Double Helix (18 page)

Since the moment we knew you were pregnant—Ava, I've always known that couldn't be wrong . . . no matter how it came about
.

What had my father meant by “no matter how it came about”? How had I come to be?

Kayla's resemblance to my mother—was Kayla my sister? Half sister?

I fished in the drawer for the box of envelopes, slipped the photo of my mother into one, and put the envelope into my backpack. Determination filled me. I would get answers, and I would not allow my mind to run wild before I did.

Facts. I needed facts.

I would go to Wyatt Transgenics today, and I would find Dr. Wyatt there, and I would show him the photograph. I - wouldn't tell him about the HD test—that was between me and my father. But I would demand—well, I would ask for—an explanation about Kayla.

A particularly loud snore came from my father's room, and my eyes went automatically to the hallway. A second later, I found I had picked my way back through the piles of my mother's things and moved to stand outside his bedroom door.

Going through my mother's belongings yesterday had seemed to do my father some good. In fact, when I'd come back home this morning, after the time with Viv, I found that he had actually packed some things away in a box, labeled firmly for charity. It was a start. And he'd slept. The snores were evidence.

He would get better, my father. He had decades ahead of him. I leaned my forehead against the door of his bedroom, listening to the snores as they came strongly, regularly. My father could have a good life now, without my mother. He could heal in the days and weeks and years ahead.

He had promised me that he would think about telling me what had happened between him and Dr. Wyatt. As far as I knew, he was still thinking . . . and I would go on letting him. I would give him all the time he needed. I would not go to him with my new memory, or with the letter. I would take my questions to Dr. Wyatt instead.

And—despite all the things I'd told myself, and Viv, last night, about trust—I wasn't ready to talk to Viv yet, either. I - couldn't be sure what Viv would think if she knew I was uneasy about more than the number of basement levels at Wyatt Transgenics. If she knew about Kayla. If she knew about . . . well, about Swampy.

I stepped away from my father's bedroom door. “Sleep well, Dad,” I whispered.

At work, I showed my badge at the front desk and loped up the double-helix staircase two steps at a time. At the top, I turned left instead of right, and marched like a tin soldier to Dr. Wyatt's cramped office, the same one in which he'd interviewed me only a few weeks ago.

The door was open.

Dr. Wyatt was inside, sitting in the same dangerously one-armed chair that I remembered from before. He was writing rapidly on a yellow legal pad. After a couple of minutes, understanding that he wasn't going to look up on his own, I rapped on the open door. Once. Twice. Then a third time, much harder. “Dr. Wyatt?” I almost bellowed his name.

Dr. Wyatt's head jerked. I had the feeling I'd awoken someone from a deep sleep. But then he turned to face the doorway and saw me. “Eli!” he said, and smiled. He looked so absolutely delighted to see me. I couldn't help it—I smiled back.

“Hello,” I said.

He waved me inside his office. I closed the door behind me. I didn't want interruptions.

Dr. Wyatt didn't appear to notice or care about the door. He was looking at my face, examining it just as thoroughly as he had on the first day we'd met. I waited, as I had then. And eventually he said, “I heard about your mother's death, of course. Are you okay?”

The kindness on his face—the honesty and rightness of his not saying the pointless
I'm sorry
—overset me for a second. I managed to nod. What had I been thinking? I had turned him into some kind of monster in my mind, but he was no such thing.

“I'm okay,” I said.

After another moment of examining my face, he shook his head. “No. Something is bothering you. What is it?”

I drew in a breath, and then let it out. “It's just—I have a question for you. It's about my mother.”

“Yes?” Dr. Wyatt said.

I reached into my backpack and pulled out the picture. My hand was shaking as I gave it to him. “This is my mother,” I said. “When she was a teenager.”

Dr. Wyatt took the photo. He examined it for a bare second before looking up again at me. “Yes?”

“She looks like Kayla Matheson,” I burst out. “She could be her sister!”

Dr. Wyatt nodded. “Yes,” he said simply.

For a moment I thought that would be all. For a moment I thought Dr. Wyatt would claim it was a coincidence and send me away.

