Chapter 6 - THE TEST
I threw up in the bank restroom.
Ethan stayed on the other side of the door.
He did not knock.
He did not speak.
For once, he understood silence.
When I came out, my mother tried to hug me.
I stepped around her.
“We’re getting tested.”
Diane wiped her face.
“Sarah, Thomas may not—”
“May not what?”
She stopped.
“May not be my father?”
“Yes.”
“Then who is?”
She looked away.
I laughed.
It sounded close to crying.
“Fantastic.”
Ethan said, “I’ll arrange a lab.”
“You’re good at arranging things.”
He accepted that.
We used a private medical laboratory.
Results would take hours with expedited processing.
While we waited, Ethan played the cassette.
My grandfather’s voice came first.
Then Thomas Mercer.
Then my father.
The recording was from 1999.
Richard sounded younger.
Angrier.
Thomas said, “If you touch Diane again, I’m going to the police.”
My mother covered her mouth.
Richard laughed.
“You think she’ll choose you?”
“She already did.”
Then my father said something that changed the air in the room.
“She’s carrying my child.”
Thomas answered immediately.
“You know that isn’t true.”
Ethan shut off the tape.
Nobody breathed.
My mother whispered, “Thomas believed Sarah was his.”
I looked at her.
“Did you?”
“I didn’t know.”
“You slept with both of them?”
Her face twisted.
“Richard assaulted me.”
The room went dead.
My anger changed shape.
She stared at the table.
“I never told anyone except Thomas.”
Ethan closed his eyes.
I sat down.
For the first time that day, I reached for my mother’s hand.
She grabbed mine like she was drowning.
Then Ethan’s phone rang.
The lab.
He answered.
Listened.
His eyes moved to me.
“No biological sibling relationship,” he said.
My lungs finally worked.
But the technician wasn’t finished.
Ethan’s expression changed again.
“What?”
He put the call on speaker.
The technician said, “There is a close familial relationship, but not sibling-level.”
I stared at Ethan.
“What relationship?”
May you like
A pause.
“Based on the markers, Mr. Cole is most consistent with being Ms. Mitchell’s biological first cousin.”
