Nancy looked at the final traces of her husband’s funeral service. She couldn’t believe Patrick was gone. He had died in a car accident. It had been a week, but she could still feel him around her. How could he be dead?

With a heavy heart, she headed toward the cemetery’s exit, telling herself she had to start figuring out the rest of her life.

Suddenly, an older woman with a baby blocked her path.

“Are you Nancy?” the woman asked while the baby in her arms cried.

Nancy didn’t recognize her. Who was she?

“I am. Who are you?” Nancy replied.

Nancy’s heart wasn’t ready when the woman, Amanda, revealed the baby in her arms was Patrick’s child.

“Only you can look after this child now,” she told Nancy. “Her mother can’t provide for her.”

A shiver ran down Nancy’s spine. She stared at the baby and backed away.

“No, it can’t be! Patrick was a loving husband. He would never do this to me!”

Nancy turned around and left. She would never doubt Patrick.

“Watch out!”

Nancy bumped into one of Patrick’s old friends, Mike. She was too lost in her thoughts to notice where she was heading.

Mike started chatting with her, offering his condolences. Nancy didn’t want to talk to anyone, but she had to be courteous. She finished the conversation as soon as she could and headed to her car.

The baby’s thoughts replayed in her mind, but she dismissed them. However, as Nancy opened her car door, she was shocked. The same baby lay in her back seat, crying.

Nancy looked around. Amanda was nowhere to be seen. “How did this baby even get here?” she wondered.

It was cold, so Nancy removed her jacket and began wrapping it around the little one.

But she froze when she noticed a birthmark on the baby’s neck. “It can’t be,” she muttered to herself.

The birthmark was exactly like Patrick’s. Nancy didn’t want to suspect her late husband of cheating. But now, she needed the truth. She needed to know if Patrick had been unfaithful to her.

Nancy drove home with the baby, took Patrick’s hair strands from his hairbrush, and went to a hospital.

“Hello, I’d like to get a paternity test done,” she told the receptionist at the counter.

“OK, ma’am. Normally, it takes a few days to get the results,” the woman said.

“Can it be done quicker?” Nancy asked. “I’ll pay extra.”

“Well, we do have expedited service. Let me see what I can do. But it will cost you more.”

“I’ll take it,” Nancy replied. She submitted Patrick’s samples and paid for the test.

Sitting in the hallway, she was awaiting the results when the baby started crying. Nancy sniffed the baby’s clothes. Her diaper didn’t need a change.

Nancy guessed she must have been hungry. There was still time before the results came in, so she drove to a supermarket and bought baby formula, bottles, and a few diapers — just in case she needed them.

She returned to the hallway and sat there, feeding the formula to the baby. After what seemed like an eternity, a nurse approached her with the results.

The woman handed her an envelope and walked away.

“This is the truth, and I’ll have to accept it whether I like it or not,” Nancy thought as she opened the results.

Her head seemed to spin when she read the words, “Paternity rate – 99%.”

Nancy looked at the sleeping baby in her arms and swallowed the tears in her eyes. Patrick had cheated on her and kept her in the dark.

Nancy decided she would not live with the proof of his infidelity forever. She would find the baby’s mother and give the baby back to her.

Pulling herself together, Nancy drove home and began going through Patrick’s things. But she didn’t find anything that could point her to his lover. She moved to his office next, searching his drawers, files, and cabinets. But nothing.

Nancy sighed. The baby was asleep in the living room. Grabbing the baby monitor, she headed to Patrick’s car. She searched under the seats, in the glove compartment, and in all the nooks and crannies of the vehicle. But she didn’t find anything significant.

Nancy sank into the driver’s seat when her eyes landed on the GPS. And it was then it hit her. Patrick was terrible at directions and always used the navigator. If he had ever visited his mistress’ house, that is where she would find her address.

Nancy went straight to recent destinations on the navigator. The list wasn’t long, mostly familiar places: local restaurants, the hardware store, and Patrick’s office. But then, one address caught her eye—it appeared more frequently than others, and she didn’t recognize it.

“This is it,” she thought. She took the baby with her and drove to the address.

***

Arriving there, Nancy found herself in front of a modest house. She scooped the baby in her arms, walked to the front door, and knocked.

“Hello? Anyone home?” she asked.

After the tenth knock, when nobody answered the door, Nancy concluded the house was empty. She looked around and decided to approach the neighbors. She started with the house next door and rang the doorbell.

The door opened with a creak, and Nancy’s eyes widened when Amanda stepped out.

“You?” Nancy asked.

“How…how did you find me?” Amanda stuttered.

“I was trying to find my husband’s…” Nancy paused. “His other woman. I wanted to return her baby.”

