Chương 12
“For everybody.”
Lauren put the mug away.
“What about the test?”
Nathan had arranged, through independent counsel, for a kinship DNA test involving himself and Mia if Lauren consented. Eleanor could also participate, which would strengthen the analysis, but Nathan had not asked her yet.
Lauren folded the dish towel.
“I told Mia it’s her choice too.”
“She’s eight.”
“She’s still the person everybody’s testing.”
Nathan nodded.
“What did she say?”
“She asked if it hurts.”
“It’s a cheek swab.”
“She said okay.”
Three days later, they did it.
No dramatic laboratory.
No family gathered behind glass.
A technician came to a neutral attorney’s office and opened sealed kits.
Mia made a face when the swab touched the inside of her cheek.
“That’s gross.”
The technician smiled.
“Almost done.”
Nathan went next.
Mia watched.
“You look gross too.”
“Thank you.”
Lauren laughed.
It was the first time Nathan had heard her laugh without tension.
Eleanor declined to attend.
Then, fifteen minutes before the appointment ended, she arrived.
She wore sunglasses despite the cloudy day.
Nathan stared at her.
“What are you doing here?”
“The same thing you are.”
Eleanor removed her glasses.
“I’m being tested.”
Lauren went still.
Mia looked at Eleanor.
Nobody knew what to say.
Finally Mia asked, “Does yours hurt?”
Eleanor looked at her.
“No.”
Mia nodded.
“Good.”
That was their first conversation after the gala.
It lasted three seconds.
It was enough.
The results did not arrive overnight.
Real life was rude that way.
Nathan had expected the waiting to consume him.
Instead ordinary things kept happening.
The Meridian transaction had to be renegotiated because of the delay.
A board member accused Nathan of allowing a private matter to interfere with shareholder obligations.
Nathan told him he was right.
The admission deprived the man of half his prepared outrage.
The company’s outside counsel reviewed Daniel’s old ownership arrangements and concluded there could be estate questions if paternity were eventually established, but nothing required an emergency public filing that afternoon.
That sentence cost approximately twelve thousand dollars in legal fees.
Peter complained about it for twenty minutes.
Lauren’s manager cut her hours after reporters began appearing outside the restaurant.
The manager insisted it was about scheduling.
Lauren did not believe him.
Nathan offered to intervene.
She told him no.
Two days later she called back and said, “Actually, I need a lawyer who knows employment stuff.”
Nathan gave her Rebecca’s list of independent attorneys.
He did not call any of them himself.
It was harder than he expected.
Helping without controlling required patience Nathan had not developed.
He began to understand how his mother had confused the two.
A week after the gala, Mia called him from Lauren’s phone.
“Do you know how to make a volcano?”
Nathan was in a meeting with six bankers.
He looked around the conference table.
“Like a real one?”
“For school.”
“Then probably.”
He did not.
He left the meeting at six and bought baking soda, food coloring, vinegar, clay, poster board, and three things the internet suggested that turned out to be unnecessary.
At Lauren’s apartment, Mia looked into the shopping bag.
“You bought too much.”
“I’m learning that.”
“You don’t need clay.”
“The website said—”
“My teacher said paper.”
Lauren, sitting on the sofa with a laptop, said, “Welcome to second grade.”
Nathan spent forty minutes constructing a volcano that leaned noticeably to the left.
Mia stared at it.
“It looks sick.”
“It has character.”
“It looks like it needs a doctor.”
Lauren laughed into her laptop.
Nathan pointed at her.
“You were not invited into this.”
“I live here.”
The volcano erupted beautifully.
It also sprayed red foam across the kitchen wall.
Nobody had expected that.
Lauren stood with her mouth open.
Mia screamed with laughter.
Nathan reached for paper towels.
Lauren began laughing so hard she had to sit down.
Nathan looked at the red streaks on the wall.
“I can pay for this.”
Lauren threw a paper towel at him.
“Shut up.”
He did.
That night, as Nathan left, Mia called from the doorway.
“Bye, Nathan.”
Not Uncle Nathan.
He had learned not to hope too loudly.
“Bye.”
The DNA results came eleven days after the gala.
Rebecca insisted they meet with the testing specialist rather than interpret the report themselves.
Nathan, Lauren, and Eleanor sat around a conference table.
Mia was at school.
The specialist explained kinship probabilities and limitations in language careful enough to avoid pretending certainty where science could not provide it.
Nathan heard very little after the central conclusion.
The genetic relationships among Mia, Nathan, and Eleanor were strongly consistent with Mia being Daniel Cole’s biological daughter.
Lauren covered her mouth.
Nathan stared at the report.
Eleanor did not move.
For eight years she had organized her life around a possibility she refused to name.
Now it had a laboratory file number.
Nathan looked at Lauren.
She was crying quietly.
Not dramatically.
Tears simply ran down her face while she stared at a line of text.
Nathan handed her a tissue.
She took it.
“Thanks.”
Eleanor stood.
Nobody stopped her.
She walked to the window.
After several seconds she said, “What happens now?”
Rebecca answered.
“There are legal questions that need separate counsel and time.”
“I didn’t ask legally.”
Nathan looked at his mother.
Eleanor faced him.
He understood.
She was asking whether she still had a family.
Nathan had no answer.
Not yet.
“I’m going to tell Mia,” Lauren said.
Eleanor nodded.
Lauren gathered the report.
At the door, she stopped.
She looked at Eleanor.
“You scared my daughter.”
Eleanor’s face tightened.
“I know.”
“You scared me for eight years.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying that like knowing fixes it.”
Eleanor swallowed.
“All right.”
Lauren opened the door.
Then stopped again.
“You paid for her school.”
Eleanor said nothing.
“Why St. Agnes?”
The question surprised everyone.
Eleanor looked down.
“Daniel went there until fifth grade.”
Nathan stared at her.
Lauren’s expression twisted with anger and grief.
May you like
“That is so messed up.”
“Yes,” Eleanor whispered.
