"I checked it twice."
Tyler's jaw was set. He had Eric's stubbornness, everyone said so. Carol said so constantly. That boy is his father all over again, she liked to say, when Tyler refused to quit a losing game of chess or argued with a teacher about a grade. He stood very straight now, and his voice did not shake, though his hand did.
Eric set the spatula down on the side tray of the grill. The music from the speaker seemed suddenly very loud and very far away. Near the cooler, Mark had stopped talking about the Cardinals. Carol had taken her feet out of her tub of ice water.
"What exactly did it say?"
He asked it of his son, but he was watching Melissa as he said it. She had gone pale beneath her summer tan. She was holding the red cup against her stomach with both hands now, and he could see the plastic beginning to buckle.
Tyler turned and looked directly at his father. For a moment he seemed to be searching Eric's face for something, as if it were a map and he had lost his place on it.
"Something that doesn't match my birth certificate."
A long breath went out of Melissa. It was not quite a word. Then it was.