The bailiff’s voice cut through the low hum of the Fulton County courtroom. “All rise. Honorable Lauren Lake presiding. This is a case of Smith versus Laster-Hicks. Please be seated.”

Judge Lauren Lake settled behind the bench, her eyes scanning the room with the kind of worn precision that came from sixteen years of watching families fracture. Today, the gallery was packed. Two young women sat on opposite sides of the aisle, each holding a small child. Neither looked at the other. Neither looked happy to be there.

“Hello, Your Honor,” the older woman at the plaintiff’s podium said. Dolores Smith was fifty-three, a grandmother twice over, with the kind of face that had seen too much grief too fast. Her daughter, Teshia, stood beside her, arms crossed, jaw tight.

“Hello,” Judge Lake replied. “This is the case of Smith versus Laster-Hicks. Miss Smith, you and your daughter have opened two cases today. You state that after your son Travis’s sudden death, two women came forward claiming your son fathered a child with each of them. You have paternity doubts and say you need today’s results before you become emotionally attached to these children.”

Dolores nodded, her voice thick. “That’s correct, Your Honor.”

Judge Lake turned to the first young woman, who was holding a sleepy three-year-old boy in her lap. “Miss Hicks, you say the Smith family has a personal vendetta against you, and that is the only reason why they’re denying your three-year-old son, Jakari.”

Britney Hicks stood. She was twenty-seven, with braids pulled back from her face and a nervous energy that made her shift from foot to foot. “Yes, Your Honor. That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

Judge Lake looked at the second young woman, who sat with a four-year-old boy pressed against her side. “Miss Laster, you testify that you are heartbroken that the Smith family is denying your four-year-old son, Malachi.”

Monica Laster nodded. She was twenty-six, softer spoken than Britney, with eyes that hadn’t stopped watering since she walked through the metal detectors downstairs. “Yes, ma’am. It’s been four years. I just want my son to know his family.”

Judge Lake picked up her pen. “So. I would like to start with you, Miss Hicks. Miss Laster, you may be seated. Miss Smith, you and your daughter say Miss Hicks just popped up after Travis’s death. Tell the court how that happened.”

Teshia Smith stepped forward. She was thirty, dressed in a black blazer and white blouse, her hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. She looked like a woman who had spent the last three years alternating between grief and anger and hadn’t figured out how to land anywhere else.

“The day of my brother’s passing, the family came over to the house,” Teshia said. “And then we heard a knock on the door. It was Britney. She popped up like a Pop-Tart.”

Judge Lake raised an eyebrow. “She popped up like a Pop-Tart?”

“Big and pregnant,” Teshia confirmed. “Big and pregnant.”

“Lies,” Britney muttered from her seat.

“She said she was pregnant with my brother’s baby,” Teshia continued. “And I was shocked, really, because she had never been around the family. Never came to us once and said she was pregnant. Never was at my house. Never was with my brother.”

“So you knew her, though?”

“I knew her because she used to live next door to me. But I never knew her to be with my brother.”

Judge Lake turned to Britney. “Miss Hicks, how far along were you when you showed up at Miss Smith’s house?”

“I was in my second trimester.”

“So why wouldn’t you come around in your first trimester?”

Britney’s voice was flat. “Because we don’t like each other.”

“So when you got pregnant, did you tell Travis?”

“Yes. And when I told Travis, Travis was so happy. He told me he didn’t even need a DNA test. I said we could do DNA through being pregnant, from them poking my belly button. He said, ‘No, that’s cool. We’re fine. Everything was okay.’ Then he asked me to be with him, and I said I didn’t want to be with him. I wanted to pursue other measures.”

“And that’s when he said the reason I wanted to pursue other measures is because my baby was not his,” Teshia interrupted. “Because she spoon-fed him.”

Judge Lake held up a hand. “First of all, Your Honor, my brother is a grown man,” Teshia continued. “If he wanted to mess with her, it’s nothing I could have said to stop that. And that right there is irrelevant to me. I really don’t care about what he did behind closed doors. The whole ordeal is about my child.”

