"Seven to ten days, minimum," Maya said finally.
Her laugh came out thinner than she intended, and Eleanor's answering smile looked like sunlight through slow parting clouds.
"Seven to ten days."
"Don't call me every day."
"I won't, I promise."
"Don't hire someone to follow me."
Eleanor blinked. "I would never—"
"I'm kidding." Maya wasn't, entirely. "Mostly kidding."
On the sidewalk, Eleanor hesitated, then held out her hand. Maya shook it — a business gesture, absurd between them, and somehow exactly right.
The wait began that afternoon.
Maya went back to work. She carried trays, smiled at regulars, folded napkins. Rosa watched her like a hawk and said nothing, which was Rosa's way of saying everything.
On day three, Rosa cornered her in the walk-in.
"You're doing the thing," Rosa said.
"What thing, exactly."
"The quiet thing. The thing where you pretend you're fine and your tips drop twenty percent." Rosa crossed her arms. "Talk."
"I don't want to jinx it."
"Jinx what? It's a lab test, not a wish." Rosa's voice softened. "You know what I think? I think you're scared it's yes. No would be easy. Yes means everything gets complicated."
Maya stared at the shelves of mise en place and said nothing, which was answer enough.
At night, Maya lay awake and counted the days on the ceiling. Seven. Ten. Business days, which didn't count weekends, which felt like a personal insult.
On the fourth night, she took the shoebox out of the closet again and held the little plastic bracelet up to the lamplight.
Baby L.W.
She put it back. She didn't open the envelope.
Ten business days felt like a year.
Chapter 7: Ninety-Nine Point Nine Nine
The call came on a Tuesday morning, day eleven. Maya was folding laundry and let it go to voicemail, then stood listening to it twice.
"It's ready," the tech's voice said. "You can pick up the results in person, or we can release them to both parties. It's your call, Ms. Carter."
Maya called Eleanor.
"They said I decide," Maya said.
"Then you decide."
"Come with me. Tomorrow. Ten o'clock." A pause. "I don't want to read it alone."
"I'll be there."
The next morning Eleanor was already in the waiting room when Maya arrived, sitting with her coat folded over her knees like she'd been there an hour.
"You came early," Maya said.
"I haven't slept in eleven days," Eleanor said. "Early was all I had left."
Maya almost laughed. "Fair."
The consultation room was the same small clean room, minus the swabs. The tech slid a sealed envelope across the desk and left them alone. Maya's name was typed on the front. Under it, Eleanor's.
"Do you want to—" Eleanor started.
"I'll do it." Maya's hands were steady, which surprised her. She tore the flap.
One page. A table of numbers she didn't understand, and one line in plain language:
Probability of maternity: 99.99%.
She read it three times.
"Ninety-nine point nine nine," she said out loud.
Eleanor made a sound like something tearing. Maya looked up, and Eleanor was crying — not gracefully, not the way women in her world cried. Her face had come apart. Twenty-five years, landing all at once.
"Oh," Eleanor said. "Oh, Lily—"
"Don't." Maya's voice was flat. "Don't call me that."
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry." Eleanor pressed her fingers to her mouth. "May I— can I hold your hand?"
Maya looked at her for a long moment. Then she put the paper down and slid it across the desk, and she let Eleanor take her hand, and Eleanor wept over the crescent birthmark.
Maya felt nothing. That was the strangest part. She'd expected terror, or grief, or relief — something cinematic. Instead there was a clean white numbness. It filled her ears like soft static, and she couldn't hear her own thoughts through it.
"It's real," Eleanor whispered. "You're real. You're here."
"Yeah."
"I know this is — I know it's too much. Take all the time you—"
"So what do I call you?" Maya cut in.
Eleanor blinked. "What?"
"What do I call you." Maya pulled her hand back. "Because you're not my mother. My mother is dead. She died in 2019 and I held her hand while it happened, so whatever this paper says, that's the truth I have." Her voice was rising. "Do I call you Eleanor? Do I call you Mom? Do I put you on some holiday card list? What exactly do you want from me?"