Rachel, Mom, and I have been planning Natalie’s baby shower. When we asked Natalie if we could throw it for her, she seemed really overjoyed and flattered. We asked her what sort of theme she wanted or what she’d like to do, and she just said that she was sure she would love whatever we came up with. She tries so hard to be accommodating and kind, and it’s really sweet, but sometimes I want to grab her by the shoulders and say, “Tell us the truth! Do you like the color yellow?” So at least we know.
Rachel, Mom, and I are sitting at this pizza place, trying to come up with a theme, but somehow the conversation evolves—or devolves, I guess, depending on how you look at it—into whether Mom should let Bill move in.
“I just don’t think I’m ready for something like that,” my mom says, as the waiter puts our pizzas on the table. The minute it’s in front of them, both my mom and Rachel start damping their slices with napkins to soak up the grease. I just bite right into mine.
“You guys have been dating for a while now,” Rachel says.
“Yes, but right now, on the nights that he doesn’t stay with me, I miss him.”
“Right,” I say. “Which is why you would ask him to move in . . .” I’m speaking with my mouth full, which my mother normally abhors, but she’s too focused on her own problem to notice me.
“No!” my mom says. “I like missing people. You know when you call someone just to hear their voice? Or you wait all day until you can see them that night? If Bill lives with me, he stops being this person I can’t wait to see, and he becomes the man who leaves his dirty dishes in the sink.”
“But you can’t sustain this part,” I say. “The natural process is that the relationship becomes more serious as time goes on.” Of course, there are exceptions to this.
“Yeah, or it fizzles out,” my mom says. “I don’t need a life partner. I’m not interested in a partnership. Someone to share the bills. Someone to raise children with. I did all of that, and I did it on my own. I make my own money. I pay my own bills. I want love and romance. That’s all.”
“But after a while, relationships become more about partnership and less about romance. That’s just how it works. It’s the nature of love. If you want to stay with Bill, he’s eventually going to stop bringing you flowers,” I say.
My mom shakes her head. “This is why I don’t want to commit to Bill.”
“Wait, what?” Rachel asks. “You are in love with Bill, right?”
“Right. Right now, I’m in love with Bill. And eventually, we will grow tired of each other.”
“And when that happens?” I ask.
“We’ll break up,” she says, shrugging. “I want romance in my life. That’s what I want. And I don’t need anything else from a man. I’ve lived my whole life, or, I guess, my life since you guys were little, dating for fun. If the romance dies, I want to be able to leave, is what I’m saying. I want to be able to have that feeling again with someone else. It’s how I’ve been living my life for a long time. It works.”
“So you’d never get married again?” I say.
“You just chew ’em up and spit ’em out?” Rachel adds.
“You two are ridiculous. All I’m saying is that I’m not looking for all of the work that comes with a long-term relationship. The best part of a relationship is the falling-in-love part. And there’s nothing wrong with admitting that.”
“You don’t think Bill’s different? You don’t think there is a way to have a long-term relationship that is worth the work?” Rachel says.
My mom starts to answer, but I jump in. “I guess if romance is your primary goal, then you can’t let him move in. I get it. Romance fades. It just does. If you don’t like the other stuff, then I get why you’d have to have an exit strategy.”
“I still think romance and commitment don’t have to be mutually exclusive,” Rachel says, but she says it in a wistful way, as if she’s pontificating on the theory of love instead of the practicality of it.
I think back to when Ryan made my stomach flip, the way he used to look at me. The way his attention was enough to lift me off the ground. The way it felt as if anything could happen.
What if I never have that feeling again? That sense where your nerve endings are so raw that you can physically feel everything that he says? That feeling where your head is light, your stomach is empty, and your legs are on fire?
Ryan is supposed to come home in three months so that we can decide if we want to spend the rest of our lives together. I mean, the goal here is to spend the rest of our lives together. If I really feel that romance doesn’t last, if I really think that’s true, am I ready to never feel that tingle again? Was I ever ready?
“Let’s talk about something else,” my mom says. “Lauren looks like she’s about to cry.”
“No, I’m sorry,” I say. “I was trapped in my own mind for a second. But we should get back to Natalie’s shower, right? What else do we have to go over?”
“Well, actually, before we get back to that, I just remembered that I need a copy of your social security card to add to my loan package as the cosigner,” Rachel says.
“Oh, sure. When do you need it?”
“Thursday?”
“Yeah, that’s fine. I’ll find it. It’s in my house somewhere.”
“I am so proud of you,” my mom says to Rachel. “This is such a brave thing you’re doing.”
“It’s stupid, right?” Rachel says. She still can’t fully believe in herself just yet. But I know she must believe in herself a great deal when she’s alone, working out what to do. Because you don’t go to the bank and discuss a small-business loan unless you’re serious. You don’t scout out bakery locations unless you believe in yourself at least a little bit.
“If no one ever did anything stupid, I wouldn’t have you girls and Charlie,” my mom says.
It’s supposed to be encouraging, but Rachel says, “So you do think it’s stupid.”
And then she and I start laughing before my mom can defend herself.
“Oh, you two are such a pain in the ass,” she says. “I swear.”