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“Hi,” I tell him when I reach his table.
“Hello, Vanessa, you’re looking beautiful as always,” he says.
I’m relieved when he doesn’t even make an attempt to stand up. The server comes and I order a bottle of water. Gabriel is nursing a beer.
“So, did you get the results?” I ask him when the server leaves us.
“Yes. She’s mine,” he says without any visible signs of emotion. How can he be so unaffected by it all? It’s as if someone has just announced that tomorrow is Wednesday. No surprise there. I can’t believe that I’d been with someone so unfeeling. So unemotional.
“How do you feel about that?” I ask him.
He shrugs. “It is what it is.”
I have so many questions, but my pride prevents me from asking. I maintain the silence until the server brings my water and I thank her.
“I’m sure you didn’t want to meet just to sit and have a drink together,” I finally say, conscious of the passing time. I have to pick up Ivy at Lexi’s in not too long.
“Yes of course,” Gabriel says. “You sure you don’t want a drink?”
“I’m sure.”
“I told my wife about Ivy when the results showed that I was her father,” Gabriel says.
I stare at him incredulously and with a bit of admiration. I didn’t think he had it in him to come clean to his wife.
“Pam took it very well and she understands that I want to have Ivy in my life,” Gabriel continues. “I’d like to start off by having her on Saturday. From two in the afternoon to five or six in the evening.”
Something is off about the whole thing. Gabriel doesn’t sound happy or unhappy about his new status as a father. I don’t know what to think. I’m not worried about Ivy’s safety. I know he wouldn’t do anything to hurt her. If there’s one thing I remember about Gabriel, it was his fear of the law.
“And your wife is okay about Ivy coming to your place?” I ask him.
He nods. They really do have a weird relationship.
“I don’t have a problem either, but I’d like to drop her off,” I tell him.
“No, that won’t be necessary. Plus, it would be unfair for Pam. She knows about our affair but seeing you will be akin to rubbing it in her face.”
I can understand that. “Okay fine. You’ll come and pick her up, but I need your home address.”
He nods stiffly. “I’ll text it to you.”
I drain my bottle of water and push my chair back to stand up. I feel as if I’ve entered a train that is hurtling toward a destination I did not agree to. My legs shake as I make my way out of the bar.
That evening after dinner as Logan and I are relaxing in my cottage, I tell him about my meetings with Gabriel and what we’ve agreed to.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he says, hurt etched on his face.
I was expecting that question and I have an answer for it. “It happened when Emma was coming home. I didn’t want to eclipse that with my issues with Gabriel. I knew I’d have time to tell you later.”
Logan is thoughtful for a few minutes. “Are you sure you don’t want to talk to a lawyer first? Get everything down on paper?”
“I guess I should.” I’m not too worried about that. I’ve had Ivy since she was a baby, and any court would agree that I’ve done a good job caring for her. More importantly, as nice and understanding as Pam, Gabriel’s wife is, no woman would want to see her husband’s out-of-wedlock child more than she has to.
Logan is not pleased by my keeping it from him but he doesn’t go on about it. I love that about him. He’s a problem solver and he doesn’t dwell on the past. I seem to be on the opposite end of the spectrum.
***
All week it’s been weighing on my mind that Gabriel will pick my baby up on Saturday and disappear with her for hours.
I wake Saturday morning to an empty space beside me but that’s our new routine. Logan spends most nights at the cottage and gets up early in the morning before Fiona and Emma wake up. The weekends are usually easy for us but today when I wake up, a feeling of dread settles in my belly. All sorts of scary scenarios come to my brain.
What if I’m stupid to trust Gabriel and he takes Ivy and doesn’t return her? Panic grips my throat. Okay, breathe. That kind of thinking is usually brought about by fear. A need to hold Ivy comes over me and I pad to her room and stand over her crib. She’s sleeping so peacefully unaware of the turmoil in her mother’s heart. I lean as close to her as I can and inhale her sweet baby scents.
