MANDY
I didn’t know what was going on with him. One minute he was kissing me and making me forget my own name and the next minute he was looking at me as if I was the devil. I didn’t know which one was worse, though I knew that I didn’t like him mad at me. This was the reason that I had ran away, that and because of the future. I knew that Greg was not ready to have the same future as me. Why couldn’t he see that I was trying to help him? He wanted to go to business school. The man had big dreams and none of them involved being saddled with me and a baby.
The words were at the tip of my tongue, but his eyes were making it impossible to look at him. I couldn’t look at him and tell him what I needed to tell him. I started to think that it would have been better if I would have simply told him in a text like a coward. I was certainly wishing that I had done it now.
“There is something that I never told you that was going on Greg. I knew that you were going to college and I wanted to leave before the summer was over. I was afraid that you would want to stay instead of going to college like you were supposed to. Look what you have done. It was for the best that I left Greg, can’t you see that?”
I was not being very clear about what I was talking about, but I didn’t want to. I was hoping that he would just let it go. It was so many years ago after all and if it wasn’t for Alfie, there would be no proof that we had ever been anything to each other so long ago. Alfie was the reminder that made it impossible to forget.
“What was going on?”
Looking away, the green eyes were burning into me and I took a drink of the whiskey that was poured for him. The wine wasn’t cutting it anymore and I needed something stiffer to drink for the courage that I was about to need.
“I was pregnant.”
His face changed and I knew then that it was not going to be something that could be glossed over anymore. There was something in the deep recess of his eyes that made me nervous. The anger was back and it was completely different than before. It would appear that Greg now had a new reason to hate me.
“You were pregnant and you never told me?”
I nodded and waited for what would happen next. I was holding my breath, hoping that he would just say what he had to say and leave it at that. The whiskey was not working fast enough and I took another gulp and finally met his eyes.
“Why would you keep that from me?”
There were reasons given, but at the end of the day, if I would have thought that he would have stayed with me and still been able to live his dreams, I would have done it. But that wasn’t the case. He couldn’t have it both and I wanted him to have the life that he had worked so hard for when he was in school. It was because of him that I had taken my studies even more seriously, but he was the talent and I had known it even then. There was part of me that was vindicated a little in my choice because of what he had been able to accomplish. It had been his destiny and who was I to stand in his way? True love meant walking away when a person is holding the one they love back.
“It was just for the best Greg. Look at how it turned out? Everything worked out the way it was supposed to.”
He didn’t believe me or didn’t agree. Either way, I wasn’t going to argue with him. I had played the should of, could of, would of games before and it never ended well. It was easier to just accept what had happened and to move on. That is what I had been trying to do for a long time, but though I was not very good at the last bit, I was working on it and still touting the effectiveness of it.
“You shouldn’t have gotten to make that choice Mandy. I know that everyone is all about it being a woman’s body, but that was my baby too.”
It occurred to me then that he thought I had gotten rid of it. It made sense because I was so shady with my answers and there was purposely nothing out of Alfie’s because I knew that he was supposed to be coming and I didn’t want to start out there, if I had wanted to go there at all. I still wasn’t sure and there was part of me that was thinking that the last thing I needed to be doing right then was talking about Alfie with Greg. But I couldn’t leave him thinking something like that. I just couldn’t and my stomach tightened up with the look on his face. He was mourning the death of a child that was never born so many years ago and for some reason that pulled at my heart strings to see it.
“The only choice that I made was leaving Watertown. My mother wasn’t going to be any help, so I went and stayed with my grandmother for a couple of years. She helped me out with him for a while until I got back onto my feet. I went to college and got a degree, then moved back here to work at the sanctuary. I should have told you. I see that now, but I like that you did everything that you said you wanted to do. You had big dreams and you did everything that you said you would do and more.”
“I would have rather known that I had a son Mandy. That we have a child together.”
He said it like he was hearing it for the first time or that it was the first time that he had heard it. It was going to be hard to process and I knew then that I should have told him. That was guilt that I was always going to have. So many times when Alfie would ask about his father, I would wonder what kind of dad he would have been. Was I hurting not just me and him, but also Alfie because he didn’t have a father?
“I know that now Greg. I was young and I thought that I was doing the right thing. Sometimes it seems that way, but years later, I get that I should have handled it better than I did. I don’t know what else to say but that I am sorry. I should have told you and just been truthful, but I was afraid of how you would have reacted and I didn’t see it turning into anything good. It was going to be a disaster and I wanted to save us all from that.”
Greg sat down on the stool next to me and I could tell that his mind was whirling. Nothing I said was even getting through, let alone going to make everything better and I knew that it was wrong to even try. I was trying to make it better for me, not him.
“So my Aunt Dawn was right when she said you had a son. She didn’t mention that it was mine.”
“No one knows who his father is. I never told him, though he is pushing me into it. I am going to have to tell him soon. He is stubborn like you and doesn’t like to take no for an answer.”
“How old is he?”
“Fourteen.”
Greg nodded and took another drink. He looked at me for a long time and I finally looked down with shame. What had I done? Why had I thought that it would only be me that had suffered when so many years were taken away from them both?
“I know that it is going to be hard for you to forgive me and I don’t really blame you if you can’t Greg. What I did was crappy and I see that now. I really do.”
I kept talking, hoping that I would find the words that would make it all better.
“So I have a son?”
Greg didn’t seem to believe it and there was something in the way that he kept repeating it. I didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing, but what I did know was that the cat was finally out of the bag and I still wasn’t drunk enough.
“Yes, his name is Alfie after my late father and he is at a friend’s house tonight. He will be back in the morning.”
“And he doesn’t know who I am?”
I shook my head that he didn’t. That seemed to bother Greg more than anything else. “So who does he think is his father?”
Another part that I felt horrible about was the fact that I hadn’t told my son. I didn’t know what to tell him, but now it was clear that he deserved the truth as much as Greg did. I owed them both and I was feeling horrible about it. I knew that there was something that I was going to have to do to make this right with him. I just wasn’t sure what it was.
“I just never told him. I told him that it was someone in my past that I loved very much.”
“And he was okay with that line?”
“It wasn’t a line. It is the truth, but like I said, now he wants more.”
“Good. I want to meet him tomorrow.”
I told him that it was a good idea, but there was still a whole lot of worry that was inside of me and I knew that it was going to happen whether I wanted it to or not. I wasn’t going to be able to keep Greg from his son, even if I had wanted to. I just wanted what was best for Alfie and knowing Greg was the best thing.
I didn’t have time to say anything else to Greg because he was storming out of the house and I was left looking at his back as he left. I didn’t blame him of course, how could I? It was hard to put myself in his position, but I knew that what I had done would have been a hard pill to swallow and I just hoped that one day he would forgive me, that they would both forgive me.