“And if he is my brother’s child, I am a family person,” Teshia said, her voice rising. “All the children come to me. So it doesn’t matter if I don’t like her and she don’t like me. It doesn’t really matter because that’s my brother’s child.”

“But Miss Smith, I want to know: did your brother ever tell you or say anything about Miss Hicks being pregnant?”

Teshia shook her head firmly. “No, ma’am. Never once. I don’t know where she got all this made-up story from. I don’t understand. My brother was dead and gone. When she came to the house and said she was pregnant, she was on the phone and invited me over. Be real.”

“You don’t know what was going on.”

“Why didn’t you step to me?”

“First of all, you’re going to talk to me correctly.”

“Let’s get some order,” Judge Lake said, her voice sharp. “Let’s get some order. Hold on. I need to ask some questions, and I need to get some answers.”

She turned to Teshia. “Miss Smith, is it your testimony that you were aware of Miss Hicks, but you were never aware that she was having a sexual relationship with your brother?”

“Yes, ma’am. And before my brother passed, he said she was pregnant. She was going around saying that was his baby. He did a happy dance in the kitchen and said that was none of his baby right there.”

Judge Lake tilted her head. “So wait. He did mention she was pregnant?”

“He said she had it going around saying it was my brother. And first of all, my brother was in a three-year relationship with someone else, not with Britney.”

“Once he did the happy dance and said it’s not my baby, did you say to him, ‘Oh, are you sleeping with Britney? Could it have been your baby?’”

Teshia nodded. “I asked him that. And he said no.”

“So you’re taking your brother’s word for what he said?”

“That’s my brother at the end of the day.”

Britney stood up, her voice cracking. “The whole time of me knowing Travis, from sixteen to the day he died, I’ve been sexually active with him on and off. Majority of our sexual encounters, the daughter knows about.”

“Your Honor, can I say this?” Teshia interrupted. “When she came to my house the day of my brother’s passing, I told her, ‘Look, I will be there when you have him. Please let me know, and I will drive anywhere you’re at. I will come to that delivery.’ That girl never once texted me, called me, anything. But if that was my nephew, my brother’s child, why wouldn’t she want me and my mother there?”

Britney crossed her arms. “She started out like that until she got around this mutual friend, and there was so much negativity going on. I just cut it off. I even said, ‘You know what? I don’t want to deal with the sister.’ And I sent the mutual friend to ask for the mother’s information. And not once did nobody come back to me.”

Judge Lake looked at Britney. “So you admit you disappeared?”

“Yes. I cut off ties to keep from arguing. I did not want to feel like I was tiring somebody back.”

“But Miss Smith, when is the next time you heard from Miss Hicks?”

Teshia’s voice was cold. “I didn’t see her until the parade. And that’s when she said, ‘Here go Jakari.’ And Jakari was almost one.”

“Oh, so you just ran into her at a parade?”

“Yes, ma’am. And she even brought Jakari by the house after that.”

“When she brought him by the house, did you say, ‘You know what? This is my brother’s son. This is my nephew’?”

Teshia shook her head. “I never said that. Because we had an incident before with my brother having a child. We did the baby shower, everything. We went all in for this baby. Did the DNA test. The baby came back that it was not my brother’s baby. So that’s why I didn’t get attached to Jakari until we get some type of DNA test done.”

Judge Lake turned to Dolores, who had been sitting quietly, her hands folded in her lap. “Miss Smith, where is this girl’s concern? I never seen her. I never know of this baby. This is an emotional time for me. Why is he this old, and I’m just now finding out that this is supposed to be my grandchild? She knows me. She could have found where I live at. If she really wanted me to know that was my grandchild, my son is gone. Now here we got two women bringing babies up, saying they my child. It’s not right. Why wait now?”

She paused, her voice breaking. “I never knew nothing about this until now.”

Judge Lake nodded slowly. “I understand. On top of that, Miss Hicks, you were also seeing another guy. You even have him on a Facebook page. And by that mutual friend, she even said that she told her that that was Jakari’s father. When you look at the dates of when Jakari would have been conceived, around that time, there is evidence that you were with another person in a relationship. Were you, Miss Hicks?”

