Scooting back on the couch, I pull my knees into my chest and fold my arms around my legs. I suddenly feel so exposed. So vulnerable. And it has nothing to do with being naked.

Mack knows that he has a son. This secret I’ve been carrying for ten years has finally been lifted from my soul. I thought when this day came I would feel lighter, not sick.

“Yes, he’s yours.” I answer him again. Resting my head on my knees, I look up at him from under my eyelashes. I’m not sure how he’s going to react. What he’s going to say. I watch storm clouds roll in over his face as he battles the emotions he’ll never share with me. Mack was never one to talk about his feelings, even before the military. Now even less so.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you get a hold of me at West Point?” He shakes his head slowly; his voice is monotone. I can’t tell if he thinks this is good news or the worst thing he’s heard. His furrowed brows aren’t really giving me a lot of information.

“I thought about it. Trust me. You have no idea how many nights I fought with myself. It was hard. Please don’t think I made the decision lightly. I didn’t. For the first three years of Chris’s life, I was a single mother. I second guessed not telling you every single day. Especially when I was getting my degree and trying to look after my baby.”

“Then why didn’t you?” Mack stands up and runs his hand over the back of his head. He walks over to the photos I caught him looking at earlier and stares down at them, his hand still resting on his neck as he looks back over the photos. My eyes sweep down his naked body, I wish he wouldn’t put distance between us. I wish he’d hold me close and talk to me about this.

“Instead you let another man raise my child as his own? I mean, does that seem right to you? Did I hurt you that badly, Lauren? Was I so terrible to you that you didn’t even let me know I had a son in this world?” The muscles in his back flex tight.

“No, you weren’t bad to me. You did hurt me, yes.” I admit, fresh tears sting my eyes as if the wound of him choosing his country over me happened yesterday. I guess it’s more like a burn than a wound. A burn that looks alright on the surface but keeps destroying the layers of skin underneath. A burn that radiates pain deep inside, long after it should have healed.

“So you got back at me by keeping Chris from me?” his voice wavers, he still won’t face me. I hate talking to the back of his head, but I understand if he can’t look at me right now. I hug my knees tighter to my body, desperate to feel Mack’s arms around me. I wonder if I ever will again.

“No, it had nothing to do with that!” I can’t believe he’d accuse me of keeping Chris out of his life because I had hurt feelings. What does he think of me? “Yes, I was hurt. Yes, I was angry. But I never kept it from you because of how you decided to leave. Let me remind you, it was you who decided to walk away and leave me here while you went off to pursue your dreams, Mack.” My tone has a razor’s edge.

“Lauren, I was doing what I thought was right. You remember how Ben died. What was I supposed to do, forget about the one thing that I cared about and stay here just because you didn’t like my decision?” He finally turns to face me and I wish he’d turn back around. His eyes flash with anger, but under the anger I can see the betrayal he’s feeling tossing around on the ocean blue storm of his eyes.

“I thought I was the one thing you cared about,” I whisper, I feel like I swallowed a rock.

“You know what I mean,” he snaps.

“No, I don’t. And I certainly didn’t then. Do you remember what you told me on prom night? How it was the perfect time for you to get into West Point because you had to be a certain age and couldn’t be married and …”

“I couldn’t have kids,” he finishes my sentence. The anger fades from his eyes as he stares down at the floor.

“Exactly. I didn’t keep Chris from you because you left me for West Point. It wasn’t some kind of revenge, Mack. I kept him from you because I knew how much West Point meant to you. I knew you would come back and look after us, but that you’d always be full of regret. You’d never get the chance to go again. Ever. I didn’t want us to be a weight around your neck.” I confess.

“You shouldn’t have made that decision for me,” his voice is flat. Defeated. My heart squeezes in my chest thinking that I did this to him.

“You’re right. I was young and stupid. I never should have let you go, either. I should’ve tried to make it work when you said you wanted to do the long distance thing. I admit I wasn’t a genius at eighteen.”

“And what about in your twenties? What about after I graduated? You still never looked me up?” He meets my eyes and I see a flash of lightening on the stormy seas of his crystal blues.

