Chapter 5 - THE OLD PATERNITY RUMORRichard did not invent the rumor from nothing.
That mattered.
My father had testicular cancer at twenty-nine.
Surgery.
Chemotherapy.
Survived.
My mother, Catherine, became pregnant with me five years later.
Family gossip had existed quietly for decades.
How?
One aunt once heard a physician tell Dad his fertility might be compromised.
That became:
Samuel could not have children.
Then:
Ethan cannot be his.
My parents never entertained it publicly.
When I was thirteen, a cousin said:
“Uncle Richard says you’re a miracle baby.”
I thought it was about Dad surviving cancer.
Maybe it was.
Maybe not.
After my mother died, I found old fertility-clinic records among her papers.
Dad had banked sperm before chemotherapy.
Later fertility testing showed reduced but not absent viability.
My parents used assisted conception.
Not donor sperm.
Dad’s stored specimen.
At least that was what the records indicated.
I never asked him.
Why would I?
He was my father.
Legally.
Emotionally.
In every practical sense.
But when Richard began trying to restructure Dad’s voting trust after my accident, the old rumor became useful.
He told two family directors:
“Before we lock control into Ethan’s line, someone should verify there is a line.”
One director told Dad.
Dad exploded.
Then, unexpectedly, asked me:
“Would you do a DNA test with me?”
I stared.
“Are you serious?”
“Yes.”
“For Richard?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“Because after I’m dead, he’ll use uncertainty like a crowbar.”
That sentence proved prophetic.
We agreed.
Not secret samples.
Not toothbrushes.
Witnessed cheek swabs at Hartwell Genetic Laboratories.
Photo identification.
Chain of custody.
Dad joked while the technician swabbed him:
“Finally, science can confirm you inherited my bad judgment.”
Results were expected within three weeks.
Dad died eleven days later.
A ruptured cerebral aneurysm.
Sudden.
Unrelated to cancer.
Unrelated to my accident.
Unrelated to Richard.
The DNA result arrived the morning of the funeral.
May you like
Sealed.
I brought it with me.
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