Twelve years ago, I had not even met Eric yet.
I was serving in the military, and my baby’s father, another soldier, had died in an accident three months before our son was born.
I gave birth alone.
In a small clinic.
At night.
I lost a lot of blood and passed out.
When I woke up, Natalie was the only person beside my bed, holding my hand.
“He’s gone, Lauren,” she whispered.
“He never took a breath.”
I never saw him.
Not even after he died.
“So you won’t have to remember him that way,” she told me.
She handled everything.
There was no funeral.
No grave.
Only her word.
I believed her.
Because she was my sister.
And because I was too broken to ask questions.
For twelve years, I kept that little blue cap without even having a grave where I could mourn my son.
That night, for the first time, I did not press it against my face.
I only stared at it.
And I asked myself why no one had ever let me see my baby.
I told no one.
They would have called me unstable.
They would have said the anniversary scandal had broken me, and now I was trying to dig up the past.
But then I remembered something.
Natalie’s son, Oliver, had been born that same week.
The exact same week she claimed she had given birth.
Now, twelve years later, Oliver had my father’s eyes.
And the same tiny mark on his chin that I had.
One afternoon, I went to my parents’ house, where Oliver spent weekends.
Estateplanning services
I picked up his hairbrush from the bathroom.
I collected several strands of hair.
I placed them in a plastic bag.
At the lab, my hands shook.
The receptionist asked what my relationship to him was.
I did not know what to say.
So I answered,
“I just need to know.”
Three sleepless weeks passed before the envelope arrived.
When it finally came, I opened it while standing in my kitchen.
I read one line.
Probability of maternity: 99.99%.
I sank to the floor.
Right there on the kitchen tiles, holding the paper in both hands.
My son had not died.
