Replication - chapter 20 (with images) (Patreon)

The exam room in the East Wing smells of antiseptic and the cold conductive gel smeared across Kate's stomach. The lights are dimmed. The ultrasound machine hums.

I sit in the vinyl guest chair next to the exam table. Kate's hand is holding mine. Her grip is tight.

The technician moves the transducer across her skin. The gray static on the monitor flickers and resolves into bone and tissue.

I don't need the technician to translate the shapes. I read the clinical data flowing across the screen with the comprehension of twenty years of training. Fetal biometry consistent with twenty-two weeks. The four-chamber heart pulsing fast. The spine intact. Everything where it should be, on schedule.

"Everything is looking perfect," the technician murmurs, clicking a button to capture a still frame. "Measuring right on track."

Kate exhales. Her thumb rubs across my knuckles. The technician shifts the angle of the wand, moving lower on the abdomen.

The image on the screen changes.

I see it before the technician opens his mouth. I know what I am looking at.

"Alright," the technician says, pausing the frame. He turns toward Kate. "Did you want to know?"

Kate grips my hand harder. She nods once. "Yes."

"It's a boy."

The air goes out of me all at once. 

A son. The fact of it sits there on the gray monitor doing nothing to prepare me for what it's going to mean.

My father's heavy wrists. My mother's dark, narrow eyes. The genetic material that survived the amber fluid in the Somatics lab and took root behind the abdominal wall sitting two feet away from me.

A sharp ache hits the back of the throat and the eyes flood before I can blink, tears coming easier now than they used to. My chest heaves, breasts dragging against the movement of my ribs.

Kate turns her head. Her own eyes are wet. She sees the tears running down my face and she gives me a tired smile.

I press the heel of my free hand against my eye and drag the air into my lungs.

He'll never know my face, never hear my real voice. He'll look at me and see a woman named Claire. He'll call me by a title that belongs to a stranger, and I'll answer him, and I'll live in the center of his life as a fabrication.

I wipe my face with the sleeve of my sweater. I squeeze Kate's hand back.

—

I go into the bathroom and strip off the sweatpants and the t-shirt. The April morning is humid, the air thick with impending rain. I step into the shower.

I take stock of it the way I do now without meaning to. The breasts heavy, swollen with the cycle. The nipples raw against the washcloth. The wide curve of the hips. The dark hair at the junction of the thighs. The slick folds of the vulva.

I wash the flesh. I don't resent it today. The resentment burned off weeks ago. This body is a tool. It's the key that unlocked Kate's apartment, the only vehicle I have that allows me to stand in the same room as my son.

I dry off and put on the structured bra. The nylon band snaps against my ribs. I pull on a dark blue sweater and a pair of jeans that fit.

I grab my keys and leave the apartment.

The drive across the city is slow. The rain starts halfway there, fat drops hitting the windshield and smearing the street grime.

Kate's apartment building looms against the gray sky. I park on the street. I don't hesitate at the lobby door. I punch in the code she gave me last week. The lock clicks green.

I take the stairs to the third floor and walk down the carpeted hallway.

I use the key she had cut for me on Tuesday.

The deadbolt turns. I push the door open.

"I'm in the nursery," Kate calls out.

I hang my coat on the hook, take my boots off and leave them next to her sneakers.

I walk down the hall.

The birch crib we built together sits in the corner. The room smells of laundered cotton.

Kate is sitting on the floor, surrounded by folded stacks of infant clothes. White onesies. Tiny socks.

She looks up, her face flushed. The twenty-two-week pregnancy is a full curve under her loose gray shirt. Her center of gravity has shifted completely.

"You're early," she says.

"The traffic was light." I sit down on the hardwood floor across from her and cross my legs.

"I picked up the boxes from my sister's house," she says. She points to a cardboard carton near the door. "Renata kept everything from her youngest. Half of this has never been worn."

"Hand-me-downs are efficient."

"Renata called it an heirloom transfer." She rolls her eyes. "She wants to manage the entire wardrobe."

