“There’s not much to talk about. I want a baby and you don’t. Even if we had sex, which could be fun, it’s just going to mess with my head. And probably yours.” Brooklyn grumbled and grabbed her handbag from the floor, hitching it up on her shoulder and shooting him a piercing look. “It’s probably best if you just forget everything I said. Forget that I told you what I want for my life, or that after all of that, you still wanted to kiss me. Forget that I asked you to leave the restaurant with me. I need to go.” She fished her phone out of her bag and pulled up a ride app.
“I really don’t think it’s fair for you to be mad at me. You sprung that baby thing on me with no warning.”
“I’m not mad at you, I’m mad at the situation. And for the record, I didn’t spring anything on you. I told you what I wanted. A baby. Then I told you the other thing I wanted. To have sex with you. Just because one can potentially lead to the other, doesn’t mean they were related. At least not tonight.” She opened the door and started down the stairs.
“Hold up, Brooklyn. Can we at least say goodbye? Can we be friends?”
She turned back and confronted him with her big, beautiful eyes. “Right now, I don’t know. You’re the one who said that life is all about timing. And our timing clearly sucks. So maybe it’s better if we just call it a day.”
The emotional side of Alec wanted to reach for her and try to sort this out. But his rational side knew that this was exactly like every other argument they’d had during their relationship. He and Brooklyn simply weren’t meant to be. “Okay.”
Brooklyn raised both eyebrows. “Bye, Alec. Let’s not do this again. Okay?” She enunciated each word with such clarity there was no ignoring her intent. Only the speed of her exit down the stairs made a greater impression.
He and Brooklyn were done.
This time, for good.
Chapter Five
Alec had been thinkingabout the date that went horribly wrong for three days. How could he and Brooklyn have gone from zero to sixty, then back to zero, so fast? Mentally, he felt stuck where he’d been months ago, trying to sort all of this out. Except he no longer had a therapist, because he’d thought he was doing okay. That might have been a premature change.
Regardless, he had to talk to someone, and the most logical person was his younger brother. Nick was a married dad of two, everything Alec had once thought he would be, and more important, everything their parents had hoped for when they were alive.
Soon after he got home from shooting the show, he stretched out on the brown leather sofa in his living room and gave his brother a call. “It was such a mess,” Alec declared after some small talk and the long explanation of what had happened with Brooklyn.
“Did she actually come out and ask you to get her pregnant?”
“Not exactly. She said she was thinking about becoming a mom. But she talked about other things she wanted to do, too. And I was all excited because I thought she was thinking about settling down. Then we kissed, went back to my place, and that was when the confusion started.” From where he was situated, he could see into the foyer where that kiss had taken place. He raked his hair from his face, wishing there was a replay for dates like they had for sporting events. Then he could just go to the tape and figure out what in the hell had really happened.
“I love that you got excited about the fact that she was showing signs of getting serious. You can be such a sap.”
Alec sighed. “I know. I’m a romantic. I’ve always been this way. I can’t help it.” Indeed, Alec was the guy who only had one girlfriend in high school. Then one in college. And although neither of those relationships worked out, and he’d had other options later in life, he’d never been interested in pursuing something casual. He’d always had some sort of commitment in mind.
“You know I’m not the guy to give relationship advice. My marriage to Zina is easy. On most things, we can find a way to compromise, and when that doesn’t work, I do whatever she wants because it makes my life a lot easier.”
Alec couldn’t see himself ever giving up that much control. But maybe that was part of his problem. He might be a romantic, but he was also incredibly Type A. “The thing is, I really like Brooklyn, but I’m not sure I want to be a dad. Ten years ago, no question. I would’ve said yes. But I’m forty-four. Even if I met a woman, or Brooklyn and I figured out our problems, I’d be forty-five or older before the baby was born. I don’t want to retire the same day they graduate from high school.”
“Look, I’m not going to try to sway you in either direction. I love being a dad. Sophia and Maya have made me a better person. But I’m younger than you and the girls are already eight and ten. So I can see why you might not want to go there. It can be exhausting.”
Alec’s mind naturally flew to his two adorable nieces, what rays of sunshine they were in the family, and how much they had meant to his parents. Before Alec and Nick’s mom got sick, she lavished the girls with all the love a grandmother—ya-ya—could muster. She showered them with kisses, and plied them with stickyloukoumades,the Greek version of donuts, as soon as they had teeth and it was safe for them to have honey. Their dad was the proud grandpa—pappouli—bragging to anyone who would listen that both girls were the most brilliant and beautiful to ever walk the earth, and he did it all while caring for his slowly declining wife.
Alec had fond memories of the extended family gatherings before his mom passed away, but he also remembered feeling as though he was falling short. Success, decent TV ratings, and the occasional feature in an entertainment magazine didn’t count for much as his mom dropped not-so-subtle hints, asking Zina to set aside the girls’ hand-me-downs for the day Alec “settled down”. She’d say to him, “I just want you to be happy”, but he knew that really meant marriage and children. At that point, every clock imaginable was ticking—Alec was only getting older and his mother was only getting sicker. And none of them were aware of it, but his dad wasn’t far behind her. Mom lost her battle with cancer, and their father died of a broken heart.
“So you and Brooklyn want different things,” his brother continued. “You aren’t hurting for options, are you?”
“I have a lot fewer than you probably think.” Yes, women sent him emails professing their love, and one celeb magazine had declared him “America’s early-morning silver fox”, but that didn’t make dating at his age an easy prospect. The landscape of courtship at forty-four was riddled with pitfalls—an endless obstacle course of exes, kids, and personal agendas. He didn’t expect things to be easy, but there were so many complications.
“Well, life is short. I know that sounds like a cliché, but it’s true. Do what makes you happy. If something doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. Move on.”
“You’re right. Accepting things is important. And I can’t control what someone else wants. I can only control myself.”Now I sound like my therapist.“I should get going, but have you and Zina had a chance to talk about Thanksgiving?” After their mom passed away, Nick and Zina started hosting the holiday, but that meant Alec had to hop on a plane after anchoring the Thanksgiving Day parade for the network. Last year, he spent much of the day stuck at JFK after bad weather on the East Coast shut everything down. It was the absolute worst, since Alec was still depressed after his break-up with Brooklyn. Nothing like spending a family holiday in a gate area, heartbroken and praying for a plane.
“I don’t think we can swing coming up to New York. I know you really want to host, but between my work schedule and Zina’s, it’s just not workable.”
Alec sighed. “Don’t worry about it. I’m happy to come down there. Hopefully, the weather won’t be as much of a problem this time.” He might be disappointed, but he did look forward to family time. This one visit might be the only one he’d get all year. “I should probably go get some sleep. Otherwise, I’m going to look like hell on camera tomorrow.”
“We don’t want that. Take care of yourself.”
“I will. You, too.” Alec hung up. Although Nick had helped him feel less terrible, he’d also gotten Alec’s brain going on the topic of fatherhood. His age felt like this big gray cloud overhead. People loved to talk about a woman’s biological clock, but men could be just as haunted by the persistenttick tick tick, too. And when he and Brooklyn hadn’t worked out, and no other chances at love materialized in his life, he’d resigned himself to never being a dad. Marriage might still be in the cards. Although after the mistakes he’d made on his date with Brooklyn, maybe he needed to accept that none of these conventional thoughts of “settling down” were right for him.