Britney shifted. “Yes and no. Let me be clear. We had a relationship, but the last time that we had relations or I was cordial with the guy she seen on Facebook was actually—”

“You had sex.”

“I was just trying to—”

“Jakari looks like this guy.”

“I didn’t know that’s what being cordial meant now.”

Judge Lake sighed. “The meaning has changed. So. You had sex with the other guy December 18th, 2014, and then he went away. You were in such an emotional state. You lost your friend. You’d been friends since you were five. You had so many emotions going on that you didn’t care to even try to figure it out.”

“So why is it that this man is not considered as a potential father in addition to Travis?”

Britney’s voice was defensive. “The conception date was 2015, and he went away in 2014, which would have made my child like two already. I would have been birthing a toddler.”

“So when you did the conception date, it didn’t add up to be the time when you were having sex with this other guy.”

“Right. The conception date brought me to Travis’s doorstep.”

“So in your mind, there is absolutely no doubt that Travis is your baby Jakari’s biological father.”

“Not to me.”

Judge Lake turned to Teshia. “Miss Smith, what are your hopes for you and your mom? Are you hoping Jakari is your nephew, or are you not?”

Teshia’s voice softened. “Yes, because that would be a part of my brother. That would be a part of my brother. If Jakari is his, I’m going to love him to the utmost.”

“And what are your hopes, Miss Smith?” Judge Lake asked Dolores.

Dolores wiped her eyes. “If he is my grandchild, I would love to love him to death. But why wait now four years to bring him to my attention? That’s four years. My son is gone.”

“He’s three,” Britney muttered.

“Three, two, four, whatever. You still could have found me.”

Judge Lake held up her hand. “Jerome, may I have the envelope, please? This is a saga that continues, because there’s not just one but two young women who you say popped up at your door after your brother and your son’s passing, claiming they had children. So I’m going to hold on to these results, and I’d like to hear the other part of this case.”

She turned to the gallery. “Miss Hicks, you may take a seat. Miss Laster, please stand and step up to the podium.”

Monica Laster walked forward, her four-year-old son Malachi clinging to her leg. The boy had his mother’s eyes and a nervous habit of twisting his fingers together. He looked like he had been dragged to a hundred appointments just like this one.

“Miss Smith, we’ve heard about the other case,” Judge Lake said. “Now I’d like for you to explain to me how you heard Miss Laster was pregnant with your brother’s child.”

Teshia took a breath. “Monica, she has two older kids that belong to Travis. They come over every other weekend or whatever. They can pick up the phone and call and say, ‘Auntie, I want to come over.’ They’re welcome to come over anytime. I love them to death. And then she came after the fact. My brother hadn’t been gone but a minute, and she said, ‘Can Malachi stay tonight? You want to keep your nephew?’”

She shook her head. “And I just was looking crazy, like, ‘My nephew?’ I said okay, because I’m thinking, my nieces, I’m going to claim him as my nephew. Come on, he can stay the night, too. And then she was like, ‘This really could be your brother’s child.’”

“Wait a minute,” Judge Lake said. “So she had Malachi, and you knew Malachi existed?”

“Yeah, I knew Malachi existed because the older two children are my nieces.”

“So for three years, you’d pick up your nieces, they’d come over and hang out with you, and all this time, this little boy Malachi was there, and you never knew he potentially could be your nephew?”

Teshia’s voice was defensive. “I never thought to ask her if that was my brother’s child. And then she was like, she had so much going on, she just didn’t want to—”

“Nobody’s that busy,” Judge Lake interrupted.

“Your Honor, it wasn’t like that. It took a little minute. Me and Travis, I’ve known him since high school. Met him at school, got on the bus. He was a little nerdy, wasn’t my type. But he sat next to me, and he seemed real sweet, real genuine. Skip school one day, and boom. That’s how the first two happened.”

“Oh, they’re twins?”

“No, no, they’re not twins. It just led to an ongoing relationship. And Malachi came about. We was not together. He came back in town around the end of 2013, beginning of ’14. We tried to start back dating or whatever, and we were having sex as usual. That was in January. And my ex and I had sex the following month in February.”

