Mark stayed close to her.
He kept one hand near the small of her back while they greeted everyone.
Lauren smiled often, but I noticed that she kept touching the side of her stomach.
She had done that throughout the pregnancy.
Sometimes it was affection.
Sometimes it was reassurance.
I could usually tell which was which.
That afternoon, I wasn’t sure.
Eventually, someone called out that we should cut the cake before the sun disappeared behind the trees.
Everyone gathered around.
Lauren laughed nervously.
Mark handed her the knife.
When she finally pressed the blade through the white frosting, everyone leaned forward.
The yard became strangely quiet.
Lauren cut slowly, then made the second slice.
Mark stood beside her, smiling.
Lauren slid the cake server underneath the piece and carefully lifted it out.
Pink.
“It’s a girl!”
The backyard erupted.
People screamed.
Everyone clapped.
Someone behind me shouted with excitement.
Lauren’s best friend started laughing and crying at the same time.
But Lauren didn’t celebrate.
She stared at the cake.
For one strange second, I thought she hadn’t understood what she was seeing.
Then she started crying.
Mark immediately wrapped his arms around her.
“We’re having a daughter.”
“I know,” she whispered.
Everyone around them seemed to interpret her tears as happiness and relief.
After everything Lauren had endured, tears made perfect sense.
Several people stepped forward to hug her.
Someone told her she would be a wonderful mother.
I desperately wanted to believe they were happy tears too.
But something about her expression bothered me.
She didn’t look happy.
She looked terrified.
It wasn’t the expression of someone overwhelmed by good news.
Her face had gone pale.
She kept staring at the pink center of the cake as though it had confirmed something she had desperately hoped wasn’t true.
I watched Mark.
He was whispering something into her ear.
Lauren nodded once.
Then I noticed the baker standing near our backyard gate.
She had personally delivered the cake that morning.
Now she was staring at Lauren.
I almost looked away.
Then I noticed how tense she seemed.
Her arms were folded tightly across her chest, and her attention remained fixed on my daughter and Mark.
When our eyes met, she quickly motioned for me to come over.
I hesitated.
Lauren was still surrounded by people.
Mark still had one arm around her.
But something about the baker’s expression made me cross the yard.
She stepped closer to the gate.
“I need to show you something.”
“What?”
“Not here.”
My stomach tightened before I even knew why.
She led me toward her delivery van and pulled out her phone.
“This morning, your son-in-law came to the bakery.”
I frowned.
“Mark?”
“He told us the doctor’s envelope was wrong.”
For a moment, I simply stared at her.
Behind us, I could still hear people laughing and talking.
My stomach tightened.
“How could he know that?”
She turned the phone toward me.
The security footage showed Mark standing at the bakery counter.
But he wasn’t alone.
A woman I’d never seen before was standing beside him.
She handed the baker a second sealed envelope.
“They paid us $500 to use this result instead.”
I stared back toward the party.
Mark was still holding Lauren.
“Then what’s the real gender?”
The baker swallowed.
“That’s not why I pulled you aside.”
She zoomed in on the woman standing next to Mark.
“She came back after he left.”
“And?”