I reach out and pick up a dark blue sweater from the pile. The fabric is small. It barely covers the span of my hand. My son will wear this.

I run my thumb over the wool. "It's a good sweater."

Kate shifts her weight. She presses a hand to the small of her back, groaning.

"Back?" I ask.

"It's been aching all morning. The center's pulling forward." She rubs the base of her spine.

I move around the pile of clothes and kneel behind her.

"Lean forward," I say.

She complies without hesitation, dropping her chin to her chest and curving her shoulders forward.

I place my hands on her lower back, pressing my thumbs into the muscles running parallel to the lumbar vertebrae. The clinical knowledge of the musculoskeletal system translates through the smaller, softer hands. I find the knot in the fascia and apply a grinding pressure.

She exhales. "God. Right there."

"You're overcompensating," I say. My voice stays in its middle register, soft. "Your shoulders are pulling back to balance the front weight. It compresses the lower spine."

"I can't help it. He's heavy today."

She rests her hands on her stomach. "I don't know anything about raising a boy."

"You'll figure it out." I resume the pressure on her back.

She leans back against my chest. Her spine presses against the breasts under my sweater. The overlap of our bodies is warm. The smell of her citrus shampoo fills my lungs.

"I saw Mark yesterday," she says.

My hands stop on her lower back. Everything in me goes still.

"At the hospital?" I ask, keeping the tone flat.

"He was coming out of a committee meeting near the East Wing." Kate pulls away from my chest. She turns around to face me. The easy warmth evaporates. The tension returns to her shoulders. "I had the ultrasound envelope in my hand. I couldn't avoid him. He cornered me near the elevators."

She reaches over to the small table near the window and picks up her phone. She taps the screen.

"He knows the timeline," she says, staring at the device. "He knows the baby isn't his. But he sent an email this morning. He wants to set up a college fund. A trust. He attached a PDF from his financial planner. He offered to pull strings with the pediatric specialists. He wants to establish a framework to support us."

I look at the phone in her hand. Mark Calloway is trying to buy his way back into the structure, using his money and his institutional weight to claim territory he has no biological right to.

"You told him it was over," I say.

"I did." She drops the phone into her lap. "But he says he knows he failed me, he wants to prove he can be a stable presence. He wants to help raise him."

The nerve of it goes through me.

"He wants a receipt," I say. The sharpness in my voice slips out before I can catch it.

Kate blinks. She looks at me. Claire's rounded face. The olive skin. The dark, patient eyes. She isn't used to hearing edge from this face.

"What?" she asks.

"He wants to pay for the delivery, set up the trust. He wants to manage your appointments." I lean forward, the thing I've been holding down all afternoon coming up before I can stop it. "He wants a paper trail that proves he's a decent man. It has nothing to do with you or the child. It has to do with his own ego."

Kate stares at me. Her brow furrows. "That's cynical."

"It's accurate." I close the distance between us. "He's a coward who builds structures to hide behind. If you let him set up that trust, if you take his money, he will use it as leverage. He will schedule his involvement. He will manage this boy the same way he manages a hospital wing."

"He's just offering support, Claire."

"He's offering a contract. You don't have to sign it."

I realize the mistake a second too late.

Kate's posture stiffens. She pulls her knees up, creating a barrier between us.

"You sound exactly like my ex," she says.

The room goes cold. My lungs lock up.

"Julian," she says. "He used to do this. I would bring him a conflict I was wrestling with, and he would dissect it. He would outline the other person's motives and tell me exactly what to do. He made me feel stupid for considering another angle."

She looks at my face. "You're telling me what to do."

I stare at her. I pushed too hard. I forgot what Claire is allowed to say.

I drop my shoulders and slump, letting the spine curve into a harmless arc. I widen my eyes and force the tension out of my jaw.

"I'm sorry," I whisper. The voice pitches up. Breathy. Apologetic. "I'm so sorry, Kate."

She watches me. The rigidity in her spine remains.

