The Moment of Truth

“Yes, Josh, I’m sure.”

He’d irritated her. But he couldn’t stop. “Why aren’t you on the pill?” Who wasn’t these days?

“No real reason to be, so why risk the side effects? STDs are more of a threat to me than pregnancy and, because of them, I wasn’t willing to consider sex without a condom, anyway, so...”

She spoke with all of the calm he so desperately wanted.

“I’m assuming you’ve always taken precautions in the past?”

“I’ve never had unprotected sex. And I have regular checkups, too,” she added. “I’ve never had an STD.”

“You emphasized the ‘I.’”

“My little sister had one once. She was sixteen, and while she was lucky and it was easily treatable, it broke my mom’s heart. And scared the hell out of all of us. Which is why I wouldn’t consider sex without a condom. I can’t believe I took such a risk. It’s not like me.”

“Why did you?”

“Because I underestimated the power of physical attraction,” she said. “I’ve never come close to...” She glanced down. “I had no idea I could lose my head like that. In the past, there was no problem remembering to use protection.”

His palms getting moist as he thought of her “losing her head,” Josh took a sip of wine. Even with the pill scare, he wanted her.

“You threw caution to the wind,” he summed up.

“Yeah, I guess I did.”

“A first for you.”

“But not for you, I take it.”

“As a matter of fact, sexually, it was. But I’ve done stupid things before. A lot of them.” His voice dropped. “I’m still paying for some of the things I’ve done.” He drew from the speech he’d rehearsed, and dismissed, more than once over the weekend. “Until I’ve paid my debt, and I’m not talking financially, until I find some way to atone for my past actions, I can’t be relied on for anything.”

Not as a lover, a friend...or a father.

“That’s ludicrous.”

Whatever reaction he’d been expecting from her, it wasn’t that.

“I’m being honest, Dana. This isn’t a conversation, it’s a warning. We can be friends as long as you don’t expect anything from me.”

“Your awareness of your shortcomings is more than most people bring to a relationship.”

This wasn’t working. “If you can’t accept that there can be no expectations between us, we can’t be friends.” There, he couldn’t put it any plainer than that.

“What are you so worried about? The fact that I might ask you to do something you won’t want to do, or the idea that I might think there’s something between us, thus preventing you from exploring other avenues?”

“What in the hell are you talking about?”

Dana took a sip of wine and looked toward the puppies, but they weren’t doing anything but lying there, lit only by the small security light in the back of the yard and the glow from the kitchen.

“Let me ask you this, Josh. Do you want to be able to uphold any expectations I might have of you?”

“Of course. But wanting and doing are not the same thing.”

“Do you intend to do as you said you would and come over on Tuesday night to help me out with Jerome?”

“I said I would.”

“And you always do as you say you’re going to do.”

“Pretty much.”

“That’s the definition of reliable,” she said, sounding satisfied.

She just wasn’t getting it. He finished his wine and stood up.

“I’m a selfish bastard, Dana. Just take my word for it.” Picking up L.G. in one hand, he scooped up her little ball of warmth in the other and handed the puppy to her. “For his sake—” he held out the dog in his care “—I’d appreciate it very much if you’d still come check on him throughout the week whenever you can make it. I’ll be here Tuesday after work.”

And without daring to look back at her, to plant whatever expression she might be wearing in his mind, he left.

* * *

LILLIE CALLED JUST after Josh left on Sunday night, preventing Dana from giving in to the need to have a good cry.

“We’ve decided on a name and thought you’d like to know,” the child life specialist said, sounding almost like a kid herself. “We’re calling him Harrison, after you.”

“Don’t you think that’s kind of hard for Abe to say?”

“Hold on a second.”

Dana held on, happier than Lillie or Jon would know that they considered her enough of a friend to even call and tell her the puppy’s name, let alone name it after her.