Stay With Me (8 page)

It was driving me crazy, and not just in my mind. The closeness of his body turned me on every time, as though it was the first time. I wanted to hit him, shake him . . . hug him, caress him, kiss him . . .

“Mommy, Mommy! Can I go?” Olivia interrupted my thoughts as I caught up to her, widening my smile. Inside, I was going completely insane.

“Where do you want to go?”

“There!” She pointed at the playground.

“Of course. Try not to get too dirty, okay?”

“Alright, bye!” She skipped toward the other children in a square with slides and other toys, singing a cartoon song. Andrew’s gray eyes watched her calmly and the corner of his mouth lifted. In that moment, he was irresistible.

I had to stop immediately—stop imagining us, together, as a family, unwrapping Christmas presents, sitting on the floor, Olivia asleep on his lap, and him kissing my forehead before going to work.

Enough. I owed it to myself. I had to resume living. Continuing to wear myself out for him wasn’t good for my health. It wasn’t an easy situation, especially since Andrew had reentered my life so unexpectedly. He was about to marry Ashley. There was nothing I could do to change things. In the end there wouldn’t have been anything I could do. He’d never thought about me in that way, as his woman or the mother of his children. I’d become the second only by mistake.

Mag was right. I needed to move on. Staying still in this limbo would annihilate me. Andrew would always be Olivia’s father and my ex-flame. Nothing more.

I’d try to have a great coparenting relationship with him. “Try” being the operative word.

I observed the space around us and saw there were some wooden picnic tables near the playground that would allow us to keep our eye on Olly. I took a deep breath and tried to save the morning.

“Andrew?”

And God help me, I didn’t do it on purpose, but I held out my hand . . . and he took it, interlacing his fingers with mine. Immediately. Without even giving me a chance to understand what I was doing. Imagine if I could understand what I was doing. What he was doing. His eyes locked with mine, and out of fear he could see what I was feeling inside, I walked toward a table with my heart in my throat.

My chest ached.

It was out of place.

Out of this world.

“I’m sorry,” I told him as I sat down.

“I’m sorry too,” he said. He released his fingers from mine and a sense of disappointment pervaded my stomach.

“We need to try and get along . . . for her.” I looked at the pipsqueak skipping from one end of the playground to the other.

“Indeed,” he confirmed.

“We can do it,” I said to convince myself.

He exhaled. His thigh was leaning against mine, against the skin my shorts left uncovered. With that contact, I remembered how he’d sigh in the middle of the night when he’d stay the night with me, and the way his arms pulled me toward his body, and I’d run my fingers over the curves of his muscles, learning every part of him.

“It’ll be difficult, Zoe. Why—”

“Why?” I asked breathlessly.

He shook his head a bit as though to expel a bad memory. “Christ.”

“We owe it to ourselves to be honest with each other, at least now. You have to tell me everything that goes through your mind, Andrew. Talking can help. Maybe you have doubts I can clear up. I can help you.”

I rested my hand on his thigh to prod him and he relaxed against the table, extending his arm behind me. Captivating my heart, I realized the familiarity between our bodies hadn’t vanished at all.

“Can you help me forget a year of you naked underneath me?”

My vision fogged, but not from tears. It was the memories colliding, making my soul vibrate, and twisting my insides.

“I could help you remember, more than anything . . .” I said, smiling, trying to hold back from embracing him passionately and smothering those lips.

“Impertinent baby.” He chuckled and patted me on the cheek. “Never invite the wolf into your home.”

“Oh please, the wolf has already been thousands of times into my home. He knows it by heart, better than his own home, I assume.”

“And if your home starts to become like the wolf’s, it’s dangerous. He might return and want to stay,” he concluded.

I felt hot. The blood was flowing to my cheeks and neck. Our little game was a double-edged sword, and I ran the risk of misunderstanding.

Of getting hurt again . . .

The trees shook and a cascade of leaves began to fall from the sky. A wisp of hair fell onto my face, and Andrew gently tucked it behind my ear, letting his fingers then slide along the arch of my neck.

