**Diary Entry**
“If the baby looks like him Ill give it up for adoption. I swear I will!” My voice sounded hollow, lifeless.
“Its too late for second thoughts now, my dear. You’ll have to wait it outunless you want to risk never having children at all,” the doctor said flatly.
I stumbled out of the consulting room and sank onto the waiting room sofa, trying to steady myself. Tears pricked at my eyestears of anger, of betrayal. I lifted my head and saw the autumn wind outside, mercilessly shaking the last clinging leaves from the branches. I felt just like those brittle twigshelpless, alone. This baby, once so desperately wanted, now felt like a cruel mistake.
Leaving the clinic, I passed a happy coupleher husbands arm around her shoulders, both beaming. The sight twisted inside me like a knife. I dragged myself to the bus stop, numb.
Back home, I locked myself in my room for nearly an hour. Mum hovered outside, coaxing me to eat, but I couldnt speak. Eventually, I emerged and sat across from her at the kitchen table, the silence between us thick and suffocating.
“If it looks like him Ill give it up,” I repeated tonelessly.
Mum startled, her eyes sharpening. “Valerie, think about what youre saying! A hardworking girl like you, throwing away her own childwhat will people say? What about your family? Your colleagues? How will you live with yourself?”
“I dont care what people think,” I snapped, my voice trembling. In that moment, I felt like a cornered animalwide-eyed, lips shaking, shoulders slumped.
“Ill help you,” Mum insisted. “And I wont let you abandon my grandchild.”
“You can barely scrape by as it is! What help could you possibly give?”
“Well manage,” she said firmly. “People survived worse in the war. Its 1989peaceful times.”
I sighed heavily. Fear gnawed at me. The future was a dark, shapeless thing. I didnt know then that the ’90s would bring their own nightmares. All I knew was this: Vadim had left me.
Wed married six months ago after a year and a half together. A handsome, happy coupleno hint of the storm ahead.
I remember that day vividlyVadim came home a different man. Distant. Thoughtful. His gaze was that of someone whod fallen out of love. He knew I was pregnantthat was the only thing stopping him from walking out sooner. For a month, I begged him to tell me what was wrong. Only when he finally left did I learn the truth.
I was hysterical when his mother, Vera, came overshe cried too, stunned by her sons cruelty.
It had started years ago, back in school. In his final year, Vadim went on a youth hiking trip, meeting teenagers from all over. Thats where he met Vika. Two weeks of puppy love, exchanged addresses, then lost touch when he moved house. He tried to forget herbut three years later, he met me. He thought hed moved on. We married, started trying for a baby.
Then Vika reappearedan advert in the local paper. Vadim invited her to town, booked her a hotel room. One meeting was all it took. He left mepregnantfor her.
At work, my colleagues tried to comfort me. “A babys a blessing,” one newly hired girl said wistfully. “My husband and I have been trying for five years.”
“Yeswith a husband,” I muttered bitterly. There was no joy in this pregnancy, only the sting of abandonment.
At home, Mum tiptoed around me, trying to ease my grief. Then Vera visited, sobbing, begging me to forgive Vadim. She hated Vikanot just for stealing her son, but for taking him a thousand miles away. (Though, really, Vadim had chosen to leave.)
Between them, their pity was suffocating. But my real fear? What if the baby looked like him? His eyes, his nose, his lipswould I spend my whole life staring at his betrayal?
When I left the hospital, I didnt expect the crowd waitingMum, Vera, a close friend with her husband, my sister and niece, even my entire small team. Everyone wanted to hold the baby, to wish us well. At home, Vera cradled him, smiling through tears. “The spitting image of Vadim,” she whispered.
I heard. I took my son back and said, “No, not Vadim. His name is John.”
Mum and Vera sighed in relief.
Twenty years later2010John was in his third year at uni. At home, his two younger sisters adored him. When they were tiny, hed been a doting big brother, helping me tirelessly.
Five years after Johns birth, I remarried. My husband was a wonderful stepfatheralmost like a real dad to Johnand later, a loving father to our girls.
I adored my daughters, but John? He held my heart. That moment in the hospital, when Id sworn Id give him upI couldnt bear to remember it.
As for Vadim? His whirlwind love with Vika ended in five years. She moved abroad with their daughter. He remarried, lives comfortably, sees John occasionally.
I dont stop him. But I feel nothing for him. Just the man who once fathered my precious son.
