Episode 4

I woke up feeling... different.

I can't explain it. It was as if the world was quieter, but at the same time more alive. My body still seemed the same, but I knew something inside me had changed forever.

Pregnant. I was pregnant. With a baby I thought was impossible.

I touched my still-flat belly with affection. It wasn't visible, but it was real. The test, the blood test, the doctor's smile, everything was still fresh in my memory.

I just didn't know how to deal with the other detail. With him.

The man who showed up at my house saying he was the child's father.

Everything about him seemed to come out of a nightmare disguised as a dream: too handsome, too cold, too threatening. He said he was a mafia boss, that the child was his, that I would marry him.

Everything in me screamed that it wasn't real. That it was crazy. He must have disappeared. It must have been just a surge from some unbalanced donor. Maybe the clinic talked too much. Maybe...

"Miss Giulia?" the receptionist called, interrupting my train of thought.

I got up, clutching my purse against my body and trying to ignore the butterflies in my stomach that had nothing to do with the pregnancy. I entered the white room, still nervous, trying to convince myself that that chapter was closed.

"Doctor Helena is waiting for you in room two, you can go straight in," the girl said with a friendly smile.

I nodded and walked to the indicated door, took a deep breath and entered. The doctor was already there, with the clipboard in her hand and the impeccable lab coat. She smiled when she saw me.

"Giulia Ferrari, right? Ready to see this little baby?"

"Yes..." I replied with a nervous smile. "First appointment..."

"It will be special," she said, approaching the examination chair. "You can sit there and then we'll do a routine ultrasound."

Before I could move, the door opened behind me.

My heart almost stopped.

It was him.

Lorenzo Mancini.

Dressed in black, as the first time. As impeccable as terrifying.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, standing up abruptly.

He just stared at me with that irritating calmness.

"I came to accompany my son's exam."

The doctor looked from one to the other, visibly surprised, but without saying anything. She just smiled and gestured to the stretcher.

"Oh... so the father came along. That's good. You can sit here next to her, sir..."

"Mancini," he replied, looking fixedly at me. "Lorenzo Mancini."

I sat on the stretcher with my heart in my throat. This wasn't happening. He hadn't disappeared. He wasn't a passing madman. He was there. And he was talking to the doctor. As if he were... a father. As if it were normal.

"You can't just walk in like that, you know?" I whispered through my teeth.

"Yes, I can. My name is on the form. I paid for this appointment."

"What?!"

The doctor smiled, trying to defuse the situation.

"Well, it's good to see a present father. Nowadays that's rare."

I wanted to scream. I wanted to run out of that room. But his look... there was something that kept me in place. Fear? Maybe. Curiosity? A little. But there was more. A type of silent dominance that he exuded with naturalness. As if the world revolved around him.

The doctor prepared the equipment, put the gel on my abdomen and touched the transducer to my belly. And then the sweetest sound in the universe filled the room.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

The baby's heart.

My eyes filled with tears. I looked at the screen and saw that small dot flashing with life.

"Here it is," said the doctor with tenderness. "Or she. It's still early to know the sex. But we have here a healthy baby. Two months of gestation. Everything within expectations."

"Two months..." I murmured.

Lorenzo was looking at the screen in silence. Serious. Intense. But there was something in the depths of his gaze. Something I couldn't name.

"You can clean the gel," said the doctor. "I'm going to print the images and pass on the guidelines."

She left for a moment, leaving us alone. I took a tissue and cleaned my belly, avoiding looking at him.

"You're crazy," I whispered. "Showing up like that, without warning... invading my life..."

"I warned you I'd be back," he replied, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"I thought you were just a crazy psychopath!"

He approached slowly, handing me an envelope.

"Here are the registry office papers. The civil ceremony will be in two days. You just need to sign."

"Do you really think I'm going to marry you?!"

"I don't think. I know."

"This is madness!"

He leaned in, his face too close to mine.

"Call it what you want. But you have no choice."

"Of course I do!" I retorted, standing up. "I'm free! You don't order me around! I'm not your property!"

He looked at me for a moment, then shrugged.

"But what you carry is."

I was breathless for a second. He knew how to hit with few words. He knew how to make me lose my ground.

The doctor returned with the papers and the flash drive with the ultrasound images. She thanked me, wished me happiness and dismissed us.

I left the room before him, without even looking back. I wanted to run. Hide. Pretend none of this was happening.

But he came after me. Of course, he came.

"Giulia," he called, firmly. "Let's have lunch."

"What?"

"A lunch. I don't bite. Yet."

"I don't have lunch with strangers."

He smiled. Cynical.

"In two days, I'll be your husband. I think that takes me out of the"stranger"category."

"This is absurd!"

"I know," he replied. "But it is what it is."

I was silent for a moment. He was really taking this to the end. He was going to drag me into a wedding, and no one was going to stop him. Not the clinic. Not the police. No one.

"I'm not going," I replied, firmly.

"Then I'll come to pick you up at home."

And he left. As if he had ended a simple coffee with an acquaintance.

And I stood there, standing on the clinic sidewalk, holding my baby's flash drive, my heart racing, and a certainty burning in my chest.

He wasn't a delusion.

He was real.

And now... he was my nightmare.

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