Chapter 10 - THE BIRTHDAY BRACELET
I could still picture Lily opening gifts that night.
She had worn a plastic bracelet of silver stars and cried when Marcus did not come home.
Marcus stared at the portal report as though it were written in another language.
“I never brought her into the program,” he said.
“Did you bring her into the hospital?”
He nodded slowly.
“Earlier that afternoon.”
I felt something harden inside me.
“She came with you?”
“She had asked to see the operating rooms.”
“And you didn't tell me?”
“It was supposed to be a surprise.”
He explained that Lily had visited an education exhibit in the lobby with a volunteer escort.
He had then been pulled into a consultation and had sent her home with our neighbor.
I remembered Mrs. Alvarez offering to pick Lily up that afternoon.
At the time it seemed a kindness.
Now it seemed like one more piece someone had arranged without me.
I called Mrs. Alvarez.
She confirmed the ride and added something that chilled me.
“Lily said a nice nurse had given her a special bracelet.”
The bracelet of silver stars.
I found it in Lily's keepsake box.
Inside the clasp was a tiny printed hospital inventory code.
Elena photographed it and warned us not to tamper with it.
Later, Lily told me she remembered someone touching her cheek and using a small swab inside her mouth.
“They said it was for a science game,” she said.
My hands went cold.
“Did Daddy know?”
“I thought he did.”
Marcus sat across from us, unable to look at his daughter.
I did not let him hide behind silence.
“You will tell the police exactly what you remember,” I said.
“I will.”
“And you won't ask Lily to keep secrets for you again.”
“Never.”
That evening Elena called with an update from an independent laboratory consultant.
The report attributed to my name contained genetic markers consistent with a juvenile donor.
“Claire,” she said carefully, “it may not be your sample at all.”
I looked at Lily asleep beneath her planet-themed blanket.
My daughter's name was nowhere in the file.
May you like
But someone had tested her as if she belonged to them.
