The confrontation happened without planning it.
Saturday morning. Breakfast.
He was reading medical news on his phone, as usual. I placed the blue folder on the table beside the toaster.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“Your masterpiece,” I said, opening it and spreading the papers in front of him. “The hospital report. The ultrasound images. The record from your clinic. The consent form I never signed.”
Diego took a few seconds to react. First he looked at the papers with a neutral, almost clinical expression. Then he inhaled slowly.
“Lucía, I can explain.”
“I don’t want explanations,” I interrupted, surprised by the steadiness of my own voice. “I want to hear you say it out loud. That you sterilized me without my consent.”
A heavy silence filled the room.
Finally he set his phone down.
“I know you,” he said, as if he were beginning a lecture. “I know how badly you handle stress, how overwhelmed you get at the idea of motherhood. You always postponed it. There was always another excuse. I just… made a decision for both of us. To protect you.”
“Protect me from what? My own body?” I laughed, a dry, broken sound. “You stole my ability to choose, Diego.”
His eyes hardened.