Tula’s mind raced as she stared at the door, waiting for the doctor to come. The minutes stretched, bending under the weight of too many tests, too many clipped answers. Ashley sat beside her, fingers laced tight, eyes fixed on the floor. Neither of them spoke. There was nothing left to say.
The doctor came in five minutes later, though it felt longer. He carried no charts this time. Just a name badge clipped too neatly to his coat and a weight behind his eyes. Tula didn’t ask him to sit. She didn’t offer a greeting. She only said, “Tell me the truth.”
Tula’s heart rattled in her chest, and she couldn’t hear anything over her deafening heartbeat. The doctor took a brief pause before speaking up. Then he spoke, and for a moment, Tula thought she hadn’t heard him correctly. Her stomach turned before her mind caught up. She looked at Ashley, but her daughter’s expression had already collapsed.
Tula folded the newspaper in half, steam curling from her untouched coffee. Morning sunlight pooled on the floor as the apartment hummed with silence. Ashley, her daughter, was asleep after another night shift. Tula had packed granddaughter’s lunch, braided her hair, and waved her off like she did every school day.
She liked this hour—when everything was done and the world paused for her. Toast crumbs on the plate, crossword half-finished. She leaned back in the kitchen chair, lifting the coffee to her lips when a sudden, searing pain stabbed low in her abdomen. Her fingers trembled. The mug clinked hard against the saucer.
She froze. The pain bloomed and faded, but its shadow lingered. It wasn’t ordinary—wasn’t gas, indigestion, or one of those harmless aches that come with age. No. It felt old. Familiar. Her breath quickened. Her hand moved instinctively to her stomach. Not again, she thought. Please—not again.
That same place. That same intensity. Tula blinked against the swell of panic rising in her chest. It had been years since the tumor. Years since doctors said “Stage II” with too much softness in their voice. She had fought, endured, survived. But survival had cost her more than she could ever reclaim.
She remembered the cramped hospital beds and plastic-tasting water. Ashley, crying in a hallway, trying to hide it. Her son-in law, Robert, taking phone calls about insurance approvals and medication dosages. The relentless beeping of machines. And yet, through it all, they had stood by her. They never let her fall.
Before the diagnosis, life had been generous—even in grief. After George passed, Tula mourned, but she didn’t retreat. She remained a fixture in the community—volunteering at the library, attending jazz nights downtown, laughing too loudly at local comedy shows with her friends. Sundays were for golf, wind, and friendship.
She had a rhythm, a routine. Her days were full—appointments at the salon, impromptu lunches, evenings with vinyl records spinning George’s favorite saxophone solos. Retirement had given her time, and George’s insurance had given her security. She wasn’t rich, but she had enough—for travel, for gifts, for comfort.
Then came the diagnosis. And with it, the quiet erosion of everything she’d built. Cancer didn’t just devour the body—it drained the account, unraveled the plans. Medications, scans, hospital stays—all chipping away at the life she’d once taken for granted. When it ended, she was alive—but stripped bare.
When the bills came—and kept coming—Tula had tried to bear it alone. And ultimately she had to make the decision of selling her house, her haven with George. Just like that. Forty years of memories boxed up and handed over. The ivy on the porch would now climb for someone else.
George had built that home for her. After his sudden death, it was the one place that still felt like him—warm, steady, full of Sunday jazz and lemon soap. Giving it up was like losing him all over again. She never told Ashley how much it hurt.
But Ashley knew anyway. She and Robert insisted Tula move in, making space in their already full lives. Emily painted a sign for her door that read “Nana’s Room” in crooked letters. Tula settled into their three-bedroom apartment with quiet grace, always aware of the effort her presence required.
Now, in the hush of the morning, she pressed a hand to her side and exhaled slowly. Whatever this was, it couldn’t be what she feared. She wouldn’t let it be. Ashley was sleeping. Emily was at school. Tula couldn’t afford to become the center of another storm.
So she stood, slowly, like the floor might give out beneath her, and walked back to her room. Each step was careful. Measured. She would lie down. Maybe it would pass. Maybe it was nothing. But in the back of her mind, something shifted—something quiet and ominous that refused to be named.
Tula became a master of concealment. She learned to flinch in silence, to smile through winces, to time her sighs between footsteps. At dinner, she pushed food around her plate, offering excuses with a grandmother’s charm—“You don’t need that much at my age”—as though appetite naturally faded with time.
