Chapter 20 - FAMILY PATHWAYS
Family Pathways had closed six years earlier.
The founder was dead.
The records had gone to county archives after a bankruptcy proceeding.
It took two weeks to get access.
Those two weeks were good for me.
I hated them.
Lily had a school project.
Noah had a transplant follow-up.
Maya visited for a weekend.
Three children who existed mattered more than one embryo that might not.
I repeated that to myself.
Often.
At the archive, Melissa found the shipment intake record.
Riverbend cryogenic vessel.
Sender:
DR. JUDITH MORGAN.
Recipient:
DR. SAMUEL VOSS.
Purpose:
REPRODUCTIVE MATERIAL — DIRECTED DONATION.
Claire read it.
“Who's Samuel Voss?”
A search answered quickly.
Reproductive endocrinologist.
Consultant to Family Pathways.
Medical director for something called the Embryo Family Initiative.
I hated the name immediately.
The initiative matched unused embryos from fertility patients with prospective parents considering adoption.
On paper, legal.
If consent existed.
Our consent did not.
Voss had died three years earlier.
His records had gone somewhere else.
Naturally.
But Family Pathways retained client indexes.
R-204 appeared again.
Not Karen this time.
A receiving-family code.
The file was mostly sealed.
Melissa obtained only the cover sheet.
One line mattered.
TRANSFER STATUS:
COMPLETED THROUGH AFFILIATE CLINIC.
Claire sat down.
I didn't.
“What does completed mean?”
Melissa answered carefully.
“It may mean paperwork completed.”
“Or?”
“It may mean embryo transfer completed.”
I looked at her.
“Was there a child?”
“We don't know.”
Claire whispered:
“How old?”
If the transfer occurred immediately, eight.
Same as Lily and Noah.
Maybe slightly younger.
Melissa held up a hand.
“We are not going there yet.”
She was right.
No names.
No guessing.
No searching school photos.
No DNA websites.
No turning some innocent child into H-417B because a ledger made us afraid.
Then Melissa showed us the family code.
FP-88.
Nothing personal.
Except beneath it:
PLACEMENT STATE: KENTUCKY.
Claire and I looked at each other.
Cincinnati sat across the river from Kentucky.
Lauren and Maya lived less than twenty minutes from the state line.
I saw the thought forming.
“No.”
Claire nodded.
“I know.”
Maya was already genetically confirmed as H-417D.
This was different.
Another family.
Possibly.
Melissa closed the file.
“The court can appoint an intermediary.”
“For what?”
“To contact the recipient family without disclosing you first.”
That sounded sane.
Slow.
Respectful.
I hated it.
So I agreed.
Three weeks later Melissa called.
I answered in the car.
Her first sentence told me everything.
“There is a child.”
I pulled over.
Claire was on speaker.
Neither of us spoke.
Melissa continued.
“A boy.”
I closed my eyes.
“Age?”
“Eight.”
Claire made a sound beside the phone.
Then Melissa said:
“But before you do anything, there is a problem.”
May you like
“What?”
“The family says their son was conceived naturally.”