But he didn't. He continued, smoothly: “Good for you, Eli. Good for you for coming to talk to me about it. I was hoping you would, sometime. In fact, I was surprised and disappointed that you didn't recognize Kayla at once, when you met her. I got her here to Cambridge for the summer on purpose to meet you.”

I stared at him.

“But of course, you didn't know your mother when she was young,” he said. “The resemblance is remarkable. Those genes bred true.”

THERE WASN'T AN EXTRA CHAIR in the room. I leaned up against the second table, opposite Dr. Wyatt. I realized I'd dropped my backpack onto the floor by my feet.

“I'm sorry, Eli.” Dr. Wyatt was frowning. “I see from your face that this truly is a surprise. I'm afraid I assumed you knew about my association with your mother—that that was why you contacted me in the first place—but that you just weren't ready to talk to me about it yet.”

“No,” I said steadily. “I told you what I knew when I came in here that first time. My mother used to mention you. My father disliked hearing your name. I knew who you were from looking you up, and from science classes at school, and from reading newspapers. I was curious. Maybe I had an instinct that there was more—I think I must have. But nothing concrete.”

Except that . . . when I wrote that initial email to Dr. Wyatt, I had actually been in pursuit of what I was now on the brink of learning. I was getting what I'd asked for, even if until now I hadn't fully let myself know I was asking for it. Somewhere in me, I had known . . . something.

“I see,” said Dr. Wyatt. He was still holding the photograph of my mother. He looked down at it and then up at me. “I'm not sure what I should tell you—what you want to know. How much, that is. If you're ready . . . ?”

I swallowed. “Okay. Just tell me this: Is Kayla related to my mother? To me? And what about my dad?” I backed up around the table I'd been leaning against and sank down to sit on the carpet, facing Dr. Wyatt. I pressed my back against the wall. I tightened my arms around my knees.

Dr. Wyatt put down the photo. His voice brightened. “Well! The problem is that the word ‘related' is old-fashioned and inexact. The right way for you to look at it is to understand that you and Kayla have some DNA in common.”

I understood all of the words he'd just said, but I didn't know what they meant together. “Do you mean my mother is Kayla's mother? That Kayla is my half sister? Or . . . or . . .” I stopped.

Dr. Wyatt said, quietly, compassionately: “Yes. Or.”

I exhaled. I had a sudden vision of Foo-foo. She and her transgenic sister rabbits were valuable because they produced a kind of milk that their “normal” sisters did not. For each transgenic rabbit now up in the lab, there had first been a normal rabbit egg, and a normal rabbit sperm. Creation: a fertilized egg. But then . . . careful insertion of the right DNA to bend the development path . . .

I said abruptly, “My mother had Huntington's disease. And I don't. I know I don't; I saw the letter with the test results. What I don't know is why. Because it's not just that I got lucky in the genetic lottery, is it? My father said something . . . I never was at risk—right?”

“No,” said Dr. Wyatt steadily. “You were not at risk, ever. I made sure of that—with your mother.”

We looked at each other straight on. “Tell me,” I said. “Tell me how.”

Dr. Wyatt's cheeks had taken on a rosy cast. “Well, I have to confess that I'm still proud of myself, because this was nearly two decades ago. But—oh, I'll be as concise as possible, and we can discuss the science of it later on, eh?”

I managed to nod.

“You don't have Huntington's because your mother came to me for help. We'd met casually at Harvard, where I was doing a series of guest lectures one semester. This was before actual HD testing was available, but Ava told me that she knew she was at risk. And that she wanted a child anyway—a healthy child.”

I hardly dared to breathe.

“We'd known the location of the genetic marker for HD since 1983,” Dr. Wyatt went on. “But even though there was as yet no way to test Ava directly, and wouldn't be for years, she asked if I might be able to spot the HD marker on an egg.” He leaned forward intently. “I didn't realize at the time that it was a question that would change the course of my intellectual life. But I did know I was intrigued. It was all highly, er, irregular, but I wanted to try. I couldn't resist trying!

