The Maternity Test

The waiting room of Apex Solutions was designed to intimidate. Chrome, glass, and a temperature set to “meat locker.”

I sat on a low-slung leather chair that was impossible to get out of gracefully, especially when you are thirty-four weeks pregnant. My ankles were swollen, throbbing in rhythm with the fluorescent lights. My lower back felt like it was being compressed by a vice.

My name is Elena. To the receptionist chewing gum at the front desk, I was just a 2:00 PM appointment. A resume in a pile. A liability.

I smoothed my navy maternity dress over my stomach. I had a Master’s degree in Operations Management from Wharton. I had ten years of experience scaling tech startups. My resume was a weapon of mass instruction.

But today, I wasn’t Elena the Executive. I was Elena the Applicant.

I was undercover.

My husband, David, and I own Vanguard Tech. We had grown too big, too fast, and we had hired Apex Solutions—a high-end recruitment agency—to handle our hiring. But lately, we noticed a pattern. We were only getting resumes from men. Young, single men. No women. No parents. No diversity.

So, I created a fake identity. I applied for a Senior Director position at my own company through Apex.

“Elena Vance?”

The door opened. A man stepped out. He looked like a shark in a bespoke suit. Too much gel in his hair, a watch that cost more than a Honda, and a smile that didn’t reach his cold, dead eyes.

“That’s me,” I said, struggling to stand up. It took me a moment.

The man, whose badge read Marcus Thorne, Senior Talent Acquisition, didn’t offer a hand to help. He watched me struggle with a look of undisguised amusement.

“Right this way,” he said, turning his back before I was fully upright.

Chapter 1: The Bump

His office smelled of expensive leather and arrogance. He sat behind a glass desk that had nothing on it but my printed resume and a stress ball.

I sat down. The chair was uncomfortable.

Marcus picked up my resume. He didn’t look at it. He looked at my stomach.

“So,” he started, leaning back and linking his fingers behind his head. “You’re… expecting.”

“I am,” I said, keeping my voice professional. “I’m due in six weeks.”

“Six weeks,” he repeated. He let out a short, sharp laugh. “And you’re applying for a Senior Director role? A role that requires travel? Late nights? Stress?”

“I am fully capable of managing my schedule,” I said. “If you look at my resume, you’ll see I led a merger worth fifty million dollars while recovering from a broken leg two years ago. I don’t let physical circumstances dictate my output.”

Marcus finally glanced at the paper. He skimmed it for maybe three seconds. Then he dropped it onto the desk as if it were a used napkin.

“Look, Elena,” he said, dropping the professional facade entirely. “Let’s be real. Vanguard Tech is a shark tank. It’s fast-paced. It’s for hungry wolves.”

He gestured to my belly.

“You’re not a wolf. You’re a nesting hen.”

I felt the heat rise in my cheeks. “Excuse me?”

“I’m doing you a favor,” Marcus smirked. “I could put you through the process. I could send this to the client. But do you know what they would do? They would laugh. They would ask me why I sent them a woman who is going to take maternity leave ten minutes after she’s hired.”

“That is illegal,” I said calmly. “Discriminating against a candidate based on pregnancy is a violation of federal labor laws.”

Marcus laughed louder. “Laws? Sweetheart, this is the corporate world. We don’t say it out loud, but we all know the score. Mothers are distracted. Mothers leave early to pick up sick kids. Mothers have ‘mommy brain’.”

He leaned forward, his face twisted in a sneer.

“Honestly, did you come here to work? Or did you just come here to find a place to give birth? Because we don’t have a delivery room in the break area.”

Chapter 2: The Escalation

I stared at him. The sheer audacity took my breath away.

“Are you rejecting my application based solely on my pregnancy?” I asked, giving him one last chance to save himself.

“I’m rejecting you because you’re a bad investment,” Marcus said, standing up. “Go home, Elena. Put your feet up. Watch some daytime TV. Leave the business to the people who aren’t… hormonal.”

He picked up my resume—my impeccable, fabricated resume—and crumpled it into a ball. He tossed it into the wastebasket.

“Door’s behind you,” he said, turning to his computer.

I didn’t move.

The anger that had been simmering in my chest boiled over. But it wasn’t a hot, screaming anger. It was a cold, calculating fury. The kind that topples empires.

“Marcus,” I said.

“I said leave,” he snapped, not looking up.

“You handle the Vanguard account, don’t you?” I asked.

He stopped typing. He looked at me, annoyed. “Yes. It’s my biggest account. I’m personal friends with the CEO, David Sterling. We go way back. He trusts me to filter out… dead weight.”

