Chapter 5: Zero Percent

The clinic was in a low brick building behind a dental office.

I had passed it a hundred times and never looked.

The waiting room had a fish tank and a rack of magazines about couples who wanted babies.

I sat under a poster of a smiling newborn and could not feel my legs.

A woman in a gray blazer came out and led me down a short hall.

She sat me in a small office with a box of tissues on the desk.

The tissues were the worst part.

"Mr. Stanbridge, I'm the clinic's lead doctor," she said.

"I'll give you the result of the test first, and then the other matter."

"Just say it."

She slid a single page across the desk.

I read the numbers in a column.

At the bottom there was a line in bold.

Probability of paternity: 0.00 percent.

I read it three times.

I wanted it to say something else.

"The sample from the hairbrush was clean," the doctor said gently.

"The match to your cheek swab is not a match."

"She's my daughter."

"Biologically, no."

"I was there when she was born."

"I believe you."

"I cut the cord."

The doctor said nothing.

I sat there with the page in my hand and my hand on my knee.

I had always known what my face did when I was hurt.

It went blank, like a screen when the power is out.

I felt it go blank now.

"I said there was a second matter," the doctor said.

"Yes."

"When we entered your swab, our system found an older file under your name and date of birth."

"From where?"

"From this clinic. Nine years ago."

I was twenty-six nine years ago.

That was the year of the cancer.

I stared at her.

"I had testicular cancer," I said. "Radiation, then surgery. They told me the treatment went well."

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