“You’re right. I met Joel in college and we ended up married. I guess after that I didn’t think about contacting you as much. I figured it would just make everything even more complicated. You never came back to Colorado, so I never knew if you got married or had other kids or anything. I guess I just thought it was better to let sleeping dogs lie.” I leave out how I still agonized about it for years. How many nights I searched for him on Facebook. How many times I tried to find his e-mail address.

“This is so fucked up, Lauren. I mean, how did any of this happen anyway? Didn’t you tell me you were on the pill then too?” Mack paces back and forth in front of my couch. I hold my hand out to him and he looks down at it like I’m holding up a foreign food.

“Please, Mack, sit down with me.” I plead.

He looks at me and grasps my hand. My heart flutters like a hummingbird’s wings with hope.

“Ok.” He settles back onto the couch and looks over at me. I can see the suspicion coursing through his veins, but at least he’s giving me the chance to talk.

“Thank you,” I breathe deep, feeling like I’m taking in the first breath after a deep dive. “You’re right, I was on the pill. I mean, you remember how diligent I was with it. I had a timer on my cellphone and everything.”

“I remember.” His jaw is tight.

“I don’t know if you remember that about a week before prom I got an ear infection?” I look into his eyes but I don’t see a flash of recognition. “Anyway, the doctor gave me a string of antibiotics and I didn’t realize back then that it makes your birth control not work that great. At least it did for me. So, yeah, Chris happened. Not that I would trade him for the world.” My mother’s guilt sweeps over me; all this talk about our son like he’s a mistake isn’t sitting well on my heart.

“Fuck, that’s a lot to take in.” Mack looks down at his palms like he’s trying to read them. If I trace his love line, will I be there? Or is my place always going to be in his past?

“I know. Just so you know, when Joel passed, I did start looking you up again to tell you. I was tracking down old high school friends to see if they knew what happened to you. Then I was watching the eleven o’clock news one night and I saw the footage of you over there. It was crazy. I’d been trying so hard to track you down and then, there you were on my television.” I remember how I sobbed uncontrollably as I watched Mack covered in blood. The news had pixelated the lower half of his leg missing, but it was clear as day what had happened to him.

“Shit. You saw that, huh?” He looks over at me and moves closer to me, gently placing his large hand on my foot.

“Everyone in America saw that, Mack. The president saw it. So, yeah, I saw it too. It just felt like, since I knew what you were going to be up against with rehab and everything, like it was a sign to leave it alone. You were going to have enough on your plate, you know? It didn’t feel like a good time to fire off an e-mail about Chris, that’s for damned sure.” I place my hand on top of his and the warmth of his skin soothes me.

“I can see that. That makes sense.” He looks over at me, into me. “Does he know?”

“That you’re his father? No. He doesn’t. Chris knows that Joel wasn’t his biological Dad, and that he was adopted. I mean the kid is smart, he figured it out the same way you did.” I sweep my hand out toward the photographs. “I’ve never told him who his real father is though.”

Silence grows between us and fills the air like a scream. A scream would be better actually. My skin begins to prickle as I wait for Mack to say something. Anything. Does he hate me? Does he want to be in our lives?

“I’m sorry,” Mack’s voice cuts through my thoughts.

“What? Why are you sorry?”

“I’m sorry that I never looked back. I was young too, I was hurt that you wouldn’t even try to stay together when I left, so I tried to erase you from my memory. I didn’t realize that it was impossible, you were more than a memory. You were etched on my soul. When I lost my leg, and … my men …” his voice wavers as his emotions battle on his face. He clears his throat and his eyes focus back on mine, “You were there.”

“You mean you thought of me?” I try to make sense of his words.

“No, you were there. I could see you. Smell you. Taste you. I felt your hand on mine. I knew that if I died then, it would be with a heart full of regret for ever letting you leave. I knew I could never die happy until I found you again.”

Tears prick the corners of my eyes and the rock in my throat feels even heavier as I struggle not to cry. “I never thought I’d see you again,” I confess. “I already felt like a piece of me had died the day you went to West Point.”

He scoots over on the couch and puts his arm around me, I lie my head against his chest and let his heartbeat sing me a lullaby. “Were back together now,” he soothes me, running his hand over my hair. “All three of us. We’re gonna make this work. Ok?” He grabs my shoulders and holds me inches from his face. I’m lost in his eyes, transfixed by them.

“Yes.”