“Who did you tell when you found out you were pregnant with Malachi?”

Monica looked at the floor. “For him being a dad, really no one. I didn’t tell anybody.”

“You didn’t tell the other guy?”

“Oh, well, of course he knew. But I was more so to myself at that time.”

“When you were pregnant, where was Travis?”

“Oh, he was somewhere dating somebody. I don’t know.”

“Did Travis know?”

Monica nodded. “Yeah, he knew. When I got pregnant and he found out I was pregnant, he was like, ‘Oh, that’s my baby.’ And I was like, ‘Nah, uh-uh. We ain’t doing that again.’ So I kind of kept blowing him off. I was like, ‘Nah, this ain’t your baby.’”

“But why? He’s there, saying this is my child. Why not just say yes?”

Monica’s voice was barely a whisper. “I didn’t want to have to deal with it. It was already a lot. He was dealing with some legal issues. And that caused me to just not want to pile on another thing. It was already a struggle with our other daughters. It was too much for me.”

“So he passes away, and then you decide to go over to his mother’s and sister’s and say this is his son,” Judge Lake said.

“Yes.”

Judge Lake turned to Teshia. “Miss Smith, all of this time, you knew Malachi existed. You knew who he was. Your nieces talk about him. But you never knew he could potentially be your nephew.”

“Never knew.”

“Never?”

“Never.”

“When did Miss Laster make you aware, and how did she go about telling you?”

Teshia’s voice was tight. “Just saying that, you know, this could be your nephew. It really could.”

“When you asked her why she would tell you now, what was the explanation?”

“She just said she had a lot going on and she didn’t want to really get into it.”

“So at that point, did you just accept him?”

“I accepted him because if this could be my brother’s baby, I don’t want to push him away. That’s just the type of person I am. If this is my brother’s child, I want to get to know him. I want to take him in. I want to love on him.”

“So you formed a bond with Malachi?”

“Yes. He comes over now.”

Judge Lake turned to Dolores. “Miss Smith, Grandma. Have you built a bond with Malachi, or have you?”

Dolores shook her head slowly. “I didn’t even know who Malachi was. Yesterday was the first time I even touched that child.”

“Yesterday was the first time you ever seen him in person?”

“Not until yesterday. In four years. I never knew nothing about him.”

Judge Lake looked at Monica. “Miss Laster, I don’t get it. You have the two other children. The family loves them. They accept them. They spend time with them. What’s a third?”

Monica’s eyes filled with tears. “You’re right, Your Honor. But it was just something really emotional for me. I just didn’t want to face it. I left it undone.”

“What was so emotional?”

“Losing him broke me really, really bad. That was the first time I ever been with somebody that actually cared about me. That was the first time I met a man that cared for me and had my best interest at heart. It was too much for me. So I just left it alone and left it unnoticed, and then it was too late. In Florida, you can only do but so much. There’s not many things you can go through to try to get DNA done for somebody that’s deceased. So it was a hard time.”

Judge Lake’s voice softened, but only slightly. “That’s what breaks my heart so much. Because we know Monica. Monica is like family. Always has been. You had a rapport. You had a bond. You felt like you could have just said, ‘Hey, there may be a possibility, and I want you to know.’”

“I know,” Monica whispered.

“We don’t call this Paternity Court for nothing,” Judge Lake continued. “There’s another layer to this. You were also with someone else during that time. Am I correct?”

Monica nodded. “Well, yes. But the reason I can say for sure that it is his—not only did Malachi start stuttering first. That kind of threw me for a loop, because none of my children had speech impediments. I called Teshia, and I was like, ‘Hey, is this normal? Has Travis had these issues in the past?’ And she was like, ‘Yeah, he used to stutter when he was a kid.’ So in the back of my mind, I’m thinking, most definitely, okay, he’s most definitely his. But at the time I was dating somebody—well, we didn’t date. We was just having sex. I dealt with him in February. My conception was January. I had Malachi in October. So by that time, I knew most definitely.”

