“I’m so sorry,” I said. “I had no idea it went that deep.”
⸻
“I don’t talk about him,” Desmond said. “I made peace with that a long time ago, or at least I told myself I had. I never once expected to see that exact mark again, especially not on my own daughter, especially not tonight, of all nights.”
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I reached over and touched our daughter’s small shoulder gently, tracing near the edge of that same dark oval mark that had apparently unraveled my husband so completely in the span of about ten seconds.
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“Do you think it means something?” I asked. “Or is it just genetics, working the way genetics sometimes work?”
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“I know, logically, it’s genetics,” Desmond said. “Birthmarks like this run in families all the time. I understand that completely with my rational brain. But for a second, holding her, all I could think about was that exact memory at the lake, and some part of me panicked completely, like she was somehow going to inherit more than just a mark on her shoulder.”
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“Desmond,” I said, “you are not your father. You’ve spent twelve years proving that to me, every single day, especially through everything we’ve survived trying to have her in the first place.”
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