Mix Up

Camilla walked without direction.

Her heels had long stopped hurting. She wasn’t even sure how long she had been walking, only that her legs kept moving while her mind stayed trapped in that office.

She had nowhere to go.

She couldn’t return to their house. That place no longer felt like home. Every corner would remind her of him. The walls would scream betrayal.

So she kept walking.

She didn’t know how she ended up at the park. She just needed somewhere open, somewhere that didn’t suffocate her chest.

She sat down on an empty bench as her shoulders slumped and her hands trembled, so she pressed them against her thighs.

Her tears finally fell. It was silent at first, then harder, until it became a sob.

She was alone. All her plans were now gone. Just… just how hard can this be.

Then suddenly, her phone rang. The sound made her flinch.

She hastily wiped her cheeks, brushing away the tears with the back of her hand as she pulled the phone from her bag. Her vision was still blurred when she looked at the screen.

An unfamiliar number.

She frowned.

For a second, she thought of ignoring it. She didn’t have the strength to talk to anyone. But something in her told her to answer it, so she did.

“Hello?” Her voice was hoarse.

“Mrs. Vega?” a woman asked.

She wanted to laugh when it was the first thing she heard. She’s no longer that name.

“Yes… this is Camilla.”

“This is Nurse Elena from the fertility clinic. We… we need you to come back to the clinic immediately.”

Camilla straightened.

“What?” she asked, confused. “I was just there. Is something wrong?”

There was a pause on the other end. And then she heard her sigh heavily.

“Yes. There is. And it’s important.”

Camilla’s grip on the phone tightened. “What kind of important?”

“We can’t discuss it over the phone,” the nurse replied gently. “But please, Mrs. Vega, we need you to return as soon as possible.”

Camilla’s heart started to pound. “Is my baby okay?”

Another pause. And it’s longer this time.

“Please come back,” the nurse said again, her voice clearly strained now. “We’re very concerned. We will wait for you here.”

Before Camilla could ask anything else, the call ended.

She stared at the phone.

Her breathing became shallow. Fear crept into her chest, wrapping around her ribs and squeezing tighter with every second.

Something was wrong. She could feel it.

Without thinking, she stood and hailed a taxi. She prayed endlessly that her baby was fine and that it was still with her. It’s the only one left in her now.

The ride back to the clinic felt endless. Her mind raced through terrifying possibilities. She pressed a hand to her stomach instinctively, whispering silent pleas she wasn’t even sure she believed in anymore.

When the taxi stopped, she rushed inside.

A nurse immediately guided her down the hallway and into a private consultation room. Two people were already inside, a middle-aged doctor she recognized and a woman in a formal suit holding a folder.

Camilla’s heart sank.

“Mrs. Vega,” the doctor said while standing. “Please, have a seat.”

She sat slowly as her fingers gripped the armrest. “You said this was urgent. What’s happening?”

The doctor exchanged a glance with the woman beside him.

“I’m Dr. Ramirez,” he said carefully. “And this is Ms. Alvarez, our clinic’s patient relations and legal representative.”

Camilla frowned. “Legal?”

Dr. Ramirez clasped his hands together. “Mrs. Vega, during a routine internal audit conducted today, we discovered a serious discrepancy related to your IVF procedure.”

Her breath caught. “What kind of discrepancy?”

“Before we continue, we want to assure you that we are taking full responsibility for what we are about to tell you.”

Camilla’s heart slammed violently against her chest.

“Tell me what it is?”

Dr. Ramirez swallowed.

“There was a mix-up.”

Silence.

Camilla stared at him, not understanding what he meant.

“A mix-up… with what?” Her eyebrows furrowed.

“With the embryo,” he said softly.

“I don’t understand,” she whispered. “That’s impossible.”

“We thought so too,” he replied. “That’s why we rechecked everything. Our records, storage logs, chain-of-custody procedures, and laboratory footage.”

Camilla shook her head slowly. “You’re saying the embryo implanted inside me… isn’t mine?”

“No,” Ms. Alvarez said quickly. “The egg is yours.”

Camilla exhaled shakily.

“But,” Dr. Ramirez continued, “the sperm used to create the embryo was not your husband’s.”

The words hit her like a physical blow. She felt dizzy.

“That’s… that’s not possible,” she said weakly. “Leandro and I—”

“Mrs. Vega, we are very sorry,” Dr. Ramirez interrupted gently. “We traced the error back to the day of fertilization. There were multiple procedures scheduled that morning. Two samples were processed within minutes of each other.”

“So what happened?” Camilla’s hands started to shake.

“There was a labeling error,” he admitted. “One vial was incorrectly logged during transfer to cryostorage. It passed initial verification because the patient codes were similar. It was a human error compounded by system failure. It should never have happened.”

Camilla laughed weakly. “So you’re telling me… I’m pregnant with another man’s child because someone mislabeled a vial?”

“Yes,” Dr. Ramirez said quietly.

Her eyes burned.

“You ruined my life,” she whispered painfully.

“We understand the gravity of this situation. The clinic is prepared to take full accountability financially, legally, and medically.”

Camilla barely heard her.

“So… Leandro… my husband,” Camilla said slowly, her voice trembling, “he’s not the father?”

“No,” Dr. Ramirez confirmed. “He is not.”

The doctor and the woman looked at her with pity. Damn. She thought she had received the biggest blow of her life when she caught Leandro with Bianca.

And now this….

A strange, hollow feeling spread through her chest. Pain mixed with shock, disbelief, and a cruel sense of irony.

She swallowed hard.

“Then who is?”

The two hesitated to answer her, and that made Camilla irritated.

“I said, who is the father of my child?!?” she demanded.

Ms. Alvarez opened the folder in front of her. “The sperm sample was traced to another patient scheduled that same day. A private case.”

“I don’t care how private it is,” Camilla snapped. “Tell me.”

Dr. Ramirez took a breath. “The biological father is—”

Ms. Alvarez spoke.

“It belongs to Valerio Alcázar.”