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It hurts. I know it’s irrational, but I feel like I’m being replaced.
“I was thinking you and Laura could come too. Benji and Angie will be miserable if you aren’t there for the big dinner. They talked about it forweekslast year, and besides, I think Jessi would want you guys there if shedoessay yes, and wedefinitelyneed you there if she says no!” He lets out a laugh, but the nerves are real.
“She’ll say yes,” I answer automatically and honestly.
His shoulders droop, but his face stays anxious. “So? Do you think you and Laura will come?”
“You’re asking that we go with you guys to the cabin?” I confirm.
He nods.
Well…
“I can’t say for sure for Laura, but… Of course, I’ll be there.”
He hugs me again. “Laura willdefinitelywant to be with you for Valentine’s Day!” he says, laughing. “I can say for sure. It might not be as secluded and romantic as she wanted, but whatever. It’s the person that matters, right?”
I doubt it, especially after she hears about the proposal.
But there’s no good way for me to explain why that’s not true without giving away the reality of the situation. So I just nod as politely as I can.
“I’ll make sure to ask her,” I say. “But I’ll be there.”
He grins at me.
For the first time in a while, I feel a burst of guilt. Lewis is a good man. He’s a good friend. He’s a caring and considerate partner to my kids’ mom, and he’s good to the kids themselves. There are many men who would balk at the closeness I still share with Jessi, who would resent having a moody teenager around. He’s a good man.
And the weight of the lies—especially now that I know the feelings in me are strong enough to have never been a lie in the first place, if I had been smarter and stronger and younger—well, the lies feel especially strong in the face of his kind and brutal honesty.
“We were thinking of going to dinner at that good Chinese place tonight,” he says as he stands. “If you wanna join.”
This is really what’s so priceless about Lewis—the melding of the family, rather than the creation of a separate unit.
My guilt rises like a tidal wave and I swallow it back. “I’ll be here tonight,” I say, lifting a page. “But thank you.”
“Woof. Then I’ll get out of your hair.” He smiles and waves, practically skipping out of the office.
I give way to the imagination of it all. What if Lewis and Jessi weren’t together? Weren’t planning on this marriage?
What if Laura and I were truly free to just… try?
She wouldn’t want me.
The answer is immediate and it’s resounding. There’s no question—not about her. She’s beautiful and young and interesting and talented. She’d bore off me. Perhaps we are alike, perhaps our interests could align, our chemistry, our compatibility—but at the end of the day, I’m a man of responsibility. My kids come first. My firm—my family’s firm—comes second. What kind of man would I be to offer Laura third?
She’d never want me—and if she did, I could never offer her what she wants.
And if it wasn’t for Lewis and Jessi to begin with, we’d never have gotten here. We were breaking up that day. Or, well, as close to it as we could come—we weren’t even breaking up because that would have constituted us being together prior. And we weren’t together. And we would never be together. Not for real.
I’m not a fool, though. I know what I felt the night of the gala. And I know, in some small way, she felt it, too.
It’s better this ends sooner than later.
I have to talk to Laura. I have to ask her aboutValentine’s Day. I have to ask her to continue this ruse for just a bit longer—and then I have to ask her to end it.
And if I break my own heart in the process, well, it’s better mine than hers.
I bury my face in my hands, and for just a few short, precious moments, alone in my office, I let myself feel the heartbreak that is coming for me, and I pretend that it’s not already here.