Ashley sometimes furrowed her brow, noticing the untouched soup or the way Tula pressed a hand to her middle, pretending to laugh at something Emily said. But Tula brushed it off. Age, she insisted. Nothing more. It wasn’t a lie, exactly—but it wasn’t the truth either.
When the pain deepened, she made the quiet decision to handle it alone. She shuffled to the corner drugstore on trembling legs and bought over-the-counter painkillers, clutching the receipt like it was a secret. The small white pills promised temporary silence, and that was all she needed—for now.
She wasn’t trying to be noble. She was tired. Tired of hospital gowns, bills, waiting rooms, and the look in Ashley’s eyes when money was tight. At seventy-two, she’d lived a full life. George was gone, the house was gone, and if this was the end—so be it.
For a week, the charade held. She moved less, stayed in her room more, swallowed tea with pills when no one was looking. Dinner became a performance. But something about her had shifted, and her family sensed it, like the air right before a storm—still, heavy, too quiet to ignore.
Then came the morning that undid everything. The apartment was hushed after Emily left for school. Tula moved through the kitchen slowly, boiling water for tea. Just as she reached for the cup, a bolt of pain shot through her stomach, blinding and sudden. Her hand jerked. The cup slipped.
Porcelain shattered across the tiled floor, a sound too sharp to be ignored. Tula staggered back, one hand clutched around her middle, breath ragged, knees giving out beneath her. A door banged open behind her. Ashley, pale and wide-eyed, rushed into the kitchen—her mother crumpled on the floor before her.
Ashley’s scream pierced the stillness as she rushed to her mother’s side, heart thundering in her chest. “Mom! What happened?” she cried, crouching beside her. But Tula didn’t answer. Her head lolled to one side, eyes closed. The pain had finally silenced her. And then, she was gone.
When Tula awoke, everything was white. The sharp scent of antiseptic stung her nose, and the steady beep of a monitor echoed in the sterile air. Her eyes fluttered open to find Ashley beside her, pale and sleepless, gripping the edge of the chair like it anchored her to hope.
Ashley noticed immediately. “She’s awake!” she called out, bolting upright and running toward the hallway. A moment later, a doctor entered, clipboard in hand, concern etched deep into his features. He approached the bed gently, asked what had happened. Tula hesitated. But then, seeing Ashley’s pleading face, she spoke.
“I’ve been having… pain. Sharp, shooting. In my stomach. For a few weeks now,” she said softly, eyes avoiding her daughter’s. Ashley didn’t respond at first, but Tula saw the way her expression changed—something like hurt mixed with disbelief. She turned her face toward the wall and said nothing more.
The doctor reviewed her chart, nodding slowly. He noted her previous diagnosis, the chemo, the recovery. “We’ll run a few scans before drawing conclusions,” he said calmly. “Given your history, we have to consider the possibility of recurrence. I just want you to be prepared.” The room suddenly felt colder.
Tula’s composure cracked. “No,” she whispered, her voice catching. “Please, Ashley—take me home. I can’t go through this again.” Tears spilled down her cheeks as she gripped her daughter’s hand tightly. “Not again. Not this place. I just want peace. I can’t do this anymore.” Her voice trembled with finality.
Ashley pulled her mother close, holding her as she sobbed. “You’re not alone, Mom. We’ll face this together,” she said, brushing back Tula’s hair. “Let’s wait for the results first. One step at a time. Please. Don’t give up on me just yet.” Her words softened the panic in Tula’s eyes.
Tula exhaled slowly, still clinging to Ashley’s hand. Her daughter’s steady voice had pierced through the fear, anchoring her. For the first time since the pain began, she felt something close to ease. Maybe it wasn’t cancer. Maybe it was something small—an ulcer, or gastroenteritis. Nothing fatal. Nothing final.
She scolded herself for spiraling—again. Her mind had gone sprinting to the worst possible place, skipping every reasonable explanation. But fear clung to her bones, deep and familiar. Still, she nodded when Ashley asked if she’d stay for the tests. She’d wait. She owed her daughter at least that much.
Nurses wheeled her down sterile corridors, machines beeped, needles pricked, and strange liquids coursed through her veins. By the time she returned to the room, the walls spun slightly. Hours passed before the doctor knocked and entered. His expression was not relief—but something muddled between concern and confusion.