A strange sadness flashed across Amanda’s face. “The woman who lived next door… died a few days ago. She had a heart attack when she learned about your husband’s accident. Emma is no more.”

“Wait…did you say Emma?” Nancy asked, shocked.

“Yes,” Amanda nodded. “Did you know her?”

“Was…Was her last name Warren?”

When Amanda nodded, Nancy hung her head in shame. “Can-Can I come inside?” she asked. “There’s something I’d like to tell you. I feel I could use some talk.”

Amanda opened the door wider for her, and Nancy stepped inside. They settled in the living room. “Emma was my classmate,” Nancy began recounting her past. “She was also my friend. But I wronged her and…Patrick…”

20 years ago…

Nancy and Patrick were in their school’s hallway. She was standing next to her locker when Patrick approached her.

“Hey, Nancy,” he said quietly, and she looked at him.

“I…I need to tell you something,” Patrick added anxiously.

“Hey,” she smiled. “Yes?”

“I…I’m in love with someone else, Nancy,” he confessed. “I know you’ve been really kind and everything, but I’m sorry.”

Nancy was shocked. “Tell me it’s a joke, Patrick,” she cried. “You can’t be serious!”

But Patrick was serious. Patrick was head over heels in love with Emma, and Emma loved him, too.

Nancy was so distraught that day that she returned home in tears.

“Sweetie, what’s wrong?” Her mother immediately sensed something had happened at school.

Nancy sobbed as she told her how Patrick had broken up with her.

“I want to break them up!” she yelled. “I won’t let them be together!”

“Nancy, you won’t be able to create your own happiness by destroying someone else’s,” her mother advised her. “Revenge is never an option. Forget about him.”

But Nancy was fueled with the desire for revenge.

In the next few days, Nancy tried everything she could to drive Patrick and Emma apart—she spread silly rumors, planned coincidental run-ins where she’d flaunt newfound confidence, and even stooped to sending anonymous notes, trying to stir up jealousy.

However, nothing worked. Emma seemed happy, wrapped up in her and Patrick’s world and Nancy was left on the outside, her plans crumbling uselessly around her.

But Nancy wasn’t the one to give up. One night, she had the perfect idea to drive a wedge between Emma and Patrick.

“Hello, Nancy, how are you?” Nancy visited Patrick, and the door was answered by this mother.

“I’m fine, Mrs. White. Is Patrick home?”

“Yes, dear. Let me get him.”

Patrick was confused to see her on his doorstep. “Nancy? What’s going on?”

“I know this will come as a shock to you, Patrick, but…I’m-I’m pregnant!” she announced.

Patrick was shocked and terrified. “What…but…Are you sure?”

When she nodded, Patrick invited her inside. She told him she hadn’t told her parents yet because she was scared. Nancy said her father would definitely be against it and force her to terminate the pregnancy. So she begged Patrick not to tell anyone about it and noticed how easily he succumbed to her lie.

Patrick was a responsible guy. Nancy knew that. He held her hands and said, “I’m the child’s father, so I’ll take the responsibility for our baby. And yes, don’t worry; this will stay between us.”

Present-day…

“I used him. I lied to him. I wasn’t pregnant,” Nancy told Amanda. “I was hurt, and I couldn’t stand losing him to Emma. So I told him a lie that changed everything. He was ready to step up, leave Emma, and be…a father.”

“Lies ruin everything, dear,” Amanda shook her head. “And what after that? Did he never find out the truth?”

“He didn’t,” Nancy revealed. “I kept up the act, the morning sickness, the whole thing. But after a couple of months, I…I couldn’t carry on with it. So, I told him there was a mistake with the test and that the doctor was wrong. And by then, Emma had…moved. She was heartbroken and had left town with her parents. Patrick and I stayed together. He never went back to her, never tried to find her. We just moved on. Or pretended to…” Nancy added, looking at the sleeping baby in her arms. Now she knew Patrick had returned to Emma.

“And I guess it’s time to correct what I couldn’t back then,” Nancy said and rose to her feet.

She was leaving Amanda’s house with the baby when the older woman stopped her.

“What are you going to do with the baby?” Amanda asked.

Nancy turned around and smiled at Amanda. “I will raise her as my own child. Maybe that’ll help me seek forgiveness from Patrick and Emma.”

And Nancy followed through on her words. She raised baby Catherine with love. When Catherine turned 16, Nancy told her everything about her past. She was expecting Catherine to hate her. And she was prepared for it.

But Catherine smiled and said, “Nothing changes how I feel about you, Mom. You raised me. You were there for every scraped knee, every fever, every heartbreak. You’re my mom in every way that counts.”

Nancy cried silently and hugged her daughter. Catherine’s words had not only relieved her heart, but they’d also made her believe that Emma and Patrick had forgiven her.