I raised an eyebrow. “Is that so? You’re the professional here; I’d think it should matter a whole heck of a lot what you think.”
“In some instances, it might. But in this particular situation, not so much. What really matters is what you think, and whether or not the decisions you have made are the ones that you can live with.”
“Well, you kind of have to live with the decisions you make, don’t you?”
“Of course, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do things to try to change them if you feel like you made the wrong choices.”
“Which you think I did.”
“I’m not saying that.”
“But you’re implying it.”
She didn’t say anything; neither did I. We both sat there, at something of an impasse. I wasn’t sure what I had been hoping would come of going to a therapy appointment, but I sure as hell did not like sitting here feeling like this lady I didn’t even know was judging me.
After I left my appointment, I texted Ben and asked how they were doing. He said that he and Declan were having a good time riding bikes around, so I decided to take a little walk. I parked at Moose Lake and took the walking trail around the lake. I wouldn’t go the whole way around because that would take me half the evening, but I walked far enough in that I was surrounded by woods on one side with a nice lake view on the other. I tried to imagine that Allie was there with me because that’s all I really wanted.
And if she was there with me right then, I let it play out how it would go if I were to tell her about Declan, about Marissa, about all of that. Why I felt like I needed to break up with her to begin with. Allie, I made a promise when Declan was a baby that I would do right by him because it was partially my responsibility for why this was happening in the first place.
We didn’t know that Marissa was pregnant; my mother certainly had no idea when she had come to me that night and asked me if I would try to get the message through to Sam in another way, one that might leave a more lasting impression. Maybe if that hadn’t happened, they would have agreed to stop using, they’d do it together for their baby, and they’d be raising Declan instead of me. Declan would be with his two real parents, and my mother would eventually get over her dislike for Sam; she would have had to because he was her daughter’s husband, her grandson’s father.
Branches slapped at my arms and face as I walked the trail; it had gotten overgrown as the summer had gone on. There were so many possibilities for the way things might have gone, but this was the way they had turned out.
I would talk to Allie. If she didn’t want to take me back, I would understand that, I would deserve it. I hated the idea that I was going to come across as indecisive, but if it meant that she and I might be able to get back together, then it was worth it.
I did not tell Ben my plan; after I got back, we hung out for a little while, I put Declan to bed, and then he took off. Not long after Ben left, though, there was a knock at the door. I went to answer it, surprised to see that it was Allie.
“Hi,” she said, an uncertain note in her voice. “Is Declan asleep?”
“Yeah,” I said. “He is. Come on in.” I stepped back so she could come in. “I was just having a beer on the deck. Would you care to join me?”
“I’ll sit with you on the deck,” she said. “But I’m going to hold off on the beer for now. There’s something I wanted to talk about.”
“Okay,” I said as we walked back outside to the deck. “There was actually something that I wanted to talk to you about too, but you go first.”
Just being this close to her was hard; I wanted to reach over and pull her to me, feel her in my arms again.
“Ben told me everything,” she said.
I let the words sink in, at first not quite believing what I was hearing. “He did what?”
“Don’t be mad at him.”
“I’m not... exactly, I guess,” I said, though I did feel surprised. “You mean, he told you everything about...?”
“About Declan.”
“Why?”
“Because he thought I should know. He thought that it might explain a little bit why you suddenly broke up with me.”
“I see,” I said. Now it felt strange to be sitting here with her, knowing that she knew the one secret I had never thought anyone else would ever know.
“I could say I wish you would have told me, but I understand why you didn’t,” Allie said.
“
Would it have changed anything?”