Anna forced a laugh. “Both of them. Genetics does what it wants, I guess.”
But late at night, I’d find her sitting in the boys’ room, watching them breathe.
“Do you think your family believes me?” she whispered.
“I don’t care what anyone thinks,” I told her.
Years passed. Josh and Raiden grew, ran, shouted for ice cream at the worst times. Our house was chaos—the kind I had prayed for.
But Anna’s smiles faded. She became anxious at family gatherings, quieter when gossip reached our door.
After the boys’ third birthday, I found her in their dark bedroom.
“Henry, I can’t do this anymore. I can’t lie to you.”
She handed me a folded paper—a family group chat.
“If the church finds out, we’re done. Don’t tell Henry! Let people think what they want. That’s less complicated than dragging old family business into the light.”
Anna broke down. “I wasn’t hiding another man, Henry. I was hiding the part of me they taught me to fear.”
Her grandmother had been mixed-race—half white, half Black. Her mother had hidden it, ashamed, pressured by family and community.
Raiden carried more of the grandmother they erased.
