And again.
At the next red light, I took it out, hoping to find a job, hoping for anything normal.
She was my mother.
Three messages.
Are you home yet?
Call me before you speak to Lucie.
Please, Adrien. There are things you need to know.
I stared at the screen until the light turned green and a horn sounded behind us.
Lucie turned her head slowly.
“Who is it?” she asked.
“My mother,” I said.
At that moment, something changed in her face.
It’s not surprising.
Recognition.
As if a small missing piece had slid into place.
“He called me tonight,” Lucie said.
I gripped the steering wheel tighter.
“When?”
“Around nine o’clock. Before the pain became unbearable.”
Her voice was weak, but firm enough to instill fear in me about what would come next.
“She told me I shouldn’t trap you with a child if I wasn’t sure about our marriage yet.”
For a moment, the road disappeared behind a beam of lights.
From inside the closed car, I could hear my own breathing, rough and irregular.
“What did he say?”
Lucie looked out the windshield.
The hospital sign appeared further ahead, blue and white, too bright against the backdrop of the night.
“He said that sometimes men need proof before they believe they are fathers.”
My stomach turned.
Not because the sentence was shocking.
Because I recognized him.
My mother had said something similar weeks before, smiling as she drank coffee, pretending that concern was wisdom.
She had asked if Lucie seemed distant.
If pregnancy made women feel emotional.
If I had ever thought about taking a paternity test, it was simply to put my doubts to rest before they arose.
I had told him not to talk nonsense.
But he hadn’t told Lucie.
He had kept it small.
Harmless.
A family nuisance that’s not worth having at home.
Now that silence remained with us in the car.
Lucie’s phone had fallen into the gap next to her seat, vibrating slightly against the plastic.
I bent down at the entrance of the hospital and picked it up.
My mother’s number was also there, in Lucie’s missed calls and in one answered call that lasted six minutes.
Six minutes before the pain turned into fear.
Six minutes of words I hadn’t heard.
At the entrance to the emergency room, a nurse brought a wheelchair after taking a look at Lucie’s face.
The questions soon followed.
How many weeks?
Any bleeding?
Any falls, accidents, or previous complications?
Lucie answered as best she could.
I stood behind her, holding the blue folder, useless and sweating under my coat.
When they asked me if I was the father, Lucie hesitated for a moment.
Then she said yes.
That small delay pierced me like a needle.
Not because he no longer doubted the child.
Because I realized that my doubt had become visible enough to make her stop.
They took her behind a curtain.
I kept going until a nurse gently placed a hand on my chest.
“Just one minute,” he said. “Then we need space.”
Lucie lay on the examination table, staring at the ceiling tiles.
The room smelled of disinfectant and hot plastic.
A machine blinked beside him, patient and indifferent.
The doctor arrived with tired eyes and a calm voice that made everything more frightening.
He asked her questions, gently palpated her abdomen, and then ordered tests and an ultrasound.
Lucie turned her face towards me as they prepared the equipment.
“Don’t call your mother,” he said.
It wasn’t a request.
It was the first time he set a boundary between us and my family.
I nodded too quickly.
Then my phone vibrated again.
This time, the sound seemed enormous in the small room.
Lucie heard it.
The doctor heard it.
Even the nurse glanced into my pocket.
I took out my phone and saw my mother’s name shining there, persistent and familiar.
For years, I answered to that name without thinking.
