Chapter 2 - the baby Garrett said never existed
Nurse Allison Reed asked hospital security to prevent Garrett and Nadine from reentering the room.
Then she called her supervisor.
Delphine watched every movement.
“No one is taking either child anywhere without me.”
Allison nodded.
“They won’t.”
“Tell me what you remember.”
“I need to be careful.”
“Why?”
“Because memory isn’t a medical record.”
“Then tell me what you remember, and we’ll find the record.”
Allison sat.
“Claire was admitted here four years ago.”
“For childbirth?”
“Yes.”
“You saw her baby?”
“I saw a newborn girl.”
Quincy pressed against Delphine.
“Her name was Rosie.”
Allison looked at him sharply.
Delphine did too.
“Rosie?”
Quincy nodded.
“Mommy Claire called her that.”
Delphine felt sick.
Garrett had not merely omitted a pregnancy.
He had erased a child.
Allison continued.
“Claire had a difficult delivery. The baby was small, but stable.”
“Did she die?”
“I never saw a death.”
“That isn’t the same answer.”
“No.”
Allison took a breath.
“What I remember is unusual because Claire became extremely distressed several hours after delivery.”
“Why?”
“She said someone had taken her baby.”
Quincy lowered his eyes.
Delphine’s skin went cold.
“And Garrett?”
“He told staff Claire was confused from medication.”
“Was she?”
“I don’t know.”
“What happened next?”
“There was a psychiatric consultation.”
“Who requested it?”
Allison paused.
“Garrett.”
Delphine closed her eyes.
It was too familiar already.
A woman says something terrible happened.
Her husband says she is confused.
Everyone starts evaluating the woman instead of the accusation.
“What about Nadine?”
“She was here.”
Of course.
Allison continued.
“I remember because she repeatedly told staff that Claire had experienced ‘episodes’ before.”
Quincy suddenly said:
“Grandma said Mommy was crazy.”
Delphine pulled him closer.
Allison looked toward the door.
“Hospital administration needs to review the archived chart.”
“Do that.”
“I already requested it.”
Security returned.
Garrett demanded to speak to Delphine.
She refused.
His voice came through the door.
“Delphine, Quincy is confused!”
She said nothing.
“Claire poisoned him against me!”
Still nothing.
“Open the door!”
The newborn stirred against her.
Delphine looked down.
The tiny fold near her daughter’s ear was barely noticeable.
Something Nadine had reacted to with extraordinary intensity.
“This family has already been through this once.”
Delphine repeated the sentence in her mind.
“What did Claire’s baby look like?”
Allison frowned.
“I don’t remember enough to say.”
“Anything unusual?”
The nurse hesitated.
“I remember genetics being mentioned.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
Delphine looked at her daughter.
“Did she have the same ear difference?”
Allison stared.
Then whispered:
“I think so.”
The room fell silent.
Quincy looked toward the baby.
“Rosie had a little bump there.”
Delphine felt her blood run cold.
Nadine had not simply disliked a harmless difference.
She had recognized it.
The same physical trait.
The same family.
Another baby girl.
And now the same woman had tried to remove Delphine’s daughter from her bassinet.
Hospital risk management arrived with the archived chart number.
But the full record could not be retrieved immediately.
Part of it had been moved into long-term storage.
One fact appeared instantly.
Claire had delivered a daughter.
Garrett was listed as father.
Delphine stared at the screen.
There it was.
Proof.
Garrett had lied.
He had told Delphine repeatedly:
“Quincy was our only child.”
Not “only surviving child.”
Not “only child I raised.”
Only child.
A deliberate lie.
The chart contained one more line.
INFANT DISPOSITION: TRANSFERRED.
Delphine looked at Allison.
“Transferred where?”
The field was blank.
“Why?”
“It shouldn’t be.”
“Could it mean another hospital?”
“Yes.”
“Did she need one?”
Allison shook her head slowly.
“Not that I remember.”
Delphine asked:
“Was there a death certificate?”
Hospital staff searched.
None appeared in the chart.
The state database would require a formal request.
But there was no immediate hospital death record.
Garrett had told Quincy his baby sister died.
Yet the hospital record said transferred.
Transferred somewhere unnamed.
Then a security officer entered holding a small backpack.
“Quincy says this is his.”
The boy nodded.
He opened it.
Inside were crayons.
A toy car.
A folded sweatshirt.
And a small plastic hospital bracelet.
Allison stared.
Delphine read the faded writing.
BABY GIRL CLAIRE M.
Four years old.
Quincy whispered:
“I took it when Daddy threw Mommy’s things away.”
Garrett had kept one bracelet.
Then tried to destroy it.
May you like
And a three-year-old boy had quietly rescued it.
👉 Quincy had preserved the hospital bracelet of Claire’s supposedly dead daughter, while the archived chart showed she had actually been transferred somewhere alive.
