Chapter 106 Surrogate
Kan's gaze ricocheted back and forth, his mind struggling to comprehend the surreal scene unfurling before him. At the epicenter stood this imposing figure, draped nonchalantly in his father's nightwear — a detail that had escaped Kan's fatigued senses the night before.
The man exuded an aura of sheer presence, towering at an impressive six foot five, his shoulders broad and his jawline chiseled to a razor's edge. Every inch of him seemed to radiate a subtle but undeniable confidence, an undeniable command over the space he occupied. His presence was magnetic, demanding attention and respect in equal measure.
The living room was charged with an unspoken tension, the air pulsing with unspoken questions. The man who stood before Kan was undeniably striking, a presence that commanded attention, but Kan's focus was elsewhere — on the gentle swell of his mother's stomach, an unexpected curve in her figure that had appeared seemingly overnight.
Kan's hand moved across his forehead, the gesture betraying the turmoil within him. He summoned a smile, a thin veil over the storm brewing beneath. Stepping toward Brenda, he struggled to keep his voice level, the effort to restrain his temper palpable.
"Mother, care to explain... errmm... everything?!" Kan's words held an undercurrent of restraint, a plea for clarity that hung in the air.
Brenda, whether genuinely oblivious to Kan's inner turmoil or an expert in masking her emotions, placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. She spoke with an easy confidence, her words dancing with a lightness that seemed at odds with the gravity of the situation.
"Kan, this is Austin, he's a rank 4 senior-level accounting officer working with Elves Connect," Brenda's voice maintained a cheerful note, her eyes twinkling as she gestured towards the enigmatic figure.
"I'm sure they must have taught you this in school, but just to be clear, there are only four ranks!!" Her chuckle carried a maternal warmth, but it did little to quell the whirlwind of questions in Kan's mind.
"Hi Kan, I've heard a lot about you!" Austin's greeting was bright, his smile almost blinding in its perfection.
Kan, however, couldn't find room for pleasantries. His gaze flicked back to his mother's stomach, a silent plea for explanation. He stuttered through his words, a mix of confusion and concern painting his features.
"What... I mean... why... you know what?... can you explain this?" His finger pointed to the one thing that held all his uncertainty — his mother's protruding belly.
Brenda's revelation had hung in the air, stark and unfiltered. Her words, delivered with a blunt candor, cut through the tension like a knife. Kan's brows furrowed in confusion, his mind racing to grasp the gravity of what he was hearing.
"Uhm, okay? That made very little sense and did very little in terms of clarification. Can I get a better explanation because I don't understand what is going on here and I need answers," Kan's voice wavered, the sharpness giving way to a plea for coherence.
Austin, a figure suddenly pivotal in this inexplicable narrative, chimed in, attempting to bridge the gap. "B-baby, why don't you just go straight ahead to tell him. We are all going to be one big family eventually, right?" His words hung in the air, laden with a weight that Kan struggled to comprehend.
"Family?!!" The word stuck out to Kan as he prayed to wake up from the nightmare he was seemingly stuck in.
Kan's response was a disbelieving blurt, his mind unable to reconcile the surreal turn of events. Brenda, seemingly unfazed, exchanged a knowing glance with Austin, her smile carrying a touch of maternal reassurance.
The next moment, Brenda's actions defied all expectation. With a fluid motion, she lifted her apron, revealing a round form beneath. It resembled a stomach, yet its rubbery texture defied reality, leaving Kan utterly speechless. The room seemed to close in, the air thick with a heady mix of revelation and incomprehension.
Kan watched as Brenda fondled with a piece of dough, almost using it as some type of tool to take her mind off the present, buying herself sometime to come to terms with telling Kan the big news. However, she sighed and dropped the dough on a rolling pan, causing it to make a sound akin to dropping a bowl into a bucket of water. She then turned Kan to face her, hands on his shoulders and kan realized then that the height gap between him and his mother was now nonexistent in a matter of weeks.
He had simply grown taller that quickly and could see her eye to eye now. However, considering the present situation on ground, he wondered if seeing her was the best of luxury.
"You know, I never told you my job right?" Brenda began. Kan's eyes shook in his sockets as his mind had already landed on a million conclusions. If conclusions were actual landmines, then his mind was currently exploding with a ton of it.
Of course he knew what she did. It made no sense for him to still not have that figured out but seeing the situation and hearing her about to pronounce it herself was all the more gut wrenching to him.
"I would have told you a while ago but I held back, thinking you were too young to understand, I guess I underestimated your growth and wisdom which I would still argue that you took after me," Brenda trailed off for a moment before she finally settled with a nervous chuckle, a more serious look appeared on her face as she continued..."I'm a surrogate," Brenda revealed.
"Okay? What now?!!" Kan's face flushed with surprise and deep down, a gush of relief until Hela chimed in.
[A surrogate is a person or thing that serves as a substitute or replacement for another. In various contexts, it can refer to a woman who carries a pregnancy for someone else (gestational surrogate), a stand-in for an absent person, or a device or system that performs a task on behalf of another. The term "surrogate" is used in a wide range of fields, including reproductive technology, legal matters, and computing] Hela was quick to put it in a screen format, right in front of kan's view.
"Well...that changes everything..." Kan said to Hela.
[Does it really, baby?] Hela replied, a much more somber tone than her usual echoed in Kan's head.
"Take it this way kan, I do what other people cannot do and I get paid for it. I'm like a hero if you want to put it that way," Brenda said to Kan.
"I see, so you do this with father knowing? And he approves? What does he do even?!!" Kan asked, infuriated already by how Brenda was trying to bend it.
"Your father is also a surrogate," Brenda said making kan's heart almost thump right out of his chest.
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