"I overstepped," I say. I look down at my hands resting on the hardwood floor. "I just… I see what he did to you. I saw you the day you missed the clinic appointment. You were terrified. You were going to end the pregnancy just to escape him."

I look back up and let a tear come, and the body gives me one on command now, a single drop over the lid and down the cheek.

"I hate him for making you feel that way," I say. "I hate him for lying to you. And I hate the idea of him using his money to force you back into a room with him."

She exhales. "I know."

She reaches across the space and takes my hand. She squeezes my fingers.

"I know you're just looking out for me," she says. "I appreciate it. I do. It just… caught me off guard. You're usually the person who just listens."

"I'll listen," I say. "I won't tell you what to do."

"No." She shakes her head. She looks at the pile of infant clothes. "You're right about the leverage. If I take the trust fund, he owns a piece of the decision-making. He gets to dictate terms."

"You don't need his money."

"I make a decent living," she agrees. "I can afford the delivery. I can afford the crib."

"We built the crib."

She smiles. "We built the crib," she echoes.

She lets go of my hand and shifts her weight on the floor.

"I'm not letting him set up the trust," she says. "He doesn't get to buy his way into this child's life. He has to earn his own redemption somewhere else."

I nod slowly. "That sounds like the right call."

"It is." She rubs her stomach again.

"He's kicking," she says.

"Right now?"

"Yeah. Low on the left side. He's been doing it all morning."

She looks at me. "Do you want to feel it?"

I look at her stomach. The gray fabric stretching over the mass.

"Yes," I say.

I move forward on my knees, closing the distance I just retreated from.

She takes my hand. Her fingers guide my palm to the lower left quadrant of her abdomen. She presses my hand flat against the fabric.

I hold my breath.

The heat of her skin radiates through the cotton. I feel the firm shape of the uterus.

I wait. Five seconds. Ten.

Then, a pressure against the center of my palm.

A thump, definite and unmistakable. My son, kicking, and there's nothing in the room now except the pressure against my hand.

A sound I can't hold back comes up out of me and I drop my head against her shoulder.

"He's strong," I whisper into her shirt.

"He is," she says. She rests her hand over mine, trapping my fingers against her belly.

The sun fades behind the cloud cover, plunging the apartment into a gray dusk. The rain starts again. I hear the first drops hit the windowpane in the living room, a tapping that builds into a steady drone.

I'm at the stove. The burner clicks before catching the gas. A ring of blue flame ignites under the stainless steel pan.

I pour olive oil. I watch it shimmer and thin out across the hot metal. I drop the diced onions into the pan. The sizzle is loud in the small kitchen. The smell of heating oil and alliums fills the air.

My bare feet are flat against the linoleum. The arches ache. This body carries a standing day differently, harder on the feet. I shift my weight to the left leg, the right knee bending, the hip going out on its own. The posture is Claire's.

I stir the onions with a wooden spoon.

Kate is at the dining table. The glow from her laptop screen illuminates the underside of her chin.

"He's relentless," Kate says.

She doesn't look up from the screen. She hits the trackpad hard.

I turn the heat down under the pan. "Who?"

"Mark. He sent another email. He's forwarding me messages from his colleagues."

"Why?"

"He wants me to know he's changing the culture at the hospital. He's trying to prove he's not the same man who lied to me." She reads from the screen. "He got the restructuring proposal approved. The one he's been fighting the board over for six months."

I add the minced garlic to the pan and stir it in. The smell hits the air, mixing with the sweet scent of the softening onions.

"Good for him," I say. I keep my back to her.

"He's using it as proof," she says. "He wrote a whole paragraph about how he changed his approach. He said he finally stopped trying to force the numbers down their throats. He said he learned how to talk to them."

The wooden spoon scrapes against the bottom of the pan. I feel a knot of pride tighten in my chest.

The advice I gave him at the spa. I fixed the administrative roadblock that had stalled him for half a year. I did it sitting by a mineral pool, wearing a bathrobe and a copper-brown mask. He couldn't solve his own board, but I solved it for him in twenty minutes.

