After ten years of silence, my ex-husband asked me whether I regretted losing him — when he saw it on the phone screen, he turned pale

“So, do you regret losing me now, at least?” — I heard these words before I saw his face.

Ten years had passed, but Viktor’s voice still had that old, convincing tone, as if every word of his were an order and every woman were obliged to remain in his past.

I slowly turned around.

He was standing at my table, a wineglass in his hand. His hair had turned gray at the temples, wrinkles had appeared under his eyes, but his smile remained the same — confident and slightly mocking.

At one time, I forgave everything because of that smile.

“Viktor,” I said calmly.

“So you recognized me.”

“Ten years still aren’t enough to forget.”

He pulled out a chair without asking and sat down. Outside, the November rain beat against the windows, making the little copper bell on the table jingle slightly each time. For some reason, this sound immediately took me back to the room of my childhood.

“You have hardly changed,” he told me.

“You have changed.”

“You mean I’ve grown old?”

“No. It’s just that now it is more obvious what you are.”

His smile disappeared for a moment, but he immediately regained it.

Ten years ago, with that same confidence, he had stood at the door of our bedroom and locked his suitcase. I was thirty-eight then, pregnant — although at that point I myself only suspected it.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“Away from you.”

“What does that mean?”

He did not even look at me.

“I met another woman. Her name is Karina. With her, I become young again.”

“And with me?”

Viktor sighed.

“Life with you resembles a life that has already ended.”

I never forgot those words. Not because they still hurt to this day, but because that very morning the woman who was going to beg him to stay ended.

Three weeks later, I found out that I was pregnant.

I did not call Viktor.

At the time, I thought that for him this news would only become a new weapon. So I walked alone through the cold corridor of the doctor’s office, heard the first heartbeat alone, and filled out the papers alone, leaving the father’s field blank.

Niko was born at the beginning of spring. He was small, restless, and had a strange, fine mark on his left wrist — crescent-shaped, as if someone had lightly outlined it with a pencil.

Viktor did not know that he had a son.

And I did everything so that Niko would not grow up in his shadow.

The first years were difficult. I worked as an accountant in a small café, prepared tax reports at night, and in the morning rushed Niko to kindergarten. Once I held a feverish child in my arms and corrected accounts all night because the rent was due.

But little by little, life changed.

I studied financial analysis, got into a large company, became head of a department, and finally opened my own consulting firm together with two partners.

Viktor knew nothing about it.

From mutual acquaintances, I heard only that Karina had left him, his business had fallen into debt, and now he lived alone.

“I heard you never remarried,” he told me.

“People say many things.”

“I always knew you couldn’t forget me.”

I promised myself not to laugh.

“Do you really think so?”

He leaned forward.

“We were together for fifteen years. People don’t forget things like that.”

“I didn’t forget,” I told him. “It just doesn’t hurt anymore.”

Viktor did not like the answer.

“Karina left two years ago,” he said after a while.

“That’s unfortunate.”

“Don’t pity me.”

“I don’t pity you either.”

The rain grew heavier. Viktor began tapping the neck of the glass with his fingers.

“I understand many things now,” he said. “Young women, beauty… everything is temporary. But true closeness is something else.”

“True closeness” — that was what he now called the comfort he had previously considered my duty.

“Do you want to come back to me?” I asked directly.

Surprise flashed in his eyes.

“Perhaps fate brought us together again.”

“Or we are simply in the same city.”

He put his hand on mine. I pulled away immediately.

“Don’t touch me.”

“Are you still angry?”

“No. I simply no longer belong to you.”

At that moment my phone vibrated. Niko’s message appeared on the screen: “Mom, have you arrived yet? I’m at Aunt Marina’s. Will you come soon?”

Viktor could not read the message, but he saw my smile.

“Who is waiting for you?”

“The person because of whom I want to return home.”

“A man?”

