happens if I’m a match?”
I asked.
Dr. Shah explained the process.
More testing.
More evaluation.
No guarantees.
No promises.
Even a perfect donor match would not erase the danger.
I listened until the room stopped spinning enough for one fact to remain clear.
For the first time in three years, Grace needed something from me.
Not money.
Not an apology.
Not an explanation.
Something inside my body.
When we left the consultation room, my phone showed eleven missed calls.
Seven from Amelia.
Three from my sister.
One from my mother.
I stared at that last name.
Grace saw it.
Her face changed.
“Don’t.”
I looked at her.
“Don’t what?”
“Call her before you know what you’re doing.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means your mother already made one decision about my children.”
She gathered Noah’s coat.
“I won’t let her make another.”
I kept my thumb over my mother’s name until the screen went dark.
Grace lifted Noah’s hood and crouched to zip his coat.
He watched me over her shoulder with the quiet concentration of someone trying to decide whether I belonged in the room.
Sophie and Lily came running from the play area carrying paper crowns covered in stickers.
“Mine has six stars,” Sophie announced.
“Mine has seven,” Lily said.
“You counted the heart.”
“Hearts count.”
“No, they don’t.”
Grace stood.
“They both count.”
Sophie frowned at this injustice.
Lily smiled triumphantly.
Noah pointed at my sleeve.
“He has the bad dinosaur.”
Both girls turned toward the sticker as if I had been accused of a crime.
Lily came close enough to inspect it.
“That’s a stegosaurus.”
“No,” Noah said.
“Yes.”
“No.”
“It has plates.”
“It’s still bad.”
Lily shrugged.
“Then don’t marry it.”
Grace made a sound that might have been a laugh and might have been a cough.
I felt the ring box in my pocket again.
The timing was so grotesque that I almost expected someone to call attention to it.
Nobody did.
The children were hungry.
That became the next crisis.
The hospital cafeteria was two floors down, and Grace said they needed to eat before Noah got too tired.
I followed them without asking permission.
She noticed.
“You don’t have to.”
“Yes, I do.”
“No, you really don’t.”
“I’m not leaving.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
I looked at her.
“What is?”
“Knowing why you’re staying.”
The elevator arrived before I could answer.
Inside, Sophie stood beside me and examined my wet coat.
“You smell like outside.”
“Thank you.”
“That wasn’t nice.”
“I know.”
“You’re supposed to say sorry.”
“Sorry.”
She considered this.
“Okay.”
Grace looked away, but I saw her mouth twitch.
The cafeteria was half full.
Parents sat over untouched coffee.
Two nurses ate salads beside a window.
A teenage boy in a knit cap pushed french fries around a paper tray while his father read something on a tablet.
The place made illness look ordinary.
That frightened me more than the oncology floor.
Grace bought grilled cheese for the girls, soup for herself, and a small container of macaroni for Noah.
When she reached for her wallet, I took out my card.
She blocked the terminal with her hand.
“No.”
“It’s lunch.”
“I can buy lunch.”
“I know you can.”
“Then don’t.”
The cashier looked at us with exhausted indifference.
I lowered my card.
Grace paid.
It was such a small refusal that it hurt.
At the table, Noah ate four noodles and stopped.
Grace didn’t push him.
She simply turned the container around and said, “One more.”
“No.”
“Half.”
“No.”
“One bite and you can have the blue juice.”
He narrowed his eyes.
“That’s blackmail.”
I looked at Grace.
She stared at Noah.
“Who taught you that word?”
“Uncle Marcus.”
Grace muttered something under her breath.
“Who’s Marcus?”
I asked.
Grace took a sip of soup.
“My brother.”
I searched my memory.
“I thought he was in Arizona.”
“He moved back.”
“When?”
“Two years ago.”
The fact landed strangely.
There were entire structures around these children that had formed without me.
Relatives.
Doctors.
Teachers, maybe.
Favorite foods.
Bedtimes.
Inside jokes.
I had not even known the names of my own daughters until an hour earlier.
If they were mine.
The qualification felt weaker every time I made it.
Noah had my eyes.
Sophie had my sister’s dimple when she smiled.
Lily tapped her spoon against the table in the exact rhythm my father used when he was impatient.
Genes could not prove history, but they were making a persuasive argument.
Grace tore a napkin into smaller squares.
“How soon can they test you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Dr. Shah said they can draw today.”
“Then I’ll do it today.”
She nodded.
No gratitude.
No relief.
Just a practical acknowledgment.
I deserved that too.
My phone buzzed again.
Amelia.
This time, Grace saw the name.
She looked down at her soup.
“You should answer her.”
“When?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not fair.”
The irony nearly made me angry.
I kept my voice low.
“You’re worried about fair?”
Grace put down her spoon.
Sophie and Lily were arguing over whose grilled cheese had more crust.
Noah was lining his noodles along the edge of his container.
Grace looked at me without blinking.
“No.”
She spoke quietly.
“I’m worried about causing another woman pain because you avoid difficult conversations until they become disasters.”
That landed where she meant it to.
I pushed my chair back.
May you like
“Excuse me.”
I walked out of the cafeteria before I said something stupid.
