Her mother had recently died of cancer. While sorting through boxes, she found photographs, letters, and a document containing Adrian’s full name.
She found him online.
Their first meeting lasted three hours.
Adrian cried alone in his car afterward.
I hated that he’d experienced something so enormous.
I hated even more that he chose to experience it without me.
“Why didn’t you tell me that night?”
He looked at my stomach.
There was the excuse I expected.
“You’d just had the bleeding scare.”
At thirteen weeks, I’d experienced light bleeding. Our doctor assured us the baby was fine, but after two previous miscarriages, we had both panicked.
Adrian said he came home intending to tell me about Maren.
Then he found me crying on the bathroom floor.
“So you decided I was too fragile to know the truth?”
“I told myself I’d wait until your next scan.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
“Then the anatomy scan.”
He nodded.
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
“Then when?”
His shoulders fell.
