The doctor came in, congratulated them warmly, checked on the baby, and left. Rachel looked up at Ethan with the same bright smile he had loved since they were teenagers.
“Look… he has your eyes,” she said softly, brushing the baby’s cheek.
Ethan’s throat tightened. “Yeah… he’s perfect,” he managed, though his voice felt чуж.
In eight years together, he had never once doubted Rachel. She wasn’t someone who lied or betrayed. She was the kind of woman who prayed, who endured heartbreak and treatments, who never gave up hope.
None of this made sense. Unless…
He tried to steady himself. Maybe something had failed. Maybe the impossible had happened.
But then he remembered the follow-up appointment. The sterile room. The doctor’s calm voice.
“You’re completely sterile. Zero sperm.”
Zero.
Rachel rocked the baby gently, unaware of the storm tearing through him. In that moment, an invisible distance grew between them.
Weeks passed, and the guilt became unbearable. One morning, in a moment of panic, Ethan did something he would later regret deeply. He took the baby’s pacifier, sealed it in a bag, and sent it to a private DNA lab in Dallas.
Ten days, they said.
Ten days of mental torture.