AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Since when does someone need God in order to have a moral compass or a sense of personal accountability for one’s actions?”
She squints at me. “Did you hit your head?”
I chuckle. “Must have been the orgasms.”
For a few pregnant seconds, she scrutinizes my face. I resist the urge to squirm beneath the old, familiar feeling that she knows exactly what I’m thinking.
“Why’d you get a vasectomy?”
I blink, then exhale a rusty laugh. Not what I’d been expecting.
“Sorry,” she says quickly.
“No, you’re not.”
She winces. “Yeah, I’m not. I’m too curious. Back in the day, you wanted lots of kids. I think the term you used was an ‘army of misfits.’”
I force a small smile but can’t repress the slight tightening in my body, a ripple of tension she senses. Before I can think of something to stop her, she sits up. Thick, unruly blond hair falls forward, curtaining her breasts.
“My eyes are up here, champ.”
I grin, unrepentant and relieved as the tension of the moment passes, even as I recognize the stubborn tilt to her chin.
“You really want to know?” I ask, hoping she’ll change her mind—knowing she won’t.
Her cheeks flush slightly and she looks down. “I mean, you don’t have to tell me. I know we haven’t been, uh, close for a long time?—”
“Of course I’ll tell you,” I interject before she can write a story I don’t want her to. “I’m an open book, Peapod.” At least to you.
Tucking an arm behind my head, I shift my gaze to the ceiling. This will be easier if I’m not looking at her.
It doesn’t occur to me to evade the question or sugarcoat the answer. She’s the only woman I’ve ever been completely, brutally honest with about my thoughts and feelings. The only one I’ve ever fully trusted. Even with our years apart, there’s no undoing the foundation we built so long ago. I can’t find it in me to give her less than the unfiltered truth.
I owe it to her a million times over for the one lie I told with my actions—that I didn’t want her—and the betrayal of abandoning her.
“This is going to be a downer,” I warn.
“Basically your M.O.”
I don’t smile, instead lowering my gaze to hers. “You’re not allowed to jump up and run after I tell you.”
Her gaze turns wary. “Uh. Okay? I mean, I’ll do my best.”
I lift the hand closest to her, waggling the smallest digit in her face. She rolls her eyes but finally complies, linking her pinkie with mine.
“I pinkie swear not to run.”
I take a moment to summon courage. “I went through a breakup four years ago. We had been pretty serious. She was hinting at wanting a ring, talking about kids. All of it. I was thinking about it. Even went to a jewelry store.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I see a familiar blankness steal over her features. I want to grab her, kiss her back to life, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t also feel a glimmer of satisfaction. A pinch of hope that maybe what she’s feeling is jealousy thinking about me with another woman. That maybe she wants me to belong to her.
“Did you buy a ring?” she asks, her voice odd.
I shake my head. “I actually got a phone call when I was in the store. A buddy of mine. He told me that another friend of ours, Eric, had just lost his wife in childbirth.”
“Oh, God,” she whispers.
“Yeah.” I clear my throat. “The baby lived, thankfully, but obviously Eric was devastated. A day before, he’d had a wife and a baby on the way, and now he had a newborn and he was alone. We got a group together and helped him manage shit the first few months until his sister moved across the country to help him.”