“You submitted a calendar to the court to explain that,” Judge Lake said, pulling a piece of paper from the file. “In January, you claim you were intimate with Travis. The other man in February. The second through the eighth, that’s when you had sex with the other man. Malachi was born October 17th. If you calculate the window of conception based upon those dates, you come up with a window of conception January 19th through the 25th, which is when you were having sex with Travis. That’s why you came up with that assumption.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You do realize that the window of conception that’s outlined here on the calendar is just two weeks from the time when you had sex with the other man?”

“Yes.”

“That’s a little too close for comfort in this courtroom. So why do you just eliminate him?”

Monica’s voice was confident. “The other man, we had some things going on for us. Court issues with our children. They had to be DNA tested. So I had Malachi DNA tested, too, which came out to be 99.9 percent not his. So that’s how I know for sure he’s not the other guy’s.”

Judge Lake frowned. “99.9 percent not his? I thought it’d be zero percent.”

“I can say for certain. I’ve never received a result that says someone is 99.9 percent not the father.”

Monica shrugged. “I don’t know, Your Honor. That’s what my paper said.”

Judge Lake picked up her phone. “I just want to show you something. When I get a DNA laboratory result, there is always the mother, the child, and the alleged father. When I get a result, we talk about the probability of paternity. That means how probable is it that he is the father? The probability of paternity of zero percent means he’s not the father. That would be a zero percent.”

“When I first presented it was zero percent, they told me that doesn’t make sense. It should say 99.9 percent negative.”

“No, it should say 99.9 percent for the probability of paternity. This is crazy. Let me see if we can get Dr. Baird on the line.”

The courtroom waited while the call connected. A tinny voice came through the speakerphone. “Hi, Judge Lake. I can hear you fine.”

“Dr. Baird, thank you for taking time for me. I’m in a hearing right now where our defendant is saying that she received paperwork indicating that during a DNA testing process, it was determined that it was 99.9 percent probability that a man was not the father of a child. Have results ever been achieved that way?”

The scientist’s voice was measured. “The typical way to express an exclusion of paternity is to say that the alleged father has a probability of paternity of zero percent. You’re basically asked to report the probability of paternity when you do a test. It’ll either be 99.9 percent or higher. I’ve never heard a result the way that you’ve read it before.”

Judge Lake thanked the doctor and hung up. She turned to Monica. “Miss Laster, after hearing Dr. Baird and listening to the testimony today, what are your thoughts?”

Monica’s face had gone pale. “I just want to get it over with and just find out if this is my nephew. We could have had a bond with him just as well as I have with my nieces.”

“It is so perplexing,” Judge Lake said, “and it would lead one to think, Miss Laster, that you weren’t telling because you weren’t sure, not because you were just busy. But then when you look at the conception windows and the calendar, we’re only dealing with a two-week span. And in this courtroom, that can go either way.”

She picked up the first envelope. “I think it’s time we get the results. Miss Laster, since we started with Miss Hicks’s case first, I will give her results first. You may be seated, and I will get to yours next.”

The courtroom went silent. Jerome handed her the envelope. She opened it slowly.

“These results were prepared by DNA Diagnostics and they read as follows. Because there wasn’t a blood card available to test the DNA of the deceased Travis, we performed a DNA test with his surviving parent, Dolores Smith. With that being said, the results determine if there is a viable relationship between the child, Jakari, and Dolores Smith. In the case of Smith versus Laster-Hicks, when it comes to three-year-old Jakari, it has been determined by this court. The percentage of relatedness between Miss Dolores Smith and Jakari is zero point zero zero. Zero percent. You are not related.”

Britney Hicks did not flinch. “Thank you,” she said quietly.

“I apologize. I assumed it was his, but I do thank you for the closure. That’s my main purpose.”

Judge Lake stared at her. “Miss Hicks, you were extremely emotional earlier, and then when I read the result, you’re not at all surprised. You just say, ‘Thank you.’ Do you know who your child’s father is?”

Britney nodded. “Yeah.”

“So my point is this: then why would you put Miss Smith and her daughter through this drama without just saying from the beginning that there may be another possibility?”

