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“Thanks,” she said when I passed it to her and opened the door. She took a step outside. Stopped. Turned back to me. “And thank you for all this. I’m sorry.”
“Quit apologizing, Pres. I’m just glad you’re here now.”
She smiled and nodded at her shoes, her eyes flicking up to meet mine once more as she said, “‘Night.”
I watched her until her taillights disappeared. When the door was closed, I leaned against it and closed my eyes, wondering what it meant to be a dad, hoping I’d figure it out.
Hoping I didn’t fuck it up.
8
It's Only Love
PRESLEY
Surely I was dreaming.
I half listened to Sebastian as he talked about Zambia, not because it wasn’t fascinating, but because I couldn’t fathom that I was sitting here in his kitchen watching him fry eggs with my secret out in the open and flapping around in the wind.
Another reality was the ever-present ache in my chest I’d come to strictly associate with Sebastian.
What he hadn’t wanted to talk about last night would have to be addressed today. And I knew a few important things to be true.
First was that I was irrevocably in love with him.
The second was that he was leaving.
And the third—and most important—was that this was the wrong time for us to start anything serious.
A large part of me couldn’t believe he didn’t boot me out of the county last night. As many times as I’d imagined how this would go, I hadn’t really expected it to work out. Maybe I’d been doing this alone for too long to let myself imagine what it would be like to have a partner. The logical outcome was that I would continue to do this alone.
Instead, he’d accepted us. He’d forgiven me. He’d decided he wanted to meet her, to know her.
I didn’t know what exactly that entailed. But I did know that he couldn’t be interested in starting something with me. Not right now, in the middle of a divorce with a plane ticket to Zambia in his pocket.
Even if he did kiss the fuck out of me last night. If I’d doubted he wanted to be with me, he’d have erased the thought right then and there.
The good news was, Sebastian and I were pros at the whole friends with benefits thing. And despite the knowledge that these things never worked when one party (me) had feelings, it was a sacrifice I was willing to make. As long as we agreed to keep it casual, everything would be fine. Probably.
Another thing I knew, something I could barely acknowledge, was that I couldn’t let him stay for us. As much as I wanted him to, I couldn’t see a way for it to work out long term. One day he would regret staying if he did it for me and-or for Priscilla.
I’d seen the look on his face when he talked about his time in the Peace Corps—the same look he had on his face in that exact moment as his story continued. That was where he wanted to be. That was his future.
I’d rather pine over him from the other side of the world than live through the possibility of him resenting us for stealing the life he wanted. He’d ended a marriage over this very thing, and I didn’t think so much of myself that I’d be exempt from the same fate as Marnie. Of course it’d be different, but the bones were still the same.
If I brought it up, he’d deny the possibility. He’d argue. But he couldn’t erase over a decade of staunch insistence that this was not the life he wanted. And I didn’t want to be on the hook when he figured it out.
More than that—I didn’t want Priscilla to endure that rejection.
He couldn’t stay here out of obligation or we’d both regret it.
So I had to keep him at arm’s length, knowing I couldn’t have him, not like I wanted. But that just so happened to be my specialty.
“I’m glad you didn’t work this morning,” he said, plating hash browns.
“Me too.”
“And that your mom was okay keeping Priscilla.”
The sound of him saying her name did something curious to my uterus. “You know Mom—she’s always the first to help. Plus, the two of them love their Nonnie time.”
“Nonnie, huh?”
“I don’t know where it came from, but it’s what grandmas have been called in my family since ever. I think it might be Italian.”
“Wonder how my mom will feel about being called Abuela,” he mused.
“I have a feeling she’ll like it.”
“Me too.” Once the eggs and bacon were in place, he strode over and placed one of two plates in front of me. “What time should I come over?”
My heart pitter-pattered. “Well, I need to get home and prep my family—it was too late last night and early this morning—but any time after that.”
