Page 116 of Maybe in Another Life

I no longer feel a rush to leave this city and head for greener pastures, because there are no greener pastures and there is no better city. I am grounded here. I have a support system here. I have someone who needs me to put down roots and pick a place.

My parents were disappointed to learn that I wasn’t going to join them in London, but the moment they resigned themselves to my decision, they suggested that the two of them and Sarah come out to L.A. when the baby is born.Theyare going to come and visitme. Us.

I just started working at Carl’s office, and it has been both hugely stabilizing and really eye-opening. I see mothers and fathers every day who are in our office because they have a sick kid or a new baby or they are worried about one thing or another. You see how deeply these parents love their children, how much they would do for them, how far they are willing to go to make them happy, to keep them healthy. It’s really made me think about what’s important to me, what I’d be willing to lose everything for, not just as a friend or as a parent but also as a person.

I’m enjoying it so much that I’m thinking about working in a pediatrician’s office long-term. Obviously, this is all very new, but I can’t remember the last time a job made me this excited. I like working with kids and parents. I like helping people through things that might be scary or new or nerve-racking.

So this morning, while Gabby is taking Charlemagne to the vet, I have found myself Googling nursing schools. I mean, it seems completely absurd to have a job, go to nursing school, and have a child, but I’m not going to let that stop me. I’m looking into it. I’ll see if there is any way I can make it work. That’s what you do when you want something. You don’t look for reasons why it won’t work. You look for reasons why it will. So I’m searching, I’m digging, for ways to make it happen.

I’m looking into the local community college when my phone rings.

It’s Ethan.

I hesitate for a moment. I hesitate for so long that by the time I decide to answer, I’ve missed the call.

I stare at the phone, stunned, until I hear his voice.

“I know you’re home,” he says, teasing me. “I can see your car on the street.”

I whip my head toward the entry, and I can see his forehead and hair through the glass at the top of the door.

“I didn’t get to the phone in time,” I tell him as I stand up and walk to the door.

There is a part of me that doesn’t want to open it. I’ve been thinking lately that maybe I am meant to raise this baby on my own, to be on my own, until my kid is in college and I’m pushing fifty. Sometimes, when I’m lying awake at night, I imagine a middle-aged Ethan knocking on my door, years in the future. He says he loves me and can’t live without me anymore. And I tell him I feel the same way. And we spend the second half of our lives together. I have told myself on more than one occasion that the timing will work out one day. I’ve told myself this so many times that I’ve started to believe it.

And now, knowing he’s on the other side of the door, it feels wrong. This wasn’t a part of my new plan.

“Will you open the door?” he asks. “Or do you hate me that much?”

“I don’t hate you,” I say. “I don’t hate you at all.” My hand is on the knob, but my wrist doesn’t turn.

“But you’re not going to open the door?”

It’s polite to open the door. It’s what you do. “No,” I say, and then I realize the real reason I don’t want to open it, and I figure the best thing to do is to tell him. “I’m not ready to see you,” I say. “To look at you.”

He’s quiet for a moment. Quiet so long that I think he might have left. And then he speaks. “How about just talking to me? Is that OK? Talking?”

“Yeah,” I say. “That’s OK.”

“Well, then, get comfortable,” he says. “This may take a minute.” I see his hair disappear from view, and I realize he’s sitting down on the front stoop.

“OK,” I say. “I’m listening.”

He’s quiet again. But this time, I know he hasn’t left. “I broke up with you,” he says.

“Well, I don’t know about that,” I tell him. “I didn’t leave you much choice. I’m having a baby.”

“No,” he says. “In high school.”

I smile and shake my head, but then I realize he can’t see me, so I give him the verbal cue he’s looking for. “No shit, Sherlock.”

“I think I wanted to pin it on you because I didn’t want to admit that I might have avoided this whole thing if I’d acted differently back then.”

“Avoided what? Me being pregnant?” I don’t want to avoid being pregnant. I like where life has led me, and if he can’t handle it, that is not my problem.

“No,” he says. “Being without you for so many years.”

“Oh,” I say.

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