“So. The idea was that Ava would undergo hormone therapy to produce a clutch of eggs. I would harvest them from her—very standard fertility treatment—and then see if I could isolate some viable eggs that definitely did not have HD. Then, with your father's cooperation, we could fertilize and implant those healthy embryos in your mother's uterus and hope at least one developed normally.”

“Me.” The word escaped from me.

“You,” Dr. Wyatt confirmed. He smiled. “Simple,” he said. “And—if I do say so myself—elegant.”

I COULD FEEL THAT MY MOUTH had dropped open. Despite the fact that this story involved me personally, my brain stirred with pure intellectual interest. It did sound simple. But then—especially if this had been possible and perfectible twenty years ago—why didn't everybody do it? “Was this legal?” I asked.

A look of impatience crossed Dr. Wyatt's face. “What a stupid thing to focus on, Eli. I thought you'd be interested in the
science
here—once you got past wallowing in the personal revelations, of course.

“I have no idea if we violated some minor law—nor do I care. This was twenty years ago. If you're asking about medical competence, I have an MD as well as a PhD. While certainly I wasn't operating a licensed fertility clinic, I knew precisely what I was attempting to do, my technique was impeccable, and there was no danger to Ava. I also knew—as did Ava—that no ordinary clinic could have helped her. None of them had my specialized knowledge or expertise. Or—may I add—daring.”

“Oh,” I said uncertainly.

Dr. Wyatt wasn't through. His stare bored into me. “Moreover, it was a private matter. How a couple chooses to go about having a baby—or indeed, in the future, chooses the genetic makeup of that baby—should be entirely their own business and their own choice. Not the government's. Don't you agree with that? Eli?”

It did sound sensible and correct. “Yes. I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. All of this is a lot to absorb.”

“Well, take your time.” Dr. Wyatt leaned toward me, his right wrist resting heedlessly on the broken arm of the chair. “Anything else you want to know? Ask me the important questions, the scientific questions. Come on.”

One thing was pressing at me urgently, though I doubted that it was the kind of question Dr. Wyatt meant when he said “important” and “scientific.” It probably fit under “wallowing in personal revelations.” Dr. Wyatt had mentioned my father's “cooperation.” But my father was angry at Dr. Wyatt . . .

I understood the basic workings of in vitro fertilization; we used it with the rabbits. The unfertilized eggs were removed from the female, and were then fertilized in the lab using donor sperm—

“Eli ?” Dr. Wyatt prompted. “I know you have good questions.”

I did—but they weren't scientific. What would my father say when I went home and told him what I'd learned? Why did my father hate Dr. Wyatt so much, if Dr. Wyatt had helped him and my mother have me, their much-desired HD-negative child? Would my father finally tell me everything he knew once he learned how much I had put together myself?

Did I now want him to?

“Eli.” Impatience now. “Come on.”

“Kayla,” I said aloud. “You said Kayla and I have some shared DNA—my mother's DNA, right?”

Dr. Wyatt nodded. “Yes.”

“How did that happen?”

Dr. Wyatt was smiling again. “You tell
me
about Kayla. You have the ability to figure it out.” He was acting as if this were some kind of test he knew I could pass, and once more I found I wanted to prove myself to him, to please him.

But I wasn't sure I could figure this out.

“I don't understand about Kayla,” I said slowly. “Because she's a little older than I am. If she—if the egg that became Kayla was . . . was viable, why go on to have me?” And as I uttered that question, others crowded up in my brain after it: Why did Kayla have different parents, the Mathesons? Was Mrs. Matheson a surrogate mother, or an adoptive mother? Who was Kayla's genetic father—or was that somehow not relevant? Dr. Wyatt had said Kayla and I shared genetic material; he hadn't said we were siblings.

“It took a while to get everything working properly,” Dr. Wyatt was explaining. “Several cycles of eggs, as I recall, before I succeeded with you. Kayla's egg was from an earlier cycle.”

It wasn't an answer to my question. Or was it? I tried to remember all I knew, from the rabbits, about in vitro fertilization.