BenOn Sunday morning, I woke up in Mila’s bed again. She was curled up on her side, her back to me, and I lay behind her, my arm was thrown over her body, holding her against me. I could do this for the rest of my life, I thought.I had to stop thinking like this. If I was going to leave, I couldn’t commit my emotions the way I was now. Mila was the perfect woman. I wanted desperately to be with her, but she deserved someone who was here for her completely, not someone who was torn between here and New York, who was distracted by business problems.How many excuses was I going to come up with? I knew what I wanted. But I knew what I had to do, too. And they were not the same thing. I had to accept that and stop arguing with myself about this.Mila and I had spent an amazing time in New York when she had been there, despite what she had been through. And last night with her had been wonderful, from the dinner and the conversation to the walk on the beach to coming back here and not wa
BenMy resolve flew out of the window. Of everything that had gone wrong, this was the last thing I’d expected. I blinked at Jerrod, wondering if he was just looking for shit.Mila was crying properly now, tears streaming down her cheeks, her whole demeanor deflated. She had let go of Jerrod’s arm.“Is this true?” I asked, even though everything showed me that it was. But I wanted to hear her say it. I willed her to say that it was all a lie. Even though I knew deep down that it wasn’t going to happen.“Yes,” Mila said with a hoarse voice. The tears ran down her cheeks even faster and her face crumpled. She covered her face with her hands.My heart was beating fast. I could almost taste it in my throat. Adrenaline coursed through my veins. I didn’t know how I felt. Angry? Yeah, I guess. Shocked, for sure. What the fuck?“And you didn’t tell me?” I asked. “Why didn’t you tell me?”Mila didn’t answer me. She only cried harder.My shock turned into anger. My body tensed, and heat flushed
MilaI cried all the way to the beach, my tears blurring the road ahead of me. I felt like I was breaking apart. By the time I reached the beach, I was nothing more than a million shattered pieces that blew away in the wind when I opened the car door.The beach was fuller than usual – it was late morning on a Sunday, and the weather was beautiful. The sea was a deep blue. The sky almost reflected the ocean in lighter shades of the same color.But the beauty was lost on me. My chest physically ached with the pain in my heart, and I had no idea how to deal with it. I had been through so much lately – trauma and breakups and panic and stress. But this was a new feeling, and I had no idea how to handle it. I felt like I had been trampled.My stomach rolled as I walked along the beach that Ben and I had followed so many times. How was it possible that all the good experienced just a couple of hours ago had evaporated like that? He would leave for New York, and I was willing to bet that he
Mila“There was just so much to deal with. I didn’t know how to handle this on top of it all. You’re leaving soon, and Jerrod hates that we’re even together. I didn’t know how he was going to react to this, but I guess now we know.” I took a deep breath and let it out with a shudder. Everything had gone wrong. I wasn’t sure how anything was ever going to go right again – maybe I would have been able to eventually get over the trauma of being kidnapped. Maybe I would have been able to move on from Ben when enough time had passed. When we moved on with our separate lives. But a baby was a forever kind of thing.When Ben still didn’t say anything, I looked at him. He was staring out at the ocean, his dark hair tousled by the wind, and he looked handsome and rugged. I hated the divide between us.“Mila,” Ben said, turning his eyes to me and they were the same color as the ocean and just as deep. “I’m not mad.”“But you were,” I said. “In the apartment. You were so angry.” I felt tears th
BenAfter Mila and I had talked on the beach, I had taken her back home so that she could get ready for her shift. Jerrod had been gone by the time we’d arrived. It was a good thing, too. I may have sorted things out with Mila, but I had been pissed off that Jerrod had done things the way he had.I had needed the time to cool off.After I had made sure Mila was okay, I had left her apartment and gone back home to have a good think about everything that happened. I’d meant what I’d said about staying with Mila. I had been a dick a couple of times, leaving Mila in a way that wasn’t right when I had only wanted to keep her safe. But with this, I wasn’t going to be the deadbeat dad. I was going to give Mila the life she deserved, and I was going to be a real father to my child.Nothing like what my father had been to me. And no matter how difficult things became with the company, I was going to take care of everything so that I never, ever passed along shame and debt to my kids one day t
BenI let go of Jerrod’s shirt. He stumbled back, his expression surprised. Maybe he had expected me to throw the first punch. He had been ready to fight me. But I wasn’t here for that. I hadn’t come to beat up my best friend. I had only come to set the record straight.“She’s a great person, Jerrod. You know that. She doesn’t deserve this shit.”I turned around and left the office. Jerrod stayed behind, gaping. I had never been one to back down from a fight. There had been enough fights in high school that had shown Jerrod that. But this wasn’t high school, and Jerrod was like a brother to me. If I ended up with Mila, he would be a brother-in-law, in fact.So, I wasn’t going to go there.Instead, I headed back home like a good boy to seethe in private.After I had taken the time to calm down, I phoned Mila.“How are you doing?” I asked.“Better,” she said, and I was relieved. “I came off my shift just now. I’m going to crawl into bed for a few hours.“Have you told your parents yet?”
MilaOn Wednesday I had the day off again and had scheduled an ultrasound. Now that everyone knew about me being pregnant, it was time to meet the baby.Ben was with me. It made me less nervous, but only a little. It was crazy how tense I was about the appointment, even though everything was out in the open now. The idea that I was pregnant, that we were having a baby, was terrifying.It had all happened so fast. It had been mere weeks since Ben had come back to Portland for the first time and now we were starting a family together. There were nights when I was sleepless and in a fit of panic, wondering how the hell we were going to get through this. We had been a part of each other’s lives for years, but when it came down to knowing each other, we were practically strangers.When I was with Ben, like now, all my worries melted away. We were great together. He was so attentive now that I was pregnant, and since he had told me he was going to stay, our relationship was stronger than ev
Mila“I love you, too.”There was nothing else to say. Words couldn’t describe how we both felt at that moment.After I changed back into my clothes, we met Dr. Holt in her office again. She gave me a prescription for prenatal supplements and an eating plan with do’s and don’ts for the next seven months.“I’ll see you back here in about eight weeks,” Dr. Holt said. “Then we’ll find out what you’re having.”When Ben and I walked back to the car, I felt like I was walking on air. Everything felt different, now. I felt more ready to be a mother, to have this baby and to raise it, than I had before. Now that I had seen the baby, I knew that I wanted all of this.Did Ben feel the same?“You know, you still have time to back out of this,” I said to Ben. He stopped dead in his tracks and looked at me.“What makes you think I would want that?” he asked.I pulled up my shoulder. I couldn’t guarantee that this feeling of amazement was mutual. Ben took a step closer to me and kissed me long and