God, those eyes.

“Stop looking at me that way,” I pleaded.

“What way?” He smiled and his fingers brushed against my lips.

“That way.”

“Don’t you get how much I desire you?”

“Over the years I’ve learned the language of the male body. You all have the same look when you’re horny.”

“Ah.” He exhaled, straightened, and his jaw ticked. “Therefore you’ve had a lot of practice.” It wasn’t a question, but a realization.

“Yes, just like you,” I lied.

Silence fell between us, sudden and icy. This time I didn’t do anything to change the situation. I still had my heart to protect, and like an idiot, I’d lowered my guard too much already in the very little time we’d spent together. If we were to continue at this pace, I would be in his arms before the end of the day, shooting to hell all of my plans and sacrifices. But it was difficult not to let my dreams get ahead of me, and not to feel the desires Andrew unleashed. Despite the pain he caused me, I loved him very much, even more than four years ago.

It’s not true that time heals all wounds. In my case, it had worsened the wound, rendering it incurable. I was certain I’d never love anyone else the way I loved him. Yes, I would have found a man, satisfying Mag and my need to have someone take care of me, but I would have always belonged to Andrew.

Sad and pathetic, but true.

Especially because he was getting married.

Soon, Olivia got bored, and glowing, she came toward us to let us know she was hungry.

Andrew took her in his arms and lifted her onto his shoulders and discussed where to have lunch.

God, they were perfect. Their rapport was so natural.

“Happy Meal, Happy Meal!” chanted the little girl.

Her dad grunted with disapproval. He hated eating at McDonald’s. “Are you absolutely sure? I know a place that’s much better than that,” he said, trying to convince her.

“Happy Meal,” she insisted.

Andrew threw me a disconsolate look, and I laughed. “Happy Meal it is.”

8

Olivia ate her french fries as she talked to the little doll from her Happy Meal. We sat around a table in the back, away from the noise. Andrew and I were side by side, while Olivia sat in front of us.

“This junk food is good,” he proclaimed as he ate the last piece of his burger.

“I agree,” I said.

“Even though it will take at least a three-hour run to burn it off.”

“You’re worried about getting fat? What are you worried for? You’re about to get married.” It was like punching myself in the stomach. My awareness never seemed as strong as when I said it out loud, and then it became all too real.

“Getting married doesn’t mean getting obese.”

Lost in thought, I nodded. Of course Ashley knew how to make him burn calories. I hated her. She had to take the only thing I’d cared for before Olivia’s birth and after the death of my parents. Imagining them together made me see red. So many contradictory emotions pervaded my body that I grew tired, feeling I was on the brink of collapsing.

That was also true of my feelings for Andrew.

I loved him and hated him.

I wanted him and was repelled by him.

It was a never-ending battle. I tried to summon reason, but it never arrived.

The entire day felt like being on a rollercoaster. First we argued, then we smiled at each other, and now we were arguing again. It was enough to make anyone feel nauseated.

“Everything alright?” Andrew stroked my hair. No, nothing was alright. I didn’t like how he made me feel. Weak and at his mercy. And he had to stop using that tone, to change direction so sharply. I wasn’t stupid, and I wasn’t about to let him pull the wool over my eyes again.

“Yes,” I groaned.

I felt him come closer. His hand wrapped around my waist, his fingertips sank into the flesh on my hip, and his breath brushed in my ear.

“Let me help you the way you wanted to help me earlier. Talk to me, Zoe. What’s bothering you? Tell me what you want.”

Of course he could have helped me. I wanted him. I needed him. His love and dedication. But they were faraway and unattainable mirages. I leaned against his body. I was attracted to the inner calamity, invisible to my eyes, yet tangible to my heart.

“I don’t think you want to know.”

“I’m dying to know.” I wrapped his waist with a hug and my hands slowly climbed up to caress his shoulders.

“Then I think you’ll die.”

“I think so too,” he murmured in my ear. “I die every time I look at you, Zoe. Your eyes annihilate me with their remorse and your body kills me from the desire.”

