Chapter 16 #4
“I’ve earned the right to take my time with this, Charlie.
I need time to get to know the woman you are and not the woman that I assumed you were,” Lauren said.
Lauren scoffed and shook her head. “Nobody marries with the thought that divorce might come one day. It’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever gone through, and it’s hard not to place blame in your lap, but then you come here, and you’re so damn organic with him. ”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Charlie said.
“You free him, Charlie! As the woman who has loved him for her whole adult life, it’s beautiful to see him engage in the world.
He was my husband, but he was suffocating, and I think that damage happened long before me.
For so long Demi wanted to sterilize everything, even his emotions and loving you is complicated and messy and he just allows it.
At some point, I got to be woman enough to stop fighting for a man that’s not for me. I want to find who is for me.”
“I’m not a bad person,” Charlie said softly.
“No, I don’t think you are,” Lauren answered. She didn’t smile. She couldn’t and Charlie knew why. This was the moment of acceptance. This was the official end of Lauren and Demi. The divorce had just been paperwork. This sit-down was the reality check.
Lauren stood and gathered her soiled tissues, moving hastily, like she just couldn’t be in Charlie’s presence much longer.
“You can tell your sister that she can have her client list back,” Lauren said.
Charlie stood too. “I’ll let Demi know you’re waiting,” Lauren said.
Before Lauren left the kitchen, Charlie stopped her. “Lauren?”
Lauren turned back to her.
“How did you know you were ready to be a mother?” Charlie asked.
“You’re never ready, Charlie. You never know what you’re doing until you’re doing it.
It will always feel scary, it will always feel like the most serious job you’ve ever taken on.
It’s terrifying. Every second of it, but it’s the purest and most consistent love you will ever possess.
It’s the only love you’ll ever possess. I was young when I had DJ, and I remember feeling like I never wanted to live without Demi.
Well, I’m now living without Demi, but the love that we curated, I’ll never lose because of our son.
The best parts of us are him. If you feel like you can live without that, then do it, go through with the abortion.
But if you know that this is it for you, if you know that this is a love that you want to keep or if you know that you’re going to end up wondering what if, one day, then choose wisely.
Whatever you do, make the decision that’s true to your heart. Not what he wants, but what you want.”
Charlie was so grateful for that piece of advice. “Thank you,” she whispered.
“Yeah, well, if you have that baby, we’ll be connected through our children, so…” Lauren shrugged and then walked out the room.
Somehow this disaster of a day felt like a resolution or, at the very least, the beginning of one.
Demi bent the corner, and he stood against the cabinet.
“You can’t do this again,” Charlie said. “You can’t abandon me when things get tough.”
“You got to follow your own advice, Bird,” he replied. “A baby makes it hard, not impossible. Why didn’t you go through with it?”
“Because, if you were going to leave, I needed a piece of you that I could keep,” she answered. Suddenly Lauren’s logic made so much sense. “You can’t use your love and your presence as leverage when my wants don’t match yours, though. That’s not cool. Nothing about that is fair.”
“You’re right,” he said. “I can’t even say shit because you’re right. I gave up a lot for this with you.”
“Is that why you came here? Because you regret it?” She asked.
“I came here because it felt like you ain’t want a nigga, Bird,” Demi admitted.
“I didn’t mean to make you feel that way. I wouldn’t be here crying at your ex-wife’s table, looking like a fucking idiot, if I felt that way. I’m in love with you.”
There it was. The full sentence. The intentional meaning. To be in something with him. To be in this world, in Charliezonia together. That’s all he wanted.
“I’m in love with you.”
She saw his stubbornness wean away as he took steps forward. She stood, and Demi pulled her into his arms. There was discontent between them and so much to discuss, so much to work out.
“Say, man,” Demi whispered as he kissed her lips.
“Say, man,” she replied. Her dirty-ass hands that had been all outside, all over the radio station desk, all over every door handle she had touched on the way to this house, were on his face. He didn’t even flinch.
“You can’t do a nigga like that. You make my mind go to crazy places, Bird. You don’t have to have this baby if you don’t want to.”
She caressed his face. “Why does it mean so much to you?”
Demi pressed his forehead to hers, closing his eyes. She really don’t get the shit, he thought.
“Because you mean that much to me, Bird. This whole experience with you, this time with you, it feels like it has an expiration date.”
“And a baby makes it forever,” Charlie finished for him. “You trying to trap a real nigga.”
Demi laughed, sincerely fucking laughed. Only Charlie would say some shit like that at a time like this.
“Get the fuck out of here, man,” Demi said.
“Is it a trap if I walk into it willingly?” Charlie asked.
Demi pulled back.
“I want both. I want this baby and I want to sing. I want us to have it all, Demi.” Another kiss.
It was filled with so much gratitude that Charlie felt it in the depth of her bones.
“Oh, and Lauren?” Charlie added, pausing.
Demi’s brow tensed in anticipation. “I know I wouldn’t be this graceful.
We owe her, Demi, for the hurt and the lies.
I want to make sure that’s made right and that we blend this new family with her and DJ the right way.
I want to be respectful of how they feel, Demi.
We were so in love we didn’t think of that before.
We just did what we wanted, regardless of who got hurt.
” Charlie shook her head in disbelief. “She’s amazing, actually. ”
“Okay, that’s enough on Lo,” Demi said. There was only so much “amicability” he could take between his ex-wife and fiancée. He didn’t need or desire for them to fill his life with awkwardness by becoming friends.
Charlie laughed. “Let’s go home.”