Tula sat up straighter. Ashley rose from her chair. Both women looked at him expectantly. But the doctor paused. “Some of the results were… inconclusive,” he admitted, eyes flicking to the chart. “There are anomalies we don’t yet understand. We’ll need to run additional tests.” The air left the room at once.
They exchanged a glance—surprise mingled with unease. Still, they nodded. The doctor was competent, thoughtful. If he said more tests were needed, they’d trust him. So Tula went again—more blood drawn, more scans, more hushed whispers between nurses who didn’t realize she could still hear them from her wheelchair.
Night crept in like fog. The windows darkened, the hallway lights dimmed. Tula lay still under the hospital blanket, staring at the ceiling. Ashley dozed upright in a chair, her hand still in her mother’s. Tula had been poked and scanned a dozen times. Still, no answers came.
When the doctor returned, his face was unreadable. No warmth, no alarm—just a practiced stillness. Ashley straightened. “What is it?” she asked. Tula’s chest tightened. “Please, doctor,” she added. But again, he shook his head. “We still don’t know. The results remain inconclusive. I’m sorry—we’ll need to run more tests.”
Tula’s thoughts spiraled faster than her breath could catch them. She clutched the hospital blanket like it might hold her together. This wasn’t cancer—not this silence, this ambiguity. It was worse. No one would say the word. No one would meet her eyes. Their restraint was no longer professional—it was cruel.
They’d admitted her “for observation,” as if she were a cloud formation they were waiting to classify. Tests came in waves. Fluids drawn. Monitors beeping. Every answer only raised more questions. But when she asked—really asked—she was met with the kind of silence that didn’t come from not knowing, but from choosing not to say.
Ashley stayed close, but even her face had begun to change. She paced more. Slept less. Her tone shifted from concern to frustration. “It’s like they’re building a wall around us,” she whispered one night. Tula didn’t reply. She felt it too. A tightening. A secret growing just out of reach.
In the corridors, conversations hushed when she passed. Behind half-shut doors and medical curtains, she caught phrases not meant for her ears. “Unstable biomarkers.” “Gestational confusion.” “Nothing aligns with her profile.” Words stacked like riddles. Her fear was no longer just about the pain—it was about being deliberately kept in the dark.
One afternoon, as they wheeled her back from another scan, two nurses paused near the elevator. The younger one looked around nervously, then whispered, “Parthenogenesis.” The older nurse hissed, “Don’t say that out loud. It’s not confirmed.” Tula didn’t understand the term, but the fear in their voices chilled her more than the word.
That night, she looked up the word on her phone. The hospital Wi-Fi crawled. The page wouldn’t load. She stared at the buffering wheel like it was mocking her. Every unanswered question became heavier. Something was happening inside her body—and it was so strange, even the doctors didn’t know what to call it.
By morning, the quiet dread turned into anger. When a nurse entered with a clipboard, Tula’s voice cracked like glass. “I want to see my chart. Now.” The nurse blinked. “Ma’am—” “Don’t ‘ma’am’ me. Tell me what’s wrong with me!” Her voice shook the walls. Ashley tried to calm her, failed.
The head nurse stepped in and murmured that a senior doctor had reviewed her scans and wanted to run a full genetic panel. “Just to be thorough,” she said, avoiding eye contact. Tula didn’t argue anymore. Let them poke and prod. At least it kept them from retreating behind their clipboards.
That evening, after yet another test, she returned to her room exhausted—emotionally and physically. Her legs ached from stillness, her ribs sore from the panic. She didn’t speak. She simply pointed to the bed. The nurse helped her lie down and began updating her file at the bedside tablet.
Then the phone buzzed at the nurse’s hip. She stepped out to take the call, leaving the file open. Tula turned her head. The report was there, highlighted in yellow: HCG levels abnormally elevated. Her heart dropped. She blinked, and read it again. HCG. Her hands went cold. Something was very, very wrong.
Tula stared at the screen, her breath caught somewhere between her chest and throat. HCG. She wasn’t the most medically literate person, but she wasn’t stupid either. She’d been pregnant once before—painfully, terrifyingly—with Ashley. And if there was one thing she remembered, it was that word.
