Chapter 7 - The Fifth Name
Mara threw the laptop against the wall.
Mara didn't answer my first three calls.
On the fourth, she picked up.
“If this is about custody, hang up.”
“There's a fifth baby.”
Silence.
Then a plate shattered on her end.
“Mara?”
“Come here.”
I drove too fast.
By the time I reached the apartment, she was sitting at the kitchen table.
The boys were asleep.
In front of her was a hospital bracelet.
REYES, BABY E.
My hands went cold.
“You had five?”
“I delivered five.”
“Where is the baby?”
She stared at the bracelet.
“I don't know.”
I sat across from her.
She rubbed her thumb over the faded plastic.
“Her name was Maya.”
“Her?”
Mara nodded.
“She was smaller than the boys. Two pounds, three ounces.”
I couldn't breathe right.
“She died?”
“That is what they told me.”
“What do you mean, told you?”
“I never saw her body.”
My stomach twisted.
“They said there were complications. I was sick. Sedated. Your lawyer was there. Your father came two days later.”
“Did he know?”
“I don't know.”
She looked up.
“I asked for Maya's records last year.”
“And?”
“No record of death.”
I stood.
“Why didn't you tell me this immediately?”
Her chair scraped back.
“Because I met you yesterday after six years, Adrian!”
“They're my children too.”
“Now you know that.”
“I would've wanted to know.”
“Would you?”
That stopped me.
She stood inches away.
“Six years ago, I said I was pregnant and you asked me if I was sure it was yours.”
“I know.”
“No, you remember. That's different.”
I looked away.
She was right.
And I hated that she was right.
Then she softened, which somehow felt worse.
“I don't know who you are now.”
“Neither do I.”
We stood there in the kitchen.
No music.
No grand apology.
Just the refrigerator humming and one of the boys snoring down the hall.
Then Mara handed me the flash drive.
“I lied. Gerald didn't take it.”
“You let me chase him down fourteen flights of stairs?”
“I panicked.”
“You could've said something.”
“I make bad decisions too.”
I almost smiled.
Then I plugged the drive into my laptop.
Folders appeared.
Invoices.
Clinic records.
Transfers.
Photographs.
And one video file.
The date was six years ago.
We opened it.
My father appeared on screen.
He looked exhausted.
“If you're watching this, Maya is alive.”
Mara made a sound I had never heard from another human being.
My father continued.
“And if she is still alive, someone in our family has been raising her under another name.”
The video froze.
Then the screen went black.
May you like
Someone had remotely wiped the drive while we were watching.
