He remained silent.
Then he answered in a voice barely above a whisper.
“Because that night was one of the most painful nights of our lives.”
A cold sensation traveled down my spine.
Before I could respond, Ethan reached into his pocket and pulled out a recent photograph.
He and Lily were standing together, smiling at the camera.
Lily was wearing a wig made possible by donated hair.
On the back, she had written a message in her own handwriting.
“When I get better, we’ll finally tell them the whole truth.”
I read the sentence twice.
“What truth, Ethan?”
Daniel closed his eyes for a moment.
“Yesterday, Lily told us what she had discovered.”
He reached inside his jacket and removed an envelope.
“Rebecca and I contacted the hospital to help us locate certain records from the time Lily was born. We were told there were details that needed to be clarified.”
I looked at the envelope.
“Details about Lily?”
Daniel shook his head.
“About Ethan, too.”
I turned toward my son.
His eyes were shining.
“Mom, please don’t be angry.”
“I’m not angry, sweetheart. I just want to understand.”
“We didn’t secretly take any medical tests,” he explained quickly. “We only talked to people who helped us figure out what questions we should ask our families.”
Daniel confirmed his words.
“Nobody gave us confidential medical information without permission. It was the old photographs and our memories that made us realize there might be something worth investigating.”
I was growing more confused by the minute.
“Daniel, what does any of this have to do with my family?”
He slowly placed the envelope on the desk.
“I need you to remember something about the night Ethan was born.”
His words brought back memories I had spent fifteen years trying not to think about.
My delivery had been difficult.
There had been complications, and I had remained in the hospital longer than expected.
I remembered the bright lights above my bed.
The voices of nurses moving around me.
The exhaustion that made everything seem distant and unreal.
And one other thing.
A woman crying somewhere in the hallway.
I had never learned who she was.
“That woman,” I whispered. “I still remember hearing her cry.”
Daniel nodded.
“That was Rebecca.”
I stared at him.
“Your wife?”
“Yes.”
The room fell completely silent.
“Why was she crying?”
Daniel took a long breath.
“Because that night, the doctors told us that one of the two babies we were expecting would never come home with us.”
My stomach dropped.
“Two babies?”
