Page 145 of Forever Flames: Padraig & Stevie
She cracks first. “Remember the blood type project?”
“The one for biology?” I nod. “You already turned it in.”
“Yeah, well…” She shifts in her seat, eyes on the cereal box. “Mr. Kwan handed them back today, and I got an incomplete.”
I’m confused. Isla, for whom anything less than an A feels like failure, doesn’t bring home incompletes. Not ever. “Why?”
“He said one of my answers doesn’t work with basic genetics, so I must’ve written something down wrong.” She digs into her backpack and pulls out a crumpled results sheet and the folded poster board we made together at this same counter.
She flattens the paper against the wood and taps the top with her finger. “See? It says I’m O positive. But you’re O negative, right?”
“Right…” My voice feels too careful.
“And Dad was AB negative?”
“Yes.”
She flips the poster open, revealing the neat Punnett squares we’d worked on. Each box filled in, some marked with red Xs. She jabs her marker at the one labeled “O child” under “AB × O,” the big red X slashing through it. “This square’s supposed to be impossible. AB and O can’t make O. And two negatives can’t make a positive. Mr. Kwan double-checked the chart himself.”
Her tone is even, but she’s watching me now, like somehow I’ll be able to tell her what the obvious mistake is.
I can’t. These are our blood types. So I don’t really know what she’s talking about or why her teacher would say such a thing.
Unless…
Mentally I go back in time, calculate quickly and realize…
The floor creaks behind us.
Padraig is there with bags full of food, gaze locked on the poster in her hand. Then on her face. Then on me.
She glances between us, confusion knitting her brow. “What?”
Neither of us answers. And in the space where words should be, the truth is deafening.
At least for Padraig and me.
Now’s not the time, though.
“Let’s go over it later.” I reach for the food. “We should eat while the food’s hot.”
We manage to get through dinner. The kids chatter over cartons of pad Thai and spring rolls while I focus on wiping sweet chili sauce off Rafferty’s chin instead of the silent, seething current running from Padraig toward me.
Isla, thankfully oblivious, disappears upstairs the second she’s finished. Jude insists on reading Raff his favorite dinosaur book before bed. Lila helps me bathe Kellan before heading to her room.
By the time the house is finally quiet, my nerves feel scraped raw.
His back is against the headboard, eyes fixed on me when I set Kellan in the bassinet next to my side of the bed.
I study my son to give me a second to gear up for the conversation I’m about to have with Padraig. His perfect bow of a mouth, the curve of his cheek, faint crease between his brows. His brown eyes. All traits he’s inherited from Padraig.
The thought comes before I can stop it.
Did Isla’s baby face hold the same features of Padraig too? At dinner, it’s all I could think about. They have the same facial features, same demeanor, artistic talent. Isla’s blonde, but there’s no mistaking, her and Padraig have the same brown eyes.
Why didn’t I consider the possibility back then? I’ve never doubted she was Cooper’s. When I got pregnant, he and I were off to the races in creating a perfect family.
Now, with her science project fresh in my mind and Padraig’s gaze burning into me, the question lodges somewhere I can’t reach.
