Chapter 10 - The Two Embryos
I had believed there were none.
Mark told me the final cycle produced no viable embryos.
The clinic record said otherwise.
Two had been cryopreserved.
Then transferred.
Not medically transferred.
Administratively transferred.
Their storage authorization had been moved to another facility.
The signature approving it looked like mine.
It wasn't.
I knew immediately.
Rebecca did too.
Another investigation began.
The second clinic had closed years earlier, but records survived.
The embryos had eventually been marked for disposal after storage fees stopped being paid.
There was no evidence either had been implanted.
They were gone.
I sat in my car after learning that and screamed.
Seven years of healing did not prepare me for discovering that even my grief had been manipulated.
I had mourned possibilities without knowing they existed.
Lauren found me later.
She didn't say she understood.
Thank God.
She simply sat beside me.
After a while, she whispered, “I'm sorry.”
I looked at her.
“For which part?”
“All the parts that belong to me.”
That was the first apology from her I believed.
Not because it repaired anything.
Because it didn't ask me to repair her.
We sat quietly.
Finally I said, “I don't know if I'll ever forgive you.”
“I know.”
“I may never trust you.”
“I know.”
“But I don't hate you anymore.”
Lauren cried.
So did I.
That was not reconciliation.
It was the beginning of something less dramatic and more useful.
Truth.
The criminal and civil proceedings continued.
My father accepted responsibility for unauthorized trust withdrawals and reached agreements regarding restitution and cooperation. I refused to protect him from consequences.
He didn't ask me to.
That mattered.
Mom struggled most.
She wanted the family “back together.”
I told her there was no going back.
“If we have anything,” I said, “it has to be new.”
She eventually understood.
Mark remained in custody while the cases moved forward.
I never visited him.
He sent letters.
I returned them unopened.
Then one came through Rebecca.
It contained an offer.
Mark would disclose additional assets if I agreed to provide a statement asking for leniency.
I laughed.
Rebecca didn't.
“It's your choice.”
“No.”
She nodded.
That was all.
I no longer negotiated with people who treated truth like currency.
Several months later, another property was recovered.
Then an investment account.
Then proceeds from a sale.
The amount returned to me eventually exceeded the principal taken from my trust.
Not every dollar.
Not every year.
Nothing could restore those.
But enough came back to create choices.
I made one immediately.
I sold the office building.
Then I established a foundation.
Not for fertility treatment.
That part of my life was too personal to turn into symbolism.
The foundation provided emergency financial and legal assistance to women rebuilding after financial betrayal or coercive relationships.
Rebecca joined the board.
When I told her the name, she smiled.
The Blue Door Fund.
Not the Blue File.
Not the Blue Robe.
I was tired of letting blue belong to painful things.
A door meant leaving.
It also meant entering.
The foundation's first recipient was a woman named Jasmine who needed three months of housing while separating her finances from an abusive partner.
The second needed legal assistance.
The third needed childcare while returning to work.
Their lives had nothing to do with mine.
That was important.
Helping them wasn't therapy disguised as charity.
It was simply useful.
One evening, Noah sat beside me on the porch.
He knew about David now.
Not every detail.
Enough for his age.
“Does having another biological dad mean Dad isn't my dad?”
I considered carefully.
“Biology tells you where part of you came from. Relationships tell you who people become in your life.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you don't have to decide everything today.”
He nodded.
Then leaned against my shoulder.
Seven years earlier, my parents had used this child's existence before birth as a weapon against me.
Now he was simply Noah.
A boy who loved dinosaurs, hated tomatoes, and asked impossible questions.
May you like
I put my arm around him.
And something inside me that had been clenched for years finally loosened.
