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“Rosso?” he calls down the steps. “Where are you?”
He’s always up before me on the weekends, and I’m waiting for him to see my tear-stained face. I try to wipe them away but they continue to come with each moment that gets closer to telling him the truth.
“Baby, what in the world are you doing awake?” I glance behind me and he stops at the coffee pot, pouring himself a cup, though I brewed it hours ago. “Need more?”
I shake my head, and I wait for him to invade my space. He’s never farther than an inch from me if he can help it.
“So, tell me, what has you awake?” He rounds the large chair that Otis and I have been lying on for a while now but stops short at the sight of me. “Oh, shit, Rosso. What’s wrong, baby? Is someone hurt? Why didn’t you wake me?”
He steps forward, and I stop him. “No one is hurt. But I think we need to talk.”
He continues toward me, and there’s room in the large chair I’m lying in, but I can’t tell him this if he’s next to me. I canbarely tell him now. “Have a seat,” I utter in a muted tone, pointing to the identical chair across from me.
“Fuck, San, you’re scaring me.”
I’m scaring myself too. “You know how we both said this happened so quickly, and our love came out of nowhere? I think it’s why we missed talking about certain subjects, things we have differing opinions on.”
“Sandra, baby, English. I’m not a press conference. I’m your boyfriend. Future. What is going on? Just say it; don’t try to sugarcoat it.”
He’s right. I’m trying to preface everything and account for all the reasons we can no longer be together.
“Dom, I don’t want kids. I’m forty. After thirty-six, I decided the window had closed, and as much as I love you, andI do, I can’t give you children, baby.”
His elbows are on his knees, but as soon as the news hits him, he falls onto the back of the chair. “You need to really think about it. If children are a deal breaker, we have to decide now. I love my nieces and can’t wait to meet my sister’s newest little one. But I can’t be a mom.”
His hands are in his hair, his legs are spread open, and he lets out a long deep breath, processing it all. “Is it that youcan’thave children, or you just don’t want them?” he asks, and his tone has turned harsh.
“Shit, Dom. Are you going to make me say it? I’m too old. At this stage in my life, I can’t fathom being pregnant. I’ve never tried to get pregnant, but I have no reason to believe I can’t. I don’t want children. I never thought about it, until I got too old, but watching Cami with her girls…it’s scary and exhausting.”
He scrubs his face with his hand, pushing from the chair and walking to the deck rail overlooking the river. I follow him, leaving Otis asleep on the chair.
I take my hand in his as I stand next to him. “You told me that your parents had screwed you up. That commitment has been hard because of the way you were raised. I assumed that meant you didn’t want to have children, or that you were indifferent.”
He keeps his hand interlaced with mine, dropping a kiss on my head. “I couldn’t take that leap to commitment. It’s a catch twenty-two. I couldn’t commit to a woman, but once I found her…” He tips his head to mine. “Once I found you, I wanted to have kids and give my wife and children everything I didn’t have. Someone who gave a shit. Someone who’d put their life on the line for us. My kids are going to have that, and so much more. Things money can’t buy. Because that’s all my parents needed to do with the little they had, and they had very little. They still could have loved us. Put us first and protected us. It’s how I wanted to right their wrongs, by giving that to my kids one day.” He turns to me and pulls my fingers to his lips. “Our kids. I want to do that with our kids one day, Sandra. I want it all with you.”
We’re staring into each other’s eyes, silently pleading with the other.
“I want a future with you, but I can’t give you the family you so desperately want. I hear it in your voice. I can’t raise kids into my fifties, baby. And I can’t ask you to give up your dreams of having a family.”
“But my dream is you, Sandra.”
I know Dom well enough. “Your dream is me; I believe you. But it also includes something I can’t give you.”
I walk away from him. We could have this conversation over and over again, and nothing will change. At the end of the day, I can’t make his dream come true.
twenty
DOMINIC
There was no reason to stay the rest of the weekend. And I find myself driving us home, agreeing to end our relationship. It was amicable, at least.
It’s a quiet three-and-a-half-hour drive back to the city, and Sandra’s line of sight is on the outdoors, watching life as it passes us by. And it is.
I try to think of anything to say to ease her fears of being a mom. I’d never force Sandra into a life as a mother if she truly is against it. But then again, I can’t give up the dream of being a dad, of shaping someone’s life, like Daimen had with me. I had a person in my corner. It wasn’t my parents, but I want to be the parent like Daimen had been with me and Daria.
Otis must sense the tension in the air and steps over the console and sits in my lap. The little turd, he takes this one moment when I’m about to say goodbye to Sandra to make nice to me. And now, I’m going to miss this compact pug and all his attitude. Great. More pain.
Each minute that ticks by, we’re closer to her apartment and closer to saying goodbye. I try to hold onto this moment with her, the last one I’ll ever have. This weekend was about becoming closer, and starting our future together, but now I’m about to say goodbye.
