He looked at it.
His shoulders dropped.
For several seconds, he appeared to age before my eyes.
Then he sat down.
“Yes,” he whispered.
The word was so quiet that I almost didn’t hear it.
I sat opposite him.
“Tell me everything.”
Michael rubbed his face with both hands.
Six years earlier, he had visited a fertility specialist after becoming concerned that we had never conceived. His initial tests showed a serious abnormality, and the doctor recommended further investigations.
Michael had been devastated.
He had grown up believing that becoming a father was an essential part of being a man. His own father had been cruel and dismissive, and Michael had promised himself that he would become a better father than the man who raised him.
When the first results suggested that he might have a fertility problem, he felt as though his entire identity had collapsed.
“I thought you’d leave me,” he said.