“Personal friends,” I repeated. “That’s interesting.”

I reached into my purse.

“What are you doing?” Marcus asked, suspicious. “Recording me?”

“No,” I said. “I’m making a phone call.”

I pulled out my phone. I dialed a number on speed dial. It rang once.

“Hey, babe,” a deep voice answered over the speakerphone. “How’s the check-up going? Is the baby okay?”

“The baby is fine, David,” I said, my eyes locked on Marcus. “But the ‘check-up’ was a disaster.”

Marcus froze. He recognized the voice. It was the voice he heard on conference calls every Monday morning.

“David?” Marcus whispered. “David Sterling?”

“Who is that?” David asked on the phone. “Elena, where are you?”

“I’m at Apex Solutions,” I said. “I’m sitting in front of Marcus Thorne.”

“Thorne?” David’s voice hardened. “I thought you were at the doctor.”

“No,” I said. “I decided to do a little quality control. Remember how we wondered why we never saw any female candidates for the Director positions? Why our diversity metrics were tanking?”

I stood up. I walked over to the trash can and picked up my crumpled resume. I smoothed it out on the glass desk.

“It’s because your ‘personal friend’ Marcus throws them in the trash,” I said. “He just told me that I’m a ‘nesting hen’. He asked if I planned to give turn the office into a nursery. And he told me that mothers are a bad investment.”

Chapter 3: The Call

The silence on the other end of the phone was terrifying. It was the silence of a man who built a tech giant by destroying his competition.

“He said what?” David’s voice was low. Deadly.

Marcus was pale. He stood up, his hands shaking. “David! Wait! I didn’t know… she didn’t say who she was! She tricked me!”

“I didn’t trick you, Marcus,” I said. “I presented myself as a qualified candidate. You treated me like garbage because I’m pregnant.”

“David, listen to me!” Marcus shouted at the phone. “I was protecting your interests! You don’t want someone who’s going to be on leave for three months! I was doing my job!”

“Your job,” David roared through the speaker, making Marcus flinch, “was to find me the best talent! Not to filter candidates based on your misogynistic worldview!”

“But…” Marcus stammered.

“Elena,” David said, his voice softening slightly as he addressed me. “Are you okay? Did he upset you?”

“I’m fine,” I said, rubbing my belly. “But I’m done with Apex.”

“Agreed,” David said. “Put him on.”

I pushed the phone across the desk toward Marcus. He looked at it like it was a bomb.

“M-Mr. Sterling,” Marcus squeaked.

“Marcus,” David said. “As of this moment, Vanguard Tech is terminating its contract with Apex Solutions. Effective immediately.”

“You can’t do that!” Marcus cried. “We have a retainer! That contract is worth three million dollars a year! It’s half my commission!”

“Read the morality clause, Marcus,” David snapped. “Subsection 4: Discrimination. You breached it. And frankly? You’re lucky my wife is handling this professionally. If I were there, I’d throw you through that glass wall.”

“Wife?” Marcus breathed. The blood drained from his face completely. He looked at me. He looked at my belly. He realized, in that moment, that the “nesting hen” owned the coop.

“Cancel the contract,” David ordered. “And Marcus? If I hear that you work in recruitment ever again in this city, I will personally sue you into oblivion. You are done.”

Click.

The line went dead.

Chapter 4: The Exit

The room was silent. The only sound was the hum of the air conditioner and Marcus’s heavy, panicked breathing.

He sank into his chair. He looked destroyed. The arrogance was gone, replaced by the hollow look of a man who just watched his career evaporate.

“Mrs. Sterling,” he whispered. “I… I had no idea.”

“That’s the problem, Marcus,” I said, picking up my purse. “You shouldn’t need to know who my husband is to treat me with respect. You should have respected me because I am a human being with a brain and a skillset.”

I walked to the door. My back hurt. My feet hurt. But I felt lighter than air.

I stopped at the threshold.

“Oh, and Marcus?”

He looked up, tears welling in his eyes.

“You were right about one thing,” I said. “Mothers are dangerous. But not because of ‘mommy brain’.”

I patted my stomach.

“It’s because we fight for the future. And we don’t have patience for dinosaurs like you.”

I walked out into the waiting room. The receptionist was still chewing gum. She looked at me.

“Did it go well?” she asked, bored.

I smiled.

“I think they’re going to have an opening for a recruiter soon,” I said. “You should apply.”

I walked out of the building and into the sunshine. My phone buzzed.

David: I’m picking you up. Lunch? Pickles and ice cream?

Me: Steak. Rare. I have a victory to celebrate.