Chapter 7 - THE NAME IN THE STORAGE RECORDS
Andrew Bennett had lived in Pittsburgh.
He and Lucía met at Penn State when they were nineteen.
At twenty-two, Andrew was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma.
Before chemotherapy, his doctors recommended fertility preservation.
He recovered.
They became engaged.
Then, at twenty-four, he died when a delivery truck crossed the center line during an ice storm outside State College.
Lucía entered religious formation the following year.
I knew most of that.
I had never known about the stored sperm.
Neither had I known Andrew had designated Lucía as the person authorized to make decisions about the samples if he died.
His parents agreed to provide DNA samples.
Elaine Bennett cried during the phone call.
Not because she knew what had happened.
Because she did not.
“Are you telling me we might have grandchildren?” she asked.
Lucía closed her eyes.
“I don’t know what I’m telling you.”
Meanwhile, the diocesan attorney obtained Lucía’s written authorization to request records from Keystone.
Those records did not arrive immediately.
The receiving logs did.
Three refrigerated reproductive-material shipments had come to Santa Clara.
The first had been signed for by Lucía herself.
The second by Beatriz.
The third by Carmen.
All three referenced the same storage account.
Andrew Bennett.
I watched Lucía read the page.
She did not deny the first signature.
That frightened me more than if she had.
“Lucía?”
She folded the paper carefully.
“I need to talk to an attorney.”
“You already have diocesan counsel available.”
“No. My own.”
I understood.
The Church was now part of the story too, and she needed someone whose only obligation was to her.
The victim advocate helped her contact an attorney in Lancaster who handled sexual assault and medical-consent cases.
That evening Lucía packed clothes for herself and the boys.
“Where are you going?”
“The order has an apartment used for sisters on medical leave.”
“You don’t have to leave.”
“Yes, I do.”
She looked around the room where I had moved her for protection.
“I can’t figure out what happened while I’m still living inside the place where it happened.”
She zipped Mateo’s jacket.
Then she turned to me.
“There’s something I didn’t tell you after the first pregnancy.”
My throat tightened.
“What?”
May you like
Lucía looked at her sleeping children.
“The first time, no one forced me.”
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