He continued to glare at me with his hands on his hips. "What the hell does that mean?"
"I wanted everything that you are offering me, Carter. But I was afraid, so I held back. And that fear hurt you and Tanner. The longer it went on, the worse I knew it would be when you found out. And then it just wasn't the anger you might feel at my not telling you sooner about Tanner, but it was the fear that you would take him away from me."
He stared at me and then it was as if all the air had gone out of him. He sank down onto a chair putting his elbows on his knees and resting his head in his hands. "I don't understand how you can possibly think that I'm the type of man that would do that. I don't remember ever doing or saying anything that would make you think that I would take a child from his mother. Jesus, I lost my mother as a child, I know what that's like."
God. I had totally forgotten that. "I was acting selfishly from my own sense of fear. It has nothing to do with you and how you've behaved. I was blinded by my own fears."
He let out a breath and then he looked at me hard with hard eyes. "I'm not going to take him from you, but I'm not going to let you keep me from seeing him."
I shook my head. "Of course not. I want you in his life. But you have to be in his life."
"There you go again, assuming that I'm going to be some sort of deadbeat dad."
"I'm sorry. It's just that he means everything to me. I care about you Carter. I really do hate that about me, but despite everything Tanner has to come first. And if that hurt your feelings, I'm sorry."
He shook his head. "I really thought you were the one."
My heart sank and tears came to my eyes at the reminder of what I was losing. I’d had everything I wanted right at my fingertips and I screwed it up so badly.
"How about we start by going to the park?" I suggested, deciding that the conversation was only going to loop into circles where I would say things that hurt Carter.
Carter nodded. "I'd like that." Then he cocked his head. "He doesn't know, does he?"
I rose on unsteady legs. "No, he doesn't."
Carter's anger dissipated, replaced with apprehension. "What if he doesn't like me? Maybe he's thinking Kevin —"
I held up my hand to stop him. "Kevin means nothing to me or him. Last night was just a friendly dinner. I'd never met him before and I'm not going to see him again."
Carter seemed to accept that. "What does he know about his father?"
"I've been fortunate that so far he hasn't really asked about it, so I haven't told him anything." But I wanted Carter to know that when the time came that I would have told him the truth. "But when he did ask, I was going to tell him about the gentle, kind, and adventurous man I had met on a cruise to Mexico. I was going to tell him about you, Carter. I’d explain that I didn't know where you were and that you didn't know where I was." I didn't want him to think that I was going to blame him for being gone.
"Thank you."
It seemed like a silly thing for him to thank me for, but I suppose he was reeling. I’d had nine months to prepare to be a mom, and then three years of actually being a mom. Carter was getting it all in one lump sum.
I went over to the sliding door, pulling it open. "Hey Tanner, do you want to go to the park?"
"Yay." Tanner came running over. "Can we get an ice cream too?"
"Maybe, we'll see. It's still early in the day."
Tanner came running in and stopped short when he saw Carter. "Are you coming to the park too?"
Carter squatted down and I could see all the love and emotion welling inside him. I both marveled at it and felt broken-hearted that I had been so selfish for so long.
"Yes, if that's alright with you."
"It's all right with me."
"Tanner, before we go, there's something that I need to talk to you about." I sat on the edge of the coffee table and reached out to take his hand. I had practiced different ways to tell Carter that he was a father, but I hadn't considered how to tell Tanner about Carter being his father. Did I just blurt it out? Did I let Carter do it?
"You know how some kids that we've met at the park have a mommy and daddy?" I asked Tanner.
"Yeah. I just have a mommy," Tanner said.
"Well, actually that's not true. Everybody has a mommy and daddy, it's just that sometimes they aren’t always able to be together." I shook my head because I knew I was doing this all wrong, especially as Tanner looked at me quizzically. I didn’t chance a glance at Carter because I couldn't imagine what he was thinking.