32
LUCA BELLANDI
I left the Palazzo before dawn without telling Gabriela.
The car took me to Milan. I opened our messages and began to type: Are you pregnant? I deleted the question.
Then would come the answer. If she said yes and told me the child was mine, I’d have to choose between her word and the medical evidence. If she said the father was Cris, it would all end anyway. I chose to look for certainty first.
I still had the contacts Cris had recommended, along with the number Sofia had given me.
I scrolled past Cris’s without opening them.
At Sofia’s, I stopped, imagining the tests a stranger would order and the days I’d wait for an answer.
Marinelli already knew my history. I called. He could see me before opening hours.
Dr. Enzo Marinelli still ran the private clinic where I’d been tested fifteen years earlier. The doctor had aged, but reception remained quiet and lined with pale wood. Diplomas and photographs from conferences covered the walls. He saw me outside his usual hours.
“Luca, we could have used the side entrance. My secretary couldn’t reach your driver.”
“No one followed me.”
“What do you need?”
I set the reports on his desk.
“I want the tests repeated.”
He adjusted his glasses.
“After all this time?”
“Is there any chance the diagnosis was wrong?”
He paused just long enough to seem considered.
“The findings were conclusive.”
“That doesn’t answer my question.”
“In medicine, we avoid absolutes. But two semen analyses, hormone testing, and a biopsy confirmed nonobstructive azoospermia. A spontaneous reversal would be extraordinarily unlikely.”
“Unlikely or impossible?”
“In practice, impossible.”
The word should have brought clarity. It brought only a cold pain.
“Do them again.”
“I can order them, but the result won’t change your history.”
“Today.”
“It would be safer to repeat with two samples at an appropriate interval,” he said. “I can refer you to a specialist laboratory.”
“Do it here first. I’m not waiting for another appointment.”
He gathered the documents and checked the time. I waited without getting up.
“Then we’ll give it the highest priority,” he said.
“I want to watch the sample being identified and receive the laboratory report, not just your opinion.”
His smile was patient.
“Of course. You’ll receive everything.”
I was sent to provide the sample. Following the employee’s instructions, I checked my name and date of birth on the container.
Two hours later, Marinelli handed me a preliminary result.
None detected. I looked at the timestamp at the bottom of the page.
Processing had been completed only minutes earlier.
“That was fast.”
“Priority status allowed immediate analysis. The authenticated final report will be sent by the end of the day.”
I took the paper. For the third time, the same conclusion. As I folded it, I remembered the first appointment, the armchair by the window, Marinelli’s voice telling me I needed to accept it. Fifteen years later, I was back in that room.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
I read the central line again.
“No room for doubt?”
“No sign of recovery. If there’s a pregnancy involved, I advise establishing paternity before making any commitments.”
I looked up.
“How do you know there’s a pregnancy involved?”
For the first time, his composure faltered.
“Only an assumption. Men rarely repeat this test urgently without a specific reason.”
“She hasn’t told me yet,” I admitted.
He rested his hands on the desk.
“Then perhaps you should let her speak first. How she presents the news will tell you a great deal.”
I picked up the paper.
“No one is to know I was here.”
“Of course.”
Outside, I found a message Gabriela had sent at eight. Where are you? We have the inspection at nine. I replied that I’d gone to Milan to revisit some tests and Carlo could accompany the team until I returned. She called at once.
“Are you all right?”
The worry in her voice cut through everything I was trying to build.
“I am.”
“Then why did you go to a doctor?”
“To review old tests.”
A silence.
“Because of me?”
My heart seemed to stop.
“Why would it be because of you?”
“Because we talked about the diagnosis. I thought perhaps you wanted another opinion.”
“The result hasn’t changed.”
“I’m sorry.”
She fell quiet. I pressed the phone to my ear, waiting for her to say something else. The pause seemed too long.
“I need to go.”
“Luca, wait. We agreed to talk when you got here. I need to tell you today.”
“What’s happening?” she asked. “You’ve been cold since you came back. You left without telling me, and now you’ve had the tests redone. If you’re scared, talk to me.”
I rested my forehead against the car window. I could tell her I knew about the pregnancy and that I was afraid. I didn’t want to hear her talk about that child while I held Marinelli’s result.
“We’ll talk after the opening.”
“You promised to listen yesterday. You can’t keep putting it off without explaining anything.”
“Tomorrow, then. After the speeches.”
I hung up.
At the group’s office, I put the new report with the photographs. I asked security for the full footage from that night at the hotel. They said the raw material was with the company handling the extraction.
“I want it sent today.”
The employee promised to follow up. I set my phone faceup on the desk. When it vibrated, I opened the message before checking the sender. It was a meeting confirmation. Lorenzo came in around noon.
“I heard you went to the clinic.”
I looked up.
“How?”
“Your driver mentioned dropping you off. Was there a problem?”
“Since when do you ask my driver where I’m going?”
“I needed to know the meeting time. You didn’t answer.”
I checked my phone: two calls from him.
“Postpone the meeting. And don’t ask the driver about me again.”
His gaze went to the clinic paper before he stood. I covered it with the folder.
“Let me know when the footage arrives. All of it.”
He said he’d chase it up himself and left. I kept the phone beside the folder. I’d known Lorenzo since he was a boy; if the material existed, he’d get it. At least that much, I still thought, I could count on.
Back at the Palazzo late that afternoon, I entered through the private passage. Gabriela was in the garden, supervising the lighting. Her hand kept resting on her belly, a gesture I now thought I understood. She saw me and walked over.
“You said we’d talk after the speeches,” she reminded me. “I don’t want to spend another night trying to guess what I’ve done.”
“Let’s stick to what we agreed.”
“I don’t know what that means to you anymore.”
An electrician approached to ask about the floodlights. She asked him to give her a minute, waited for him to move away, and turned back to me.
“Why are you speaking to me like this?”
I was waiting for her to mention Cris. Each time she tried to reach me, her silence about him irritated me more.
“I’m tired.”
“Stop using that as an excuse.”
She touched my arm. I pulled away. Just then, a message from Cris appeared on the phone in her hand: Did you get to talk? Call me when you can. She lowered it. He knew. While I waited for an explanation, the two of them were still talking.
“Luca . . .”
I looked at her hand, still suspended between us, and didn’t take it.
“Tomorrow. After the speeches,” I repeated, walking away before she could answer.
In my private office, I took my copy of the house drawing from the safe. I considered tearing it up. I remembered her holding the original, talking about the light that would enter the living room, and put it back.
The tailor was waiting to make the final adjustments to my tuxedo. I took security’s call while he straightened the sleeve.
“The supplier says transferring the complete footage will take longer, Mr. Bellandi.”
I stared at my reflection.
“How long?”
“They haven’t confirmed.”
“Get an estimate.”
“Yes, sir.”
The tailor asked me to lower my arm. I looked at the armchair where Gabriela used to sit while I finished dressing. I’d liked having her there, hearing her hurry me along. Now I was the one keeping her out. I didn’t cancel the order.
I’d keep the folders until she spoke. If there was an explanation, she’d have to give me something I could believe. I ran a hand over the newly adjusted sleeve without looking at the chair again.