Pregnancy hormone. Human chorionic gonadotropin. Elevated levels meant one thing. Pregnant. The blood drained from her face as she slowly placed a hand on her abdomen. Was this some kind of joke? She felt nothing but the familiar ache—and now, a growing horror.
Pregnant? At seventy-two? She shook her head, heart galloping. George had been dead for over a decade. She hadn’t even looked at another man since. She hadn’t touched anyone. The idea was absurd. Obscene. Yet the number sat on that screen like a verdict. High. Abnormal. Elevated.
“No,” she whispered aloud, rising to her elbows. “No, no, no.” Her voice began to rise. Panic overtook her reason. She pressed the call button. Then pounded it. The nurse re-entered, startled. Tula was trembling. “Get the doctor,” she snapped. “Now.” The nurse hesitated. “Now!” she screamed. “I want answers!”
Minutes later, the doctor arrived—calm, too calm. Clipboard in hand, face composed. Ashley stood behind him, confused and pale. “Tell me,” Tula demanded. “Tell me what this report means. No more silence. No more hiding. Am I hallucinating, or are you people saying I’m pregnant?”
The doctor exhaled slowly, shifting his weight. “Mrs. Abraham… I was going to explain this to you more gently but yes—your test results have, repeatedly, shown elevated levels of HCG. Your blood work and hormone panels are consistent with… early-stage pregnancy.” His voice faltered at the word, unsure how to frame it.
The silence that followed was so dense it could’ve shattered glass. Tula looked at him as if he’d spoken in tongues. “You think I’m what? Pregnant? At seventy-two?” Ashley gasped audibly behind him, clutching the chair. “No,” she said. “That’s not possible. That’s not possible.”
Tula turned to her daughter, eyes wild. “You think I’ve… been with someone?” Her voice was cold, sharper than it had ever been. “Don’t you dare ask me that. Don’t you insult me like that.” Ashley shook her head rapidly, tears gathering. “No—I didn’t—I just—I’m trying to understand!”
Tula’s chest heaved, but her fury crumbled as quickly as it had risen. Her voice faltered. The disbelief no longer roared—it simply hung in the air, heavy and paralyzing. She sank back into the pillows, eyes glassy. There was no explanation she could form that made any of this make sense.
The doctor hesitated, then spoke with the measured calm of someone walking a tightrope. “No one is accusing you of anything,” he said gently. “This isn’t about physical contact. What we’re considering is a rare, mostly theoretical phenomenon—parthenogenesis. It means conception without fertilization. In humans, it’s practically unheard of. But… your results suggest otherwise.”
The doctor cleared his throat, speaking slowly. “Parthenogenesis is an asexual form of reproduction,” he said. “Extremely rare, and nearly unheard of in humans. But in your case… the data suggests it’s possible. This could be an outlier—a biological phenomenon.” His voice trailed off, careful not to say too much.
No one said anything directly, not anymore. But Tula saw it. In the nurse’s second glance. In the intern who lingered just a little too long at the door. In the subtle hush that followed her down the hallway. Something about her was being whispered. Catalogued. Filed into memory.
They called the pregnancy “high risk” in the notes. The doctor mentioned it briefly—possible cardiac strain, complications due to age, unpredictable outcomes. He said it clinically, as though listing weather patterns. But beneath the words, Tula heard it clearly: this wasn’t just unusual. It was dangerous.
Tula lay back against the stiff hospital pillows, eyes fixed on the ceiling. Pregnant. The word didn’t fit in her mouth. It was too absurd, too impossible. She was seventy-two. Her bones ache when it rains. How was she supposed to explain this—to Ashley, to Robert, to the world?
The doctor had said she had time to think. But how could she think when none of this made sense? Being pregnant at 72 was unheard of but even after the doctor’s reassurance, it just didn’t feel right.
Tula remembered her pregnancy with Ashley. Morning sickness, her feet swelling up weeks before she found out, body feeling sore and tender. She remembered how her body had changed even before her mind could catch up.
But this? This didn’t feel like creation. It felt like confusion. Like someone had draped the word pregnant over her, and it refused to sit right. She touched her stomach, not tenderly, but in search of reason. What should she do? Was she really pregnant?
She didn’t say any of this aloud. Ashley was already carrying the weight. Tula could see it in her eyes—the restless calculation. The worry. The hesitation to give any consolation. How could she? How could she console her mother over this bizarre diagnosis when she didn’t understand it herself?