Britney’s voice was steady. “I don’t know. But I was also sleeping with Travis. In this courtroom, we let it all play out. I knew when you disappeared and then she found you at the Martin Luther King parade just walking around. I knew then, but I didn’t say anything because I knew the DNA had the answers. I just wanted certainty. Because her intentions behind the DNA were ill-mannered. That was my knowing.”

“I’m not going to let you tell another lie,” Judge Lake said, her voice rising. “What you wanted for your child was a family.”

“Thank you.”

“No. You wanted a family because the guy whose baby it is, he’s away. He’s not going to be able to be a dad. And unfortunately, Travis is gone. But what Travis does have is a family who loves the children in the family, takes care of them. And when you were out there by yourself, hanging on a strand of nothing, trying to figure out how you’re going to raise this baby by yourself, you thought to yourself: ‘You know what I’ll do? I’ll go pop up over there and say that the baby is Travis’s.’”

Britney opened her mouth, but Judge Lake held up her hand.

“We already got your number, babe. But listen. Let me tell you about this. It’s why it don’t make no sense to lie. My grandmother always said, ‘If it don’t come out in the wash, it’s coming out in the dry.’ You got to say it. And I’m saying this to you because I want you to start policing yourself. Stop yourself from digging these holes. You’re a beautiful young girl. There’s going to be a whole lot of men that want to lay down with you. But you’re going to end up being the one with the baby. You’re more than that. Do you understand?”

Britney nodded, her eyes wet. “Yes.”

“I want you to sit on over there and think about yourself.”

Judge Lake turned to the second envelope. “Miss Laster, it’s your turn. Are you ready for this next result?”

Monica Laster stood, her hands trembling. “Yes.”

“The results determine if there is a viable relationship between the child, Malachi Laster, and Dolores Smith. When it comes to four-year-old Malachi Laster, it has been determined by this court. The percentage of relatedness between Ms. Dolores Smith and Malachi Laster is zero point zero. Zero percent. You are not related.”

Dolores Smith let out a sound that was half cry, half laugh. “Oh wow.”

Monica’s face crumpled. “I’m very sorry.”

“Both of them?” Teshia said, her voice cracking. “Both of them put me through all of this? And my daughter? All of it? For what?”

Judge Lake looked at Monica. “Do you need to sit down, Miss Smith? You may have a seat if you’d like. I know you’re so upset. There are no small claims in this court. That’s why we don’t play no games.”

She turned to Monica, who was staring at the floor, tears streaming down her face. “Miss Laster, you really do look shocked. I am. I am. Do you know who Malachi’s father is? I’m going to ask you the same thing I asked Miss Hicks.”

Monica shook her head. “Those were the only two people I remember sleeping with at that time.”

“Do you think there is some way you misread the previous test? If you saw 99.9 or saw that number, that would say that there would be a probability of paternity. I don’t know.”

Judge Lake set down the results. “Before we go, I have to say: I don’t know what it is, but y’all got to stop having these babies all over the place. I don’t know what these men are telling y’all. Really, I’m not even going to blame it on the men, because it’s our responsibility. We’ve got to protect ourselves, ladies. You understand?”

She looked at Britney, then at Monica. “Let’s do better. We’ve got counseling and resources for you. I want you all to just talk to Dr. Jeff and be honest. What’s really going on? I wish you the very best. Court is adjourned.”

The gavel fell. Dolores Smith walked out of the courtroom without looking back. Teshia followed her, her arm around her mother’s shoulders. The two young women stood alone in the gallery, each holding a child who would grow up without a father and without the family they had tried to claim.

Britney Hicks left first, Jakari on her hip. She didn’t say goodbye to anyone.

Monica Laster stayed longer, her son Malachi playing with a toy truck on the floor of the gallery. She stared at the empty bench where Judge Lake had been sitting, her face unreadable.

“What do we do now?” she whispered to no one.

The bailiff approached her gently. “Ma’am, you need to clear the courtroom.”

Monica nodded. She picked up Malachi and walked toward the door. The little boy waved at the empty room.

“Bye-bye,” he said.

No one answered.