“Mommy!”

I turned to Olivia, my hands shaking as I struggled to compose myself.

What was Andrew trying to achieve? Was it possible he was still attracted to me? Possible he didn’t care he was about to get married? And I was a horrible person for the way I was behaving.

Somehow the day was slowly reaching its end. I was happy about it, even though . . .

What would happen tomorrow? How would Andrew behave once Ashley would be back? Too many doubts and one only certainty: he wasn’t mine and he’d never been. I had to remember that and stop building castles in the sky, seeing us as a family. We weren’t. A daughter in common didn’t make Andrew and me a family, only parents.

God, we’d been there for an hour and I’d managed to dream about a magnificent life of only the three of us. I peeked at him. He was explaining something fun to Olly, and they looked adorable.

She held his hand, and he was smiling and making funny gestures. I would have loved to freeze time or relive that moment to infinity. I looked at the clock, and it inexorably showed five in the evening. Before McDonald’s we had spent two hours at the zoo, and now we were going home. I was already thinking about how I was going to feel once I was alone with Olly.

That little glimpse of paradise was about to transform itself into a limbo of uncertainty.

I took a deep breath. “What’s so funny?” I asked, trying to appear peaceful.

“Mommy!
Andew
is saying that the cartoons
he used to watch
when he was little are better than mine,” she said, pouting with concern.

“Oh, well, I’d say Andrew’s right,” I said.

“Mommy!” she protested.

Andrew burst out laughing, and stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. “There’s only one way to prove it.”

“How?” Olly asked, looking curiously at Andrew.

“The only way to determine which one is better is to watch one of mine and one of yours,” he remarked, looking at Olivia.

She, in return, stared at him as though he’d spoken in Aramaic. “Deter . . . what?”

I couldn’t help but burst out into thunderous laughter. I even had to put my hands on my abdomen. “Andrew, God . . . she’s three-and-a-half! Not forty,” I said, trying to slow down my hiccups. Then I turned to Olivia and said, “Andrew wanted to say that in order to decide which cartoon is better, you’ll watch one of yours and one of his.”

Olivia’s face went from perplexed to radiant, and her eyes sparkled with enthusiasm.

“When,
Andew
? When?” she asked excitedly.

“If it’s not a problem for your mom, we can do it this evening,” he said, looking at me.

“Mommy, can we, can we?”

How could I say no? With those two, I’d always be screwed. “On one condition, Olly: you’ll eat string beans tonight!”

“But Mom . . .”

“String beans for two cartoons? Take it!” Andrew suggested, winking at her.

Olivia puffed, but finally gave in. “Alright, Mommy, I’ll eat ahlll of the stwing beans.”

“Which cartoon are you going to choose, Olivia?” I asked even though I already knew the answer.
Rapunzel
.

“
Rapunzel!
” she yelled, causing a few passersby to turn around. “Yours,
Andew
?”

He smiled. “Easy.
The Sword in the Stone
.”

“It was always my favorite cartoon too,” I whispered.

“It’s the best as far as I’m concerned,” he said as he resumed walking.

For a moment I went back to when I was six years old and to the Saturday evenings I spent with my family: Daddy would rent a video cassette, Mom would make the popcorn, and then the three of us would sit on the couch and watch a movie.

“Zoe, are you there?” Andrew’s voice intruded on my memories.

“What?” I asked, confused.

“I asked if it’s really not a problem that I come for dinner,” he asked cautiously.

“No, of course not. I like dining with an adult. Olly’s fantastic, but the conversations are mostly based on her cartoons or the color of one of her dolly’s skirts,” I explained while the little one skipped along happily a couple feet in front of us.

“You’re not dating anyone?”

“No. Why?”

“You said you always eat alone with Olivia.” It looked like a disadvantage. After a beat of silence, he continued. “Who helps you with Olly, besides Ash’s aunt?” It was obvious he wanted to know more about his daughter’s life.

“I have a babysitter, plus she goes to preschool. I manage to arrange things well.”

“What about your parents?”