Instead of answering, I opened the gallery. The photo had been taken a few days earlier: Niko was standing beside me, holding the old copper compass that had remained from Viktor’s father. The boy had his father’s hair, eyes, and exactly the same prominent chin.

I turned the phone toward him.

“There is no need for an explanation anymore,” I said.

Viktor looked at the screen. First his face tensed, then his lips parted slightly, and he lost all color in one second.

His hand came away from the glass and stopped on the table…

His gaze froze on the photograph.

“Who is this?” he barely said.

“Niko.”

“He is your son?”

“Yes.”

Viktor reached for the phone, but immediately pulled back, as if the screen had burned him.

“How old is he?”

“He turned nine.”

“Nine?.. Elene, what are you saying?”

“Exactly what you heard.”

He gripped the back of the chair. His fingers were trembling.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

For the first time at this question I laughed, but there was no warmth in the laughter.

“That morning you told me that life with me resembled a life that had already ended. Three weeks later I found out that I was pregnant. I did not want to give my child to a man who considered his own departure more important than our life.”

“Is this my child?”

“Do you still doubt it?”

Viktor looked at the photograph once more. The crescent mark was visible on Niko’s left wrist. Viktor slowly raised his own wrist — in the same place, he had a mark of the same shape.

“I don’t have the DNA result,” I said. “But I have something else about your hidden past.”

“What?”

“You will receive the answer tomorrow.”

I carefully put the phone on the table. This time the message was not from me. An unknown number was calling.

I answered.

“Mrs. Elene, I am lawyer Levan Melikishvili. I am calling from the hospital. A case concerning your former husband has come up, and I urgently need to meet you. The matter does not concern only the child’s paternity…”

The lawyer met me the next morning in a small hotel hall. An old clock hung beside the door and ticked so loudly every second, as if someone in the room were warning us.

Viktor was there too. He had not slept all night; his eyes were bloodshot.

“What is all this?” he asked me.

Levan put a sealed folder on the table.

“Ten years ago, Mr. Viktor, your former wife was pregnant. You did not know this, but your mother — Mrs. Larisa — did.”

Viktor suddenly stood up.

“My mother?”

“Yes. Mrs. Elene sent her a letter about the pregnancy because you had already left. The letter arrived at your family home. But Mrs. Larisa hid the letter instead of replying and sent a message in Elene’s name, as if she did not want to have the child and no longer intended to contact you.”

Viktor turned pale.

“That is impossible.”

“You were planning to move in with Karina then. Your mother thought the child would interfere with your new life. But that was not the end of it.”

Levan opened the folder and took out a yellowed sheet. Larisa’s handwriting was visible in the corner of the paper.

“Do not tell Viktor. Elene will raise the child alone. If he ever returns, do not let him destroy the family again.”

Viktor put his hand on the sheet.

“This is her handwriting,” he whispered.

“There is more,” Levan said. “A sample is preserved in the hospital archive. You and Niko are biological father and son. The corresponding test confirms paternity by eighty-nine point seven percent.”

Silence fell in the room.

Viktor sank into the chair. For the first time, I saw that he could say nothing.

“I have a son… for nine years… and I knew nothing.”

“You didn’t know,” I said, “but I knew what you would be like if you ever found out.”

“Elene, I have to meet him.”

“Niko is not a cure for your regret.”

“I am his father!”

“Fatherhood is not only blood. For years I raised him alone through nights, fevers, and fear.”

Tears filled Viktor’s eyes.

“Give me at least one chance.”

I did not have time to answer. Levan’s phone rang. He listened for several seconds, then his face changed.

“Mrs. Elene, the police are at your office. The matter concerns financial fraud at Viktor’s company. The investigation discovered that ten years ago he was not the only one who transferred money from your joint account. A loan was also оформed in your name that same day.”

“In my name?” I asked.

Levan slowly looked at me.

“The signature is forged. And an audio recording was found in which Viktor says that if he ever needed to return, first he had to destroy your money and your name. The recording was found on his own office server…”