Page 81 of Let's Call a Truce
“It’s not… Last time…” His throat worked like he was trying to force out the words. “I’m scared, Juliana,” he whispered.
“What happened to being scared together?” His head dropped forward, and I knew I’d lost him. “I’m not sitting around while you’re with another woman. It’s me or her.”
The petulance in my voice was embarrassing, but I didn’t know what else to do.
“It’s not you or Stephanie. It’s me or Paris. Please don’t make me choose between my happiness and hers. Two, three weeks tops, and Stephanie will be gone. I promise.”
But what if she wasn’t? She left him once already. I couldn’t imagine she’d do it again. And of course, he’d choose her—the fun, beautiful, vibrant mother of his child—over me. I put on a good face, but I’d let him see the mess underneath, the anxiety and complications of grief that would never go away. Why would he choose me?
“I can’t do it.”
He grabbed my hand as I tried to back away. “No. Please, baby. I’m just asking you to be patient. I waited until you were ready. Can we put us on pause until I can work this all out?”
I shook my head at him, blinking back tears. I didn’t understand why he couldn’t just tell Paris the truth. If I wasn’t enough to warrant an uncomfortable conversation with her, I wasn’t someone he planned on building a life with.
I was crumbling, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to make a fool of myself at my daughter’s soccer game by crying and begging him to choose me.
“Asking for time to be one hundred percent certain about us before telling the kids is not the same as you asking me to wait while you’re in a relationship with another woman.” He tried to jump in and argue, but I held up my hand to cut him off. “I won’t tell you how to raise your daughter. If you feel like you have to do this, that’s your call. But this doesn’t end well for me. Either you and Stephanie fall back in love and I’m left shocked and heartbroken, or I’m the homewrecker who kept you from giving your family a real chance. I’m not interested in either.”
“Please, Juliana.” A tear slipped from the corner of his eye as he slid a hand around the back of my neck. “I can’t lose you. I love you.”
I was going to be sick. Ben had shown me how he felt about me for the past two months. It had been in the way he watched me across a room, in how he smiled through my rambling stories, and in how patient he’d stayed while I grew confident enough to go public with our relationship. But he’d never said the words, and hearing them now, for the first time, while he was actively breaking my heart, sent a spark of anger through me.
“Don’t.” I pushed him away harshly. “You don’t get to say those words to me right now.”
This is what the universe did to me. It gave me glimpses of great love. Beautiful, heart-stopping, world-altering love. And then it ripped it away in the most hurtful fashion, like it fed on my pain and needed to create as much sustenance as possible.
He nodded and looked away, wiping the tear from his cheek.
I straightened my spine, determined to make it through this conversation with some dignity intact. “I’ll see you for our work with the interns, but otherwise, I need space. Please don’t contact me.”
If I had to see him for another second, I’d break down. Iturned away, schooling my face into a neutral expression as I went to gather the kids, keeping it together long enough to get home and into my room.
Then, and only then, did I collapse on the bed and finally let myself cry.
I couldn’t afford to lose it. Regardless of what had happened, I still needed to keep life moving for my kids and my department. So I threw myself into work. It had been two weeks since Stephanie showed up, and Ben had respected my request, staying away and giving me space at our meetings.
A small, irrational, immature part of me wished he wouldn’t.
The next presentation for the interns came too quickly. Ben planned to attend the meeting as usual, but this time he had sent me an email asking if we could talk before or after. No more explanation than that. It was the first contact he’d made outside of the meetings we both had to be in, and I was terrified of what he had to tell me. If he told me he loved me again, I thought I would break and give in, and if he told me he was back with Stephanie, I didn’t think my heart could handle it.
I normally arrived for the intern meeting at least ten minutes early, giving time for them to come up to ask me questions or to get to know them better. Today, I waited until the last minute to slip into the room, telling a small white lie about another meeting running long. There was just enough time to pull up my presentation and jump in. Ben was sitting in the front with his arms crossed across his chest, and I saw him run his tongue across his teeth and shaking his head in frustration. I gave him a bland stare before turning my full-watt smile on the interns.
We discussed and debated how to add their internship to their résumés and what hiring managers were looking for. I caught Ben’s eye every few minutes, finding a mixture of sorrow and admiration that broke my heart all over again.
The students had been working in pairs for the past ten minutes, and I had flitted between them. It gave me a chance to give them some one-on-one feedback and to avoid talking to Ben. I moved back to the front to call everyone’s attention back to me.
“That’s all the time we have today. We’ll be back here at the same time next week and do some mock interviews, so review those interview tips we talked about before. Keep working on your résumés, and we’ll review them again before your internship ends to make sure you have everything on there.”
I waved off a few students and rushed out the door, walking as quickly as possible without making people stare.
“Baby. Baby, please wait.” A soft hand closed around my wrist and pulled me to stop.
“I am not your baby anymore, Ben.” I looked around to make sure no one was watching.
“I know.” His voice sounded as heartbroken as I felt. “I’m sorry. I miss you so much.”
My stomach flipped, and I blinked away my tears. I missed him, too. Of course, I missed him. But that didn’t mean anything had changed in the past two weeks. I had to protect myself from even more heartbreak.