I tensed at the question. We’d never talked about it. I knew a little about his family through Google, but we’d always avoided personal subjects.

I slowed down my breathing, trying not to let my emotions get the better of me. “They’re dead.” The pang in my heart when I said those words had given no sign of diminishing with the passing years.

He turned toward me, scrutinizing me with questioning eyes. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

“You couldn’t know something you never asked me about.” I immediately regretted what I said, but talking about my parents made me irritable. “In any case, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Of course, as you wish,” he replied and continued walking, paying attention to our daughter.

“It’s ready!” I yelled, then peered into the living room. “Go wash your hands, Olly.”

“Yes, Mommy.”

I noticed how Andrew’s presence had a calming effect on her. Normally, she was like a little hurricane, ready to turn everything—even people—upside down until weariness got the better of her.

Instead she’d behaved calmly throughout the day, never over the top—almost as though together, we were trying to conquer Andrew.

“Do you need a hand?” he asked, appearing at my side.

“No thanks, go ahead and have a seat outside with Olivia. I’ll be there in a minute.”

“What did you fix us? Everything smells so good.” He sniffed.

He was so close that I had to tell myself to keep my eyes on the pot as I stirred the seafood stew. “Fish.” My voice was shaky. I felt shy about sharing that moment with him. Not that it had been the first time. I’d cooked for him four years ago, but we’d rarely managed to enjoy the meal while it was still hot.

“What about the string beans?”

“They’re in that bowl. I’ve already added the condiments. If you like, you can take them outside. I’ll be right there.”

He grabbed the bowl and went out onto the terrace. His presence made me feel like an adolescent with her first crush. I was at the mercy of my hormones. I transferred the stew to a casserole dish and went to join Andrew and Olivia.

I was walking into a very bad situation, and instead of putting a stop to impending disaster, I stayed and enjoyed the moment.

If I had to give a title to our evening together, I would have called it
the Perfect Dinner.

The three of us were perfect.

This was how it should have been from the beginning: true and exciting and sincere like the smiles Andrew gave Olivia and the glances I reserved for him. But we couldn’t go back in time, and it was useless to even think about it. Even this moment wasn’t the norm, nor would it ever be. It was just a special occasion. Then after the wedding, everything would change again for the worse, dictating new and precarious balances.

Once Andrew married Ashley, for all he might say and do to the contrary, he would not have all of that freedom. Perhaps it wouldn’t even last up until the wedding. No sooner would he confess the existence of a child then
poof
, Andrew might as well disappear into nothingness.

I would never allow Olivia to suffer. I had to talk to him as soon as possible to plan our immediate future and decide what to do for the good of my little girl.

Andrew balled up a piece of bread and threw it at Olivia’s face with a chortle.

She popped her eyes open and gave me a shocked lock. I understood right away she was asking permission to retaliate. I nodded, taking a sip of water, and watched them play above the edge of the glass.

I want to try again with him.

I almost choked when I formulated the thought. What was I thinking? Was I going completely insane?

God, was I fit to be tied. I was changing my mind every other minute.

But my internal chastising wasn’t enough. The more Andrew smiled at Olivia, and the more they played and fell into their roles of father and daughter, the more my mind spun.

He’s not married yet . . . I could give it another shot. I have a feeling he won’t reject me.

I shook my head to drive away those forbidden desires and exhausted, I massaged my temples.

“Everything alright, Zoe?” he asked.

“Sure, sure, I just have a bit of a migraine. It’ll pass in a bit.” I forced a smile, and we all went back to our dinner.

Olivia had fallen asleep on the corner of the couch with a plaid throw on top of her.

She’d passed out immediately, having spent the entire day playing and running. She’d even skipped her afternoon nap.

“Should I put her to bed?” Andrew whispered.

The question warmed my heart. “Yes, thanks.”

I watched his every move, even his breaths, because I was stupid and wanted to hurt myself.

He got up, trying to move as little as possible, and bent over Olly with a strange expression. I wasn’t able to decipher it right away, but then I understood.