Chapter 3: Twenty-Six Years
Then someone knocked violently on the front door.
Ryan opened it.
His older sister, Jessica, stood there completely out of breath.
The moment she saw the black liquid on the floor, her face went white.
“Mom gave that to Emily?”
Margaret whispered, “Jessica, don’t.”
Ryan stared at his sister.
“You know what this is?”
Jessica slowly nodded.
Then she looked at me.
“Emily, you need to tell the paramedics something before they take you to the hospital.”
Margaret suddenly tried to leave.
Ryan blocked the doorway.
Jessica’s next words made the entire room go silent.
“Because Mom tried the same mixture on another pregnant woman twenty-six years ago.”
And when Ryan asked who that woman was, Jessica looked directly at him and said,
“Your biological mother.”
The sirens were almost at the house now.
I sat on the edge of the couch, one hand on my stomach, the bitter taste of the black liquid still in my mouth, while the three of them stood frozen in the entryway.
Ryan’s voice, when it came, was quiet and dangerous.
“Explain. Now.”
Jessica kept her eyes on me, not on Margaret.
“She needs the hospital first. The paramedics need to know it isn’t a simple herb. And you need to know the rest before Mom tries to rewrite it.”
Margaret’s face had gone bloodless.
Outside, car doors slammed.
Ryan did not move from the doorway.
He looked at his mother, then at the dark stain on my shirt, then at his sister.
The contractions tightened again, sharper this time.
I gripped the arm of the couch and met Jessica’s eyes.
May you like
Whatever had happened twenty-six years ago was about to enter the same room as the child I was trying to deliver safely.
And Margaret was no longer the only one who knew the truth.