The TV muttered quietly in the corner as evening settled. Tula stared past it. Her breath came slowly, heavily. The room felt smaller than it had in the morning. More observed. More staged. As if someone was waiting for her to make a decision she didn’t believe in.
A nurse entered quietly with a clipboard. “Mrs. Abraham? I just need your signature for the extended genetic panel.” Tula reached for the pen, hand trembling slightly. She glanced at the form, only idly at first—until her eyes caught the printed text: Date of birth: 7 May 1980.
She blinked. “This isn’t right,” she said softly. The nurse leaned closer. “Hmm?” Tula pointed at the field. “That’s not my birthday. I was born in 1951. September nineteenth.” The nurse chuckled lightly, not unkindly. “Oh—must be a printing error. We’ve had a rough week. I’ll just cross it out.”
Tula’s fingers hovered over the page, pen unmoving. Something in her chest curled tight. She signed, slowly. But her mind didn’t move on. May 7, 1980. Forty-four years old. Exactly the age the ultrasound technician had off-handedly mentioned being written on the report today.
Tula signed the form, but her mind wasn’t on the consent. The incorrect birthdate lingered in her head longer than she’d expected. The nurse had corrected it casually, a quick stroke of her pen. But something about it itched at her—like a word she’d misheard and couldn’t forget.
She reminded herself hospitals were busy places. Mistakes happened. Still, it wasn’t the only one. A technician had asked if she was “back already” during her first scan, though she’d never met him before. Another nurse had said that she brought in a scan for ‘Tula A.’, before correcting herself and leaving the room without explanation.
At the time, none of it had seemed worth holding onto. The days were blurring. Between tests, bloodwork, and restless sleep, it was easy to overlook small things. But now, in the stillness of her room, those small things rose to the surface like air bubbles.
She didn’t know what they meant—if they meant anything at all. Maybe she was just tired. Maybe it was all in her head. But a quiet unease had settled into her. Something didn’t feel right. And it was more than her anxiety about being pregnant at 72.
The next morning, as the nurse entered with a fresh chart, Tula didn’t wait. “I want to see my full file,” she said. Her tone was steady, without apology. “Not summaries. Not reprints. The original paperwork. Intake forms. Every page with my name on it from the day I came in.”
The nurse hesitated. “Would you prefer to speak with your doctor about—” “No,” Tula said, sharper now. “I don’t need an interpretation. I need the documents.” She looked the nurse directly in the eye. “Bring them.” There was no anger in her voice, just a hard-edged clarity that left little room for delay.
The nurse gave a short nod and backed out of the room. She didn’t return for nearly an hour. When she did, she placed a thick file on the tray table and left without a word. Tula pulled it toward her, unclipped the binder, and began to read.
The pages were clinical, impersonal: vital signs, handwritten notes, lab requisitions. Nothing strange at first. Ashley watched from the chair, saying nothing. Then, sandwiched between two ultrasound reports, Tula found it—a single page that didn’t belong. Patient: Tula Afsana. DOB: 07/05/1980. Her eyes narrowed. Her breath slowed.
“This isn’t me,” she said, holding the paper up without looking away from it. Ashley stood, moved closer, and took the page from her hand. Her face changed as she read it. “That’s… not your file,” she said quietly. Her voice was level, but her fingers curled tightly around the edge.
Within minutes, a nurse reappeared, followed by two doctors. The file was reviewed again. Pages cross-checked. Barcodes scanned. And then came the explanation—delivered carefully, but unmistakable in its finality. “There was a barcode mix-up on the intake day,” one of them said. “Two patients named Tula. Same initial. Different floors.”
As the last page was clipped back into the file, Tula looked at the doctor and said, dryly, “So I’m not giving birth at seventy-two after all?” Her voice was calm, but the weight of the last week sat heavily behind it. The doctor offered a thin, embarrassed smile. “No,” he said. “You were never pregnant. Your pain was due to Gastroenteritis actually. I warned the staff not to rely on system shortcuts. But… we failed you.”
They left her with silence and a half-hearted apology. Tula didn’t need either. She finally had her name, her file, her truth—and that was enough. She lay back, closed her eyes, and let the weight lift, not with relief, but with something steadier. The calm reassurance of a woman who had believed in herself.