“Let’s go make some tea, and we’ll pick out a new movie,” he suggests.
My heart sinks. I love tea and movies, but just a few minutes ago, I had my hand down his pants, and he seemed to like it. During our going slow time, he’s done all the touching. Now, I want to do something for him.
I lick my lips nervously. “Is something wrong? Do you not want me to touch you?”
Holding on to my hands, he sits back, pulling me upright with him.
“Babe, I fuckin’ love when you touch me, but we’re taking things slow, right? Everything’s great—I’m happy. Are you?”
“Yes. But… Don’t you want more?” I’m okay with going slow. In fact, I appreciate it, since I have no memory of ever having sex.
According to the journals, we had a very intimate, physical relationship. There are more entries than I can count about how amazing things were. Asher was celibate for close to eight years—by choice. He’s a healthy, very beautiful man inside and out with a ton of sex appeal and thousands of female fans. I may have come out of a coma recently, but I wasn’t born yesterday—he’s got to have the worst case of smurf balls ever at this point.
“I want you more than anything,” he says as he zips his jeans back up. “But I’m fine with going slow.” He takes a deep breath. “We’re seeing your doctor next week, so we can talk to her about all this then, and make sure it’s okay for us to do more.”
“Why? Is something wrong with me?” A lead ball of fear sinks down into my stomach. Maybe he knows something I don’t. Perhaps I suffered additional damage from the accident that I’m not aware of.
“Sweetheart, no.” He pulls me closer to him and rubs my back. The warmth of his hand is comforting. “We just have to make sure it’s safe for us to make love. Find out what’s safe for you. That’s all, I promise.”
“What do you mean by safe?”
“Like birth control, for one.”
“What did we use before?”
“You were on the pill. There’s new methods now that might be better.”
“What about condoms?”
He fingers his beard. “When we used those years ago, you had an allergic reaction from them.”
“Oh.” It’s slightly embarrassing that he knows more about my own body than I do. I vaguely remember talking to my doctor about sex and birth control right before I came home from the hospital, but I had no interest in sex at the time, so the conversation didn’t go far.
Things are different now, though. I want to have sex with my husband, and I can’t deny that I’ve been thinking about wanting a baby someday.
The lead ball sinks even further. “Can I even get pregnant?”
He looks surprised at the question. “I don’t know, babe. All I wanted was for you to come home and be healthy. I didn’t discuss sex or pregnancy with your doctors. That was the last thing on my mind. I figured we’d cross that bridge when the time was right.”
“How will we know when the time is right?”
He grins and leans in for a kiss. “When it’s right, we’ll know. There’s no rush. I’m not going anywhere.”
“What if I want a baby someday?”
His smile falters, and he chews the inside of his cheek. His mood is bouncing all over the place tonight.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
He grabs on to my hand, avoiding my eyes for a few moments, obviously struggling. I brace myself for bad news. More loss. More of my life taken away from me.
“Em.” His voice is low, almost sad, confirming my fears. “The last conversation we had, right before you fell, was about having a baby.”
“We wanted to have another baby?”
“Yes. You wanted to quit the band and have a baby. Like soon. You weren’t enjoying our lifestyle anymore—all the travel, being apart too much, the stress. Just all the shit that comes with it. You wanted us to have a normal, quiet life, spend time together as a family.”
That’s what I want.
“What about you? Did you want that too?”
“Yes. I had a lot of commitments with the band. There was a shit ton going on, literally nonstop. But I wanted to cut back so we could be together more and have a baby. That was what our plan was moving forward.”
“Then after we talked, I just… fell?”
He nods.
“Did we have a fight about it? Was I upset? Is that how I fell?”
A sick feeling creeps through me as I envision us having an argument on a cliff. Did I run off in anger? Did I freak out and jump? What were we even doing there to begin with?
I shake my head, dispelling the horrible images from my head, which are ridiculous.
“God no, not at all. We were happy and excited about starting a new beginning. We wanted to travel, build our dream house, and try to have a baby. You were so young when you had Kenzi, you wanted to experience motherhood as an adult. Without all the stress and fears we went through when we were young.”