“So you’re a father, you have a valid opinion on this?”
“I have a valid opinion. It’s got nothing to do with whether I’m a parent or not.”
She pulled a chair out from the table, turned it to face him and sat. She gave off nonchalant, but her crossed leg swung, small, intense kicks. “I suppose you’re going to tell me about it.”
He let her keep her distance, her space from him, from what they were doing to each other. “Yep. You’re goddamn beautiful, you’re educated, you have a career and money. You’re healthy. You live in a First World country, with all the rights and privileges that brings. What makes you think you can’t do a better job than most with a kid?”
“What makes you think I can?”
He kept his voice level, hammered the sentiment out of it. “Because my mother was an alcoholic who abandoned me, and I turned out just fucking fine.”
She shifted in the chair, a slight shrink, but her words didn’t run from the fray. “Maybe you’re not so fine. That collection of scars. You put your own brother in hospital. Maybe there’s a reason you aren’t married and you get detained.”
Bingo.
There was the fire lit. It blazed in her skin and raged in her contained sarcasm.
“Don’t make this about me. This is about you. Feeling you need an excuse not to conform to type, to make an apology for being a career whore. To justify your choices.”
She was on her feet, chin thrust up, eyes searing, limbs tense. He wanted her to look like that when his hands were on her. “I’m not apologising for who I am.”
“What is it you want?”
“I want to be the best at what I do. I don’t want to be judged for being a daughter or a sister or a mother.”
“What else?”
“I want to right wrongs. To out people who hurt others. To change things that need changing.”
He laughed. “You want to be a superhero. Who makes you God to decide what’s right?”
“Men like you.”
“Like me, how?”
“Arrogant. Controlling. Rich enough to buy anything you want and screw the consequences.”
He let a silence fall, softened his voice to disguise his intention. “Can I buy you?”
She hissed, “Never,” aiming her contempt squarely at him.
“You owe me a dare, Lois. Show me I can’t buy you. Prove you don’t need to justify your choices.”
“How?” she scoffed, as if there was nothing he had she wanted. She shouldn’t have scoffed. It was like an invitation to rumble.
“Admit what you’re feeling, right now. No apologies. Kiss me.”
Her weight went to her back foot. She leant away as though he was contagious. “You’re insane.”
“Am I? It’s what you want isn’t it? You believe in the moment. It’s why you danced with me. We’re strangers. We’re free to be exactly who we are, to ask for exactly what we want. No history, no future, no expectations. Why not the truth?”
She was breathing hard. She could be in the corridor shouting rape in two strides. Excitement rippled through his body like before a brawl, when anything could happen, when everything could be lost in the speed of a flinch or a door opening and a voice raised in fear.
Her eyes fixed on his, she held her ground. She was a brawler too. He braced, his own breath forced out sharp, loud in his ears. She took two strides towards him. “This is madness.”
“It stops the minute you don’t want it.”
“What if I want it?”