Chapter 4 - Lauren’s Secret
Lauren had been four months pregnant when she lost the baby.
Mom told me everything from the other end of the phone.
Lauren had hidden the pregnancy from nearly everyone.
She had been seeing a man who was married.
When he refused to leave his wife, Lauren stopped talking about the future.
Then the pregnancy ended unexpectedly.
She blamed him.
She blamed herself.
Eventually, according to Mom, she started blaming me.
“Why me?”
Mom cried harder.
“Because you announced your pregnancy three weeks later.”
I remembered that afternoon.
Lauren had sat silently while everyone celebrated.
I thought she was angry because attention wasn’t on her.
I had no idea she was grieving.
That knowledge hurt.
But it did not erase what she had done to Emma.
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
“She said she hated you.”
Mom’s answer was painfully simple.
“She said seeing you happy made her feel like the universe was mocking her.”
James sat beside me.
He could hear most of the conversation.
“I would have helped her,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“Instead, all of you kept it secret.”
“Your father thought it was best.”
I looked at Dad through a different lens now.
His silence at dinner.
His instinct to excuse Lauren.
The way he chased her to the door.
He had been carrying this for months.
“Mom, grief doesn’t make tonight okay.”
“I know.”
“Does Dad?”
She didn’t answer.
That was answer enough.
The police asked us not to stay in the house until the locks were changed and the situation with Lauren was clearer.
We went to a hotel near James’s base.
Emma slept between us in a portable crib provided by the hotel.
I couldn’t sleep.
James sat by the window.
“I keep replaying it,” I said.
“So do I.”
“What if I’d stopped Lauren sooner?”
He looked at me.
“You couldn’t have predicted it.”
“She walked toward Emma.”
“And you trusted your sister.”
The words hurt because they were true.
Around three in the morning, James’s phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
He answered.
Nobody spoke.
Then a woman began crying.
James put the call on speaker.
“Lauren?”
Her breathing was uneven.
For a moment, I thought she was finally going to apologize.
Instead she whispered, “Ask your wife why Mom always chose her.”
I sat upright.
“Lauren, where are you?”
“You really don’t know, do you?”
“Know what?”
She laughed softly.
It sounded exhausted rather than amused.
“Ask Mom about Christmas Eve, 1996.”
Then the call ended.
I stared at James.
I had been born in 1996.
May you like
And suddenly Lauren’s anger seemed connected to something much older than either of us understood.
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