After His Mistress Made Me Infertile, He Defended Her

The examination room at Mount Sinai smelled like antiseptic and something else I couldn't name. Something cold. Dr. Patel sat across from me with my file open on her lap. Her face was careful. Too careful.

"Serenity," she said. "The tests came back."

I nodded. I'd been trying for eight months. Eight months of tracking ovulation, of hope every cycle, of Maxwell saying *soon, soon* while scrolling through his phone at breakfast. Eight months of my body refusing to do the one thing I'd wanted it to do since I was twenty-three years old.

"There's no easy way to say this." Dr. Patel's hands folded over the file. "You're infertile. Permanently."

The word hung in the air between us.

"That's not possible," I said. My voice sounded far away. "You said last year everything was fine. You said—"

"It was fine last year." She leaned forward. "This isn't a congenital issue, Serenity. Your hormone levels show prolonged exposure to high-dose contraceptive compounds. Synthetic progestin at concentrations that would only be present if you'd been taking—" She stopped. Her eyes met mine. "Have you been taking any medication besides the prenatal vitamins?"

"No."

"No birth control? Nothing over-the-counter?"

"Nothing."

Dr. Patel's jaw tightened. She wrote something on a prescription pad, tore it off, and handed it to me. "Take this to a lab. Have them test the vitamins you've been taking. All of them."

I looked down at the paper in my hand. The letters blurred.

"Serenity." Her voice was gentler now. "This didn't happen by accident."

I drove home with the windows down even though it was forty degrees outside. The cold air felt good against my face. My hands on the wheel were steady. I didn't cry. I didn't scream. I just drove.

The penthouse was quiet when I walked in. Maxwell was still at Crawford Ventures. Fallon was somewhere—maybe the guest room, maybe the kitchen making herself tea the way she did every afternoon at three-thirty like clockwork. I didn't look for her.

I went straight to the master bathroom and locked the door.

The prenatal vitamins were on the second shelf of the medicine cabinet. I'd been taking them for eight months. One every morning with breakfast. Maxwell used to kiss my temple and say *that's my girl* while I swallowed them down with orange juice.

I pulled the bottle off the shelf. Shook it. Opened it.

The capsules looked right. White and smooth. But when I cracked one open between my fingers, the powder inside didn't smell like vitamins. It smelled faintly chemical. Sharp.

I opened another. Same smell.

I dumped the whole bottle into the sink and started cracking capsules one by one. My hands were shaking now. Not from fear. From something colder.

I heard the bathroom door handle rattle.

"Serenity?" Fallon's voice came through the wood. Soft. Concerned. "Are you okay in there?"

I didn't answer. I kept cracking capsules.

"I heard you come in," she said. "You seemed upset. I just wanted to check—"

I unlocked the door and pulled it open.

Fallon stood in the hallway in one of Maxwell's old Columbia sweatshirts. Her hair was pulled back in a loose bun. Her face was open and worried. She looked at me, then at the pile of broken capsules in the sink behind me.

For one second—just one—her eyes went flat. Cold. Calculating.

Then her face crumpled. Her hand flew to her mouth. Her eyes filled with tears.

"Oh my God," she whispered. "Serenity, what—what happened?"

I held up the empty bottle. My voice came out calm. Quieter than I expected.

"How long?"

Her face went pale. "I don't—I don't understand—"

"How long have you been switching them?"

"Switching—" She shook her head. Tears spilled down her cheeks. "Serenity, I would never—"

"How. Long."

She took a step back. Her shoulders started shaking. "I didn't mean to—I wasn't thinking—I just—" Her voice broke. "I was so scared you'd have a baby and Maxwell wouldn't need me anymore and I'd have to go back to *him* and I couldn't—I couldn't go back—"

She sank down onto the hallway floor. Sobbing now. Her hands covering her face.

I looked at her. At the performance. At the woman who had lived in my home for six months, eaten at my table, smiled at me every morning over coffee.

I pulled out my phone and called Maxwell.

He answered on the second ring. "Hey, I'm in a meeting—"

"Come home," I said.

"What? Serenity, I can't just—"

"Come home now."

I hung up.

Fallon was still crying on the floor. I stepped over her and walked into the kitchen. I laid the empty vitamin bottle on the counter. I laid Dr. Patel's note next to it. I laid the cracked capsules in a neat line.

Then I sat down at the kitchen table and waited.

Maxwell arrived twenty minutes later. He came through the door fast, his tie loose, his face flushed.

"What's going on?" he said. "You sounded—"

He stopped. He saw Fallon first. She was still in the hallway, curled against the wall, her face red and wet.

"Fallon?" He crossed to her immediately. Knelt down. Put his hand on her shoulder. "Hey, hey, what happened?"

She looked up at him. Her voice came out small and broken. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, Maxwell. I didn't mean to hurt anyone. I just—I was so scared—"

"Scared of what?" His voice was gentle. Protective.

I stood up. "She's been switching my prenatal vitamins with contraceptives for eight months."

Maxwell's head turned toward me. His face went blank.

"I'm infertile," I said. "Permanently. Because of her."

He looked at Fallon. At me. At the evidence on the counter.

Then he stood up and stepped between us.

"Okay," he said. His hands came up like he was calming a spooked animal. "Okay, let's just—let's not do this right now. Fallon's clearly in a fragile state—"

"Fragile," I repeated.

"She didn't know what she was doing," Maxwell said. His voice was firm now. "You can't attack her like this, Serenity. She's been through enough."

I raised my right hand. The one with the missing ring finger. The one I lost pulling him out of a car wreck on an icy road ten years ago. The one that ended my career before it started.

I held it in front of his face.

"I gave you this," I said quietly. "I gave you ten years. I gave you everything I had. And you're protecting *her*?"

His jaw tightened. "That's not fair."

"Fair." I lowered my hand. "She leaves in three days, Maxwell. Or I do."

He stared at me. For a long moment, he didn't say anything.

Then he nodded. "Okay. Okay. I'll—I'll figure it out."

I walked past him. Past Fallon. Into the bedroom.

I locked the door and sat on the edge of the bed.

My hands were steady again.

I didn't cry.