I suppose I should be glad that he saw this thing between us as not something that could develop into a committed relationship. After all, I couldn’t marry him and keep Andrew a secret. He couldn’t marry me and keep me a secret from his mother. On the other hand, I was sad, and yes, a little hurt, that he didn’t think I was marriage material.
His comments highlighted just how little he knew of the world average people lived in. He had choices in life that most people didn’t have. Money and influence were currencies that bought anything a man wanted, and could make inconveniences go away. After all, his mother had offered me a crapload of money to disappear.
“I guess you don’t have to worry about it. Men have choices like that,” I said to his comment about having a kid but not being able to commit to it.
“What do you mean? Women can choose too.”
“Not always. Not in the case of an unplanned pregnancy. There are many women out there who raise children without fathers because the fathers didn’t want to be bothered with it. Or sometimes they’re just not involved. Mother’s don’t have a choice to be involved or not.”
“In that situation, I like to think I’d step up. But given the choice to have kids or not, I think I’ll opt out.”
He’d step up to fatherhood out of duty, but not out of love. Considering that was what his parents were asking him to do by marrying a woman he didn’t love and taking over a business he hadn’t a choice in running, I almost felt like I was giving him a gift by keeping Andrew from him.
Don’t fool yourself, Serena, my conscience warned. He still has the right to know.
“I suspect you’re going to want a brood of kids,” he said.
“I’d like at least one.” I scoffed at myself for my answer.
“You probably want the whole shebang. Husband. Kids. Home with a picket fence.”
I sighed. “I suppose in an ideal world, all that would be nice. I totally wanted that for a time, but today, I’m older and wiser. I’ve learned that life doesn’t always turn out the way you plan.”
He was quiet for a moment and I wondered what I’d said that left him without a response. “Serena?”
“Hmm?”
“What happened to you?”
My hackles rose, feeling offended that he thought something was wrong with me. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, did someone hurt you? I hate the idea that something happened to you to change that free-spiritedness you’d had. I grew up so stifled and meeting you five years ago was like having my first breath of fresh air.”
Had things been different, his statement would have filled me with warmth. I’d loved that who I was brought life into his drab, ordered world. But things weren’t different. He’d brought me life too, in the form of a son, and I’d always cherish that. But it had been a significant change that meant I couldn’t be a free spirit. I had a child to house and feed. A college tuition to save for. And I had to be present as much as I could, so dating or a personal life just wasn’t in the cards.
“Just life, Devin. Like I said, responsibilities. Obligations. I can’t afford to be impulsive.”
“Is that what we were? Impulsive?”
For reasons I didn’t understand, tears came to my eyes. I supposed I was grieving the two young lovers five years ago. “Yes.”
“And now?”
“I don’t know what’s going on now, to be honest.”
He was quiet again for a moment. “Is it impulsive to feel drawn to a person? I have to sound like a cliché but I’m a fucking moth and you’re the flame. Is that impulsive?”
“I don’t know about impulsive, but there is danger in getting burned, isn’t there?”
“Fuck.”
Neither of us said anything for a time.
“I’m a selfish bastard.”
“Oh?” I said, curious about his statement.
“You and I want different things. If I was an honorable man, I’d wish you luck and let you go. I will if that’s what you want, but I meant what I said. I think of you all the fucking time.” He laughed in a way that made me think he was self-conscious or embarrassed about all he was revealing. “But I don’t want to hurt you and I’m afraid I will.”