"You have to lead with the human story," I say.

I reach for the salt shaker. I pinch a generous amount between my fingers.

"If you lead with efficiency, they just count who gets inconvenienced and protect their turf. The sequence is the whole thing."

I sprinkle the salt over the pan. I tap the wooden spoon against the metal rim. Twice.

The apartment goes quiet.

The sound of the rain outside the window drops away. The refrigerator hum stops.

I turn around.

Kate is staring at me. Her hands are flat on either side of the laptop keyboard, her fingers curled inward. The flush of the second trimester vanishes, leaving her skin the color of ash.

"What did you just say?" she asks. Her voice is a whisper.

I wipe my hands on a dish towel.

"I said the sequence matters. It's standard consulting strategy."

She doesn't blink. She breathes in through her nose.

"He told me about her," she says.

The towel stops moving in my hands. "Who?"

"The woman from the spa." She stands up. She pushes her chair back. The wooden legs scrape against the floorboards. "When I confronted him. When I made him tell me exactly who he was throwing our life away for."

I drop the dish towel on the table.

"He said she was a health systems consultant," Kate says. Her chest heaves. The loose gray shirt pulls against the swell of the pregnancy. "He said they spent the afternoon talking by the pool. He said she gave him advice on his board meeting."

She takes a step away from the table. She puts distance between us.

"He quoted her to me, Claire. He told me she used those exact words. If you lead with efficiency, they protect their turf."

I stop breathing.

I try to force the voice out, construct the lie. "It's a common phrase in the industry. Everyone uses it."

"You said the exact words."

She looks at my face.

She left Mark in February. I appeared at the yoga studio two weeks later. I inserted myself into her routine and became indispensable.

"Dark hair," she breathes. "Tanned skin."

"Kate. Listen to me."

"You were the woman in the photo." Her eyes widen. "You sent it to him while we were at the café. You wanted me to see it."

I take a step forward. I raise my hands, palms open. "I did it to get you away from him. He was lying to you. He's a coward."

She stumbles backward until her spine hits the wall near the hallway.

"You engineered this," she whispers. "You broke us up. And then you followed me here."

"I wanted to protect you."

"You slept with me."

The words hang in the kitchen air. She let me undress her, touch her stomach, cry in her arms on this floor. She brought a stalker into her bed.

She presses her hands against her mouth. Her shoulders shake. She looks like she is going to vomit.

"Don't come near me," she says.

"Kate, I swear to God, I only wanted you to be safe. He was lying to you."

"You built this friendship on a lie. You destroyed my life and then you wore my clothes."

She drops her hands. Her eyes are dead.

"Get your coat."

"Please let me explain."

"Get your coat and get out of my apartment." She points a trembling finger toward the hallway. "If you do not walk out that door right now, I'm calling the police."

I look at her face. The lines around her eyes are flat.

I walk to the hook and pull my coat down. I pick up my boots.

I carry them in my hands, walking out into the hallway, hearing the deadbolt slide into place behind me.

I walk down the three flights of stairs. The concrete steps are hard under my stockinged feet. I don't put my boots on until I reach the lobby.

I sit on the bench near the mailboxes, pulling the leather boots over my feet. I tie the laces. My hands are shaking so hard I can barely pull the knots tight.

I push the glass door open.

The rain is falling. The streetlights cast reflections across the wet asphalt.

I walk to my car, unlock the door and slide into the driver's seat.

I drop the keys into the center console. I don't start the engine.

I sit in the dark and stare through the windshield at the brick facade of her building. The yellow rectangle of light from the third-floor window. The kitchen.

I lost her. I didn't lose her because of the mesh, or because the tank wiped my male anatomy away.

I lost her because I am Julian Reyes.

The arrogance that made me a surgeon is the same thing that made me drop that phrase into a quiet kitchen. I couldn't stand letting Mark take the credit. I had to be the smartest person in the room.

I sit in the car and listen to the rain hit the roof.