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I’m tryin’ to make sense of it myself.
“Austin opened his not sixty seconds after I showed it to him. He wanted to be there for me when I opened mine. That’s why I’m here.”
“You’re my son.”
“Even if I’m not?
“You’re my son.”
“Even if I’m your nephew?”
“You’re not my fucking nephew!” He roars. And I can see by the emotion on his face he knows I suspect it’s Uncle Mitch.
“Open it,” Dad demands.
I stare at the thing. The fucking thing that feels like a poisonous snake, that’s felt like poison all this time.
“Should I open it?” Dad asks.
I stare at him.
“You’re my son,” he says with absolutely no doubt on his face.
“Because you raised me or because your seed made me?”
“Both.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure. I’d love you even if you weren’t my son. But you are. Fuckin’ open it,” Dad barks.
“I’ll fuckin’ open it,” Austin says. He leans over and takes the envelope, but his eyes are on me.
“Give it,” I say. I ordered a comprehensive test and told the lab the paternity in question was between identical twins. My uncle had left his body to science, so his DNA results were accessible on file. He was a big believer in philanthropy and his death resulted in six lives being saved or enhanced.
They assured me the results will be accurate. They told me they had three labs test comprehensively and results are based on all results. If anyone comes up as in doubt, they’d let me know. The tests came back to me with an invoice that told me conclusively there were no questions about the results.
I open it and unfold the paper and I don’t want to look.
If this came from nowhere, like it did for my brother, maybe I’d have just opened it fast. But this has been fuckin’ with me for a long fucking time. My whole life I wanted to make him proud. Get his attention. Get his attention away from his fucking work for five minutes, so I excelled. I excelled at everything. But I failed at
being a decent human being because he looks at me like he’s sorely disappointed in the man that I am. And then I find out I might not even be his. Of course it’s been fucking with my head.
They’re waiting.
I look down at the paper.
My knees go a little weak.
“Quinten Carmichael, you are the father.” I say.
Austin snickers and goes to a drawer in a table beside his television and pulls out three cigars.
“Cubans,” he says and grabs a box of matches.
Dad’s eyes are on me.
“I’m sorry, Aiden. I’m sorry I didn’t let you speak when I knew what you were going to say. If I had, maybe you wouldn’t have been in pain all this time. Carrying that weight on your shoulders. I… I was weak.”
