Chapter 69

The next thing we knew, both I and Reuben were walking out into the hot, late August sun with long strips of black and white ultrasound pictures in our hands. Two of the pictures had been done in shades of tan through brown and gave a 3D picture of our baby’s face.

Neither of us could stop looking at it.

“Look at those cheeks,” I said. “They’re so round and pudgy—how can he be so pudgy at only twenty-three weeks?”

“He doesn’t look happy to be getting his picture taken.”

I nearly stopped in the middle of the parking lot after glimpsing the soft, happy look on his face. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d hugged the picture to his face.

“If you’re so happy to have a baby,” I asked before I could think better of it. “Why haven’t you had one before? Like, find a girl, get married. Or the dark way, I suppose.”

He gave me a look that told me I should know better, but I still waited.

When we were both seated in his too-nice car (he had opened the door for me before I could think of refusing; he’d gotten good at that), he finally answered.

“Well, as I told you before, I was put off women. But, also…” he paused to check his blind spots and flick his turn signal. “Before I could even start to get to know a girl, I’d find myself thinking of a million different reasons she could have ulterior motives or just general red flags. I became paranoid and eventually gave up.” He succeeded in pulling out perfectly and got back onto the highway. “It came to a point where just thinking of meeting a girl and having to figure out whether I could trust her, let alone love and make a happy family with her, I’d just get exhausted. It became more exhausting the more I got involved with the company. Being busy makes time fly and, before I knew it, my mom was looking at me and asking why I looked so old.”

I chuckled. “Thirty-two, how ancient.”

“In a way, it is, mainly because all the good girls have already been found and taken by now. Unless I want to marry someone ten years younger than me or something akin to that, but even then…” he shook his head. “It’s all on me. I’m really an insecure child who likes pushing their problems away with work. Being told I was old made me wake up and realize just how lonely and pointless my life had become.”

I turned my head from where I’d been watching out the window while resting my chin on my hand. “Pointless? With all the success you have?”

“Exactly. What’s the point of making all that money and working so hard when it was only for myself? I was alone, and I’d wasted most of my wife working for nothing. True happiness isn’t found in money, Alaina. It’s in family.”

At a stop light, he leaned his head back for a moment and closed his eyes.

“I can still remember one of my happiest moments. It was when I was a kid just lying on the floor of the living room while I listened to my parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles talk and my sisters play. It was just so…warm. It wasn’t even anything special.” The light turned green, and he opened his eyes in time to push the gas. “I want that. It’s unfair how easy it is to be distracted from that. I want it so bad it makes me a coward about getting it.”

“I don’t know if you’re a coward,” I said, thinking of all the embarrassing situations he’d thrown himself into just to get my attention and how he was more or less clinging to me like superglue. Then another question came to me. “Why were you in that club in the first place? It’s not exactly your ‘scene,’ for a lack of a better word.”

He gave me a side glance and a smile.

“Blind date.”

I laughed, though I couldn’t exactly nail down why that was so funny. Probably because Mr. Czarn had to be the last person who could need a blind date.

“Had a change of heart in your existential crisis and realized you needed to get dating right away?” I said, grinning.

“She was a recommendation from Kim’s wife, so I figured that was as good as anywhere to start on whether she was trustworthy or not. Kim has an excellent eye for people, but it pales in comparison to his wife’s.”

I kicked back, so I could prop my feet onto the dashboard. The more pregnant I got, the more uncomfortable it became to sit normally. “So…what happened? She stood you up?”

“No. She was…” I didn’t miss his half-restrained wince. “Sweet.”

“…And?”

“…Let’s just say that my obsession with trust left some want of attention in other areas.”

“Like?”

“Are you feeling jealous?”

I stiffened. “No, I just want to hear what you’re avoiding so much. It sounds like a laugh.”

“Well, as I said before, once you reach this age all the good women have been taken.” He hesitated. “She wasn’t…very attractive.”

“Oooooooo.”

“Stop.”

“So you were shallow?”

“The amount of care a woman gives to her own health and appearance also reflects on her personality—”

“Just say you dumped her because she was ugly. Own it.”

“I said no such thing! She had redeemable qualities! And it wasn’t just her looks, she was too…forward. Anyway, the point being, I ended the date on a pleasant note and sent her on her way and felt I needed a drink after that…disappointment.”

“Is that really the word you wanted to say?”

“You’re already thinking up your own interpretation to amuse yourself. Shallow or not, that’s what got me at the Blue Moon club feeling sorry for myself and fearing I’d be sleeping alone in a cold bed for the rest of my life….then I happened to look down the way and see a beautiful woman, with the most dazzling long legs, looking just as jaded about life as I was.”