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“Lisa?” I say, trying not to sound as bitter as I feel. “How are you?”
“Can we start with a less complicated question?”
“Fine. Where are you?”
“I went out of town for a while,” she says.
“You left. I don’t understand…”
“Marco, you know we’ve had problems this last year. I know I owe you an explanation, but this is hard enough as it is.”
“You don’t love me anymore?”
She sounds weary. “Love has nothing to do with it. I’ll always love you, and you know that. But we have to let go of us. Together we’re a disaster, Marco. If you admit it to yourself, then you’ll agree. We’ve tried and tried, and we barely tolerate one another. We fight, we makeup, and then the cycle begins again.”
“Why couldn’t you say this in person?” I spit. “Do I not deserve that?”
There’s a brief pause, then, “I couldn’t face you.”
So she took the coward's way out.
“Well, you obviously don’t want to live with me anymore, but we still have to discuss the baby and what we’re going to do, how we can make this work.”
“Marco…”
“And it’s fine, I’ve had my assistant draft a document that I can email to you. I’ll be making some big changes to my schedule once the baby’s born, Lisa. I still want to be very much a part of their life…”
“Please, don’t do this.”
“Do what? I thought you’d be happy to hear that I won’t be ditching my responsibilities. I would never do that, even if we don’t get back together.”
“There is no baby.”
I hear white noise. “What?”
“There is no baby, Marco.”
Pain begins to throb in the back of my head. “Was it a false alarm?”
She hesitates, and a horrible feeling creeps into my gut. “No, it wasn’t. I, oh God…” She starts to cry.
I close my eyes. “You lost the baby? Why didn’t you call me? I would have come there to be with you. This is pretty fucking important!”
“I didn’t want you there.”
I shake my head. “I’m confused about what’s happening. When did you start to hate me all of a sudden?”
“I don’t hate you,” she whispers. “I could never…”
“Then why?”
“I terminated the pregnancy, Marco.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose and the blood starts to pound in my ears. “What the fuck?”
She begins to sob. “A baby would’ve just complicated things even more. I just couldn’t deal with it on top of everything else.”
It?I stand and begin to pace.
