Page 43 of Friend Zone to End Zone

She’d also said that all the chocolate chip cookies she baked back then and chocolate milk didn’t help with that either…but I understood the sentiment.

“I’m sure I’d be a nervous wreck if I was her,” Arianna said. “But it sounds like she was just trying to do her best. She was perhaps a little misguided, but she was doing her best to take care of you and make sure you got here safe.”

“Yep. No one can ever say my mom didn’t care about her kids.” I mean, she and my dad had cared so much about me and my future that they’d moved from the paradise of Hawaii to Denver because they wanted me to have a shot at playing football professionally.

“That’s why people like her make such good moms.” Arianna set another slice of cake in the container. “I am definitely not cut out to be a mom.”

I frowned and studied Arianna, trying to understand why she would say that.

This was not the first time she’d said something like this, either. In fact, every time I ever even so much as mentioned something that I wanted to do when I had my own kids, she always seemed to think my spoken desire for a family required her to say something about how she didn’t have the patience or some other random trait that a person needed in order to be a parent.

Which was so confusing, because I had never met anyone who would be a better mom than Arianna. Sure, she wasn’t going to sacrifice all her goals and dreams to raise a family like some people expected women to do—but I didn’t believe that was what a mother should be required to do anyway. Moms could have goals, too.

In fact, it was healthy to have a life outside of just being “a wife” or “a mom.” Otherwise they might end up resenting their families or send a signal to their own daughters that girls were just basically born to be the wind beneath someone else’s wings—a supporting character in someone else’s life.

But I’d never met anyone who was more caring and compassionate than my friend. She was the opposite of selfish, and if someone she knew had something they needed, she always went out of her way to help them out.

Just throwing this secret surprise birthday party for me and inviting my closest friends and family was evidence enough of that.

She wasn’t a Mother Theresa or anything—the way she looked tonight definitely had me thinking my own impure thoughts—but she was far from the worst candidate for parenthood that I had ever come across.

And yet, she seemed convinced that there was something inside her that inherently made her unfit to be a parent.

Maybe it was my own bias coming in, since I was the odd guy who had actually thought about what I’d name my future kids and the various things I wanted to do with them or teach them, but I just had a hard time imagining her not wanting at least one little munchkin running around that looked like her.

She’d make the prettiest babies. I was sure of it.

Her daughters would go around breaking all the boys’ hearts in high school.

“So I know you just said you aren’t cut out to be a mom, but can I ask when you decided that?” I asked, hoping she wouldn’t get upset at me for sticking my nose in her business. “Was it after you met Chad? Or before?” And would it change for her if their breakup actually stuck this time?

“You think the only reason why I haven’t wanted kids is because Chad didn’t want them?” She narrowed her eyes at me.

“I don’t—“ I started, not exactly sure I wanted to answer the question now that she seemed annoyed that I’d even asked her in the first place. “It’s just…I guess I’ve always been curious about it.”

“Well—” she said, pushing the plastic lid on the container with the cake, “—contrary to popular opinion, this Alabama girl actually decided not to multiply and replenish the world a couple of years before moving to Denver.”

“What made you decide that?” I tilted my head to the side. “Was there a specific experience or aha moment that made you realize it? Or did you just never really picture having a family of your own when you were growing up?”

Something like pain flashed in her eyes and her jaw tightened. I suddenly found myself wishing I could read her mind, because when she turned her head to look at the snow falling just outside my kitchen window, I knew she was trying to think of a way to hide whatever caused that flash of pain in the first place.

After a few seconds, she looked back at me and said, “I didn’t always feel this way, no.”

I wanted to ask her what had made her change her mind, but something in her eyes told me that I shouldn’t press her further—probably shouldn’t ever really even bring the subject back up in the future.

So I cleared my throat uncomfortably and said, “Well, I guess it was probably good that you and Chad were on the same page when you were together.”

“Yes.” She nodded curtly. “We had our differences, as you well know, but thankfully, that was never one of them.”

“That’s good.”

“It is,” she said, pushing down the last corner on the storage lid. “Falling for someone who wants something I can’t give him would be its own kind of torture.”

When she held my gaze for a few heart-pounding seconds, I got the sense that even if there had been someone else she’d known who was a better match for her than Chad in every other way, she would never consider putting herself in the situation where he would have to choose between having her or having kids.

Which meant that as much as I wanted it now that they were done, she would never allow us to be anything more than friends.

19

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