Julian's car was parked in front of Eleanor's house when I arrived.
I sat behind the wheel for several seconds, looking at the front door.
I could still turn around.
Nobody had forced me to come. Eleanor had asked, and I had agreed, but I could change my mind.
Then I remembered the tremor in her voice.
Something was wrong.
I got out and walked to the door.
Eleanor opened it before I could knock a second time.
She looked older than she had the last time I saw her. Her hair was pulled back carelessly, and there were deep lines beside her mouth.
"Thank you for coming."
I stepped inside.
"What's going on?"
She didn't answer.
From the living room, I heard Julian's voice.
"What the hell is she doing here?"
I stopped in the hallway.
Of course.
Even now, he could make my presence sound like an offense.
Eleanor walked past me.
"Julian, stop."
I followed her into the living room.
Chloe was sitting on the sofa with a baby in her arms. Another infant slept in a bassinet near the sliding glass door.
The room smelled faintly of baby powder and the coffee Eleanor had left on the side table.
For a moment, nobody moved.
Julian stood beside the fireplace, his hands hanging at his sides.
He looked furious.
Chloe looked frightened.
I wondered whether she had known Eleanor was calling me.
Then the baby in her arms stirred.
He opened his eyes.
I stopped breathing.
It wasn't something I could explain immediately.
I had seen the hospital photograph Julian sent me. I had studied both babies' faces, though I had tried not to.
But a photograph was flat.
It didn't move.
It didn't turn toward you.
This baby looked at me, and something inside my chest seemed to come apart.
His eyes were a pale gray-blue.
My father's eyes had been that color.
So had mine when I was a baby, according to the few photographs my mother kept from my first year.
But that wasn't the only thing.
The baby's nose.
The small crease beside his mouth.
The way his left eyebrow lifted slightly when he looked toward the light.
I had seen those features before.
Not on Julian.
On myself.
I took one step closer without meaning to.
Chloe tightened her arms around the baby.
"Sarah."
My name sounded like a warning.
I looked at her.
"What is this?"
Julian moved between us.
"I don't know what you think you're seeing."
I stared at him.
"I haven't said anything yet."
His jaw tightened.
Eleanor stood near the armchair, holding a folded blanket in both hands.
She looked at Chloe.
"Tell her."
Chloe shook her head.
"Please don't do this here."
"Then where?" Eleanor asked. "When will be the right time?"
I looked from one woman to the other.
The baby made a small sound and turned his face against Chloe's shoulder.
I wanted to hold him.
That thought frightened me more than anything else in the room.
I had spent years trying to accept that motherhood might never happen for me. I had finally started building a life around that possibility.
Now I was standing in a living room, looking at a newborn child who seemed to carry pieces of my own face.
And everyone else appeared to know something I didn't.
I turned toward Julian.
"Why did your mother ask me here?"
He rubbed his forehead.
"Because she's convinced there's some problem that doesn't exist."
Eleanor's expression changed.
"Don't you dare."
He looked at her.
She held his gaze.
For the first time since I had known her, I saw her openly challenge her son without immediately softening the moment afterward.
"She deserves to know."
My hands had started shaking.
"Know what?"
Chloe looked down at the baby.
Tears slid down her cheeks.
I waited for her to speak.
She didn't.
"Chloe."
She closed her eyes.
"I'm sorry."
I had heard those words before.
I had heard them when she called after I discovered the affair. I had heard them through her crying, followed by explanations that never became answers.
I couldn't bear to hear them again.
"Don't apologize. Tell me what I'm looking at."
She pressed her lips together.
Julian stepped toward the sofa.
"That's enough."
Eleanor moved between him and Chloe.
"No. It isn't."
The room fell silent.
I looked at the second baby, sleeping in the bassinet.
A small hand rested beside his cheek.
He had dark hair, unlike his brother's lighter fuzz.
I tried to make sense of what I was seeing.
Perhaps the resemblance was a coincidence.
Perhaps grief and shock had made me look for familiar features where none existed.
I wanted there to be an ordinary explanation.
But Chloe's face told me there wasn't one.
She looked at me with the same helpless expression I had seen on the phone after the affair was exposed.
Only this time, she wasn't merely ashamed.
She was terrified.
I looked at Julian again.
"How long have you known?"
His eyes narrowed.
"Known what?"
I almost laughed.
He was still trying to control the conversation.
Even now.
I pointed toward the baby.
"Why does he look like me?"
Nobody answered.
I felt the silence in my stomach.
Eleanor sat down heavily in the armchair.
Chloe began to cry harder.
Julian turned away and stared toward the window.
I took another step toward the sofa.
The baby looked at me again.
I could see the tiny movements of his mouth as he settled against Chloe's chest.
I had imagined holding a child for so many years that the desire had become something I tried not to touch.
Now it was there, immediate and painful.
I hated that I felt it.
I hated that I wanted to reach for him while the people in the room were keeping the truth from me.
"Someone needs to explain this."
My voice sounded unfamiliar.
Eleanor nodded slowly.
Then she looked directly at her son.
"Tell her what happened to the embryos."
The words struck me harder than anything else she had said.
I turned toward Julian.
For a second, he looked as though he had forgotten how to speak.
Then he shook his head.
"Mother, you have no idea what you're talking about."
Eleanor's hands tightened around the blanket.
"I know enough."
My heart began beating faster.
The embryos.
The storage facility.
The night Julian had stood in our kitchen and told me they were gone.
I had never questioned his explanation.
I had believed him because I had no reason not to.
I looked at him now.
"Why is she talking about our embryos?"
He didn't answer.
Chloe lowered her head.
And suddenly, I understood that whatever had brought me into that room had begun long before the twins were born.
It had begun while I was still Julian's wife.
Click here to continue reading: PART 6: My Mother-in-Law Wouldn’t Let Her Son Hide Behind Another Excuse, and Every Word Made the Past Look Different
I Thought Losing the Chance to Become a Mother Was the Worst Thing My Husband Could Ever Do to Me
Part 5 of 16
