12. Chandler
12
CHANDLER
I never wanted to push her to do something too fast, but when she told me to touch her, the tight grip I had on my control snapped. I had gone nine years thinking that I would never get to hold her in my arms again, let alone feel her body under me as she came apart.
I moved to lay beside her after we both caught our breath and pulled her into my arms, where she still lay, her head on my chest. I can’t keep my hands from touching her soft skin. On some level, I’m scared that all of this will be a dream.
I glance down at her face to see if she’s fallen asleep and find her studying her ring with a serious expression.
“Are you sure you’re okay with that arrangement?”
She doesn’t answer me immediately, she just keeps her eyes on the ring. She sits up and pulls one of the pillows to cover herself as she turns to face me, crossing her legs. She is a vision, sitting there with her hair a mess, nothing but the pillow to cover her curvy, naked formed, her cheeks flushed.
“Everything is happening really fast. I know it doesn’t seem to be for you, but it is for me. I know nothing about you. I don’t even know anything about myself, and yet I’m supposed to be marrying you simply because we were together before I lost my memories? Aren’t you curious about what happened?”
I want to tell her that I’m not, but that’s not the whole truth. I am curious, but I’m terrified to find out the reason why she was going to Willow Creek. I lift up to lean on my elbow and turn my body to face her, trying to convey with my body language that I am an open book for her.
“What do you want to know?”
Her brows come together over her eyes in confusion.
“What?”
I wave my hand in between us.
“What do you want to know? Ask me anything about either of us; I will tell you anything you want to know.”
Her eyes dart back and forth between mine, and I can see her mind turning as she thinks about what she wants to ask.
“Do I have any family? Jillian told me that you hired a PI to try and find me, but wasn’t anyone else trying to find me?”
I’ve dreaded her asking this question.
“You do have family, but you’ve been estranged from them since before you and I met.”
I can tell this surprises her.
“Estranged? Why?”
“You told me once that there were times when someone had to cut off people that weren’t healthy for them to be around. You said that they had outdated views and there was nothing you could do to change them.”
I never wanted to pry into her life, but I always wondered what really happened to force her to cut them off.
“That’s all I said? I never told you why I felt that way?”
I shake my head no and she rolls her eyes, making me smile at how Sophia has picked up that habit from her.
“Okay, how old am I? When is my birthday?”
“You were born on October 22nd, 1988. You are thirty-five, about to be thirty-six.”
“What is my last name? I was using the name of the man who saved me as my last name. I’m going to have to change Sophia’s.”
Hope that she will change it to my last name fills my chest, but I’ll let that be her choice.
“Carter.”
I watch as she takes in this information.
“What about you? Do you have any family?”
“I have my parents. I’m an only child, so no siblings.”
“Have you told them about us?”
I cringe because I know how this is going to sound.
“Not yet. I know my mother, and if I tell her I found you and she has a granddaughter, I’m not going to have a moment of peace with you two. She is going to come here and steal you away from me.”
She laughs, and I know she thinks I’m joking, but I’m not. My mother will move in here if she has the chance.
“Am I still the same as I was before?”
This question throws me. I don’t know why but for some reason I wasn’t expecting it.
“In most ways, you are. There are some differences, but I think that’s from growing up and going through what you have.”
Her shoulders drop from where they were tensed. I hadn’t realized how much this worried her.
“Where you scared you would be a completely different person?”
She nods. “Yeah, I was worried that I wouldn’t like who I was before.”
A pang hits me in the chest at the realization that she was worried about such a thing.
You’re failing her by not telling her about her past, jackass.
“Do you want to know anything else?”
I’ve been too caught up in my own shit to realize that it’s important to her to know these simple little things that are just natural for a person to know.
“How much did you pay to try and find me?”
This is something that I never planned on telling her about. Jillian must have told her about what I did, to some extent.
“Not enough, apparently, because all I had to do was go to an education charity in a small little town an hour away from here.”
I want to make her laugh, but the way she is looking at me tells me that I’m not off the hook.
“Why don’t you want to tell me?”
I move so that I’m lying on my back again and reach around her waist to pull her down onto my chest. Her face level with mine.
“Because I don’t want you to put a number on something that I would ultimately spend every penny I have on.”
Her hair has fallen in her face, and I reach up to brush it away.
“There isn’t a limit to what I would do for you.”
She searches my face, and I hope that she can see how much I mean it.
I don’t see much of my girls on Sunday. I have work to do, and I spend most of the day locked away in my home office trying to fix the presentation that marketing gave me. They didn’t do bad with it, but I want, no, need it to be perfect. We need more customers.
Around one, I get a text from Tanya.
Tanya: If you want to say goodbye to your daughter, you need to do so now. We are getting ready to leave. Kayla is here.
The tone of the text worries me, but I brush it off as her being nervous about the drive back to Willow Creek.
Me: On my way down.
I close the documents I’ve been working on and make my way down to the girl’s apartment. The door is partially open, so I walk in.
“I’m here.”
I listen to see where they are in the apartment and follow the sound of soft voices coming from the kitchen. Tanya and Kayla are standing at the island, talking, and from the looks of it, it’s about something important.
“Hey, you guys ready to go?”
Tanya doesn’t even look at me as she nods her head toward the hall that leads to the spare rooms.
“Soph’s in her room grabbing some things.”
Feeling dismissed, I head over to the hall, trying to catch Tanya’s eye as I do.
What happened between last night and now?
When I get to her room, Sophia is shoving things into a book bag.
“What in the world are you doing?”
She doesn’t even flinch as I walk in and sit on her bed.
“Mommy said to pack only the stuffies I can’t leave behind and to set the rest up on my bed, but when I was trying to choose who to leave, I couldn’t decide. I can’t just leave some of them behind.”
A reasonable dilemma to have.
I have to work to keep my laughter back; I don’t want her to think that I’m making fun of her.
“I don’t think all of them are going to fit in your bag, and I think Mommy wanted you to keep some here so you don’t have to bring them back and forth every time you come here.”
Her little shoulders drop and her lip pouts out some.
“Aww, come here.”
I open my arms for her, and she climbs into my lap, laying her head on my shoulder.
“How about this, whatever ones you were thinking of leaving here, I’ll take back to my apartment so they can stay on the couch in my office while you are back in Willow Creek?”
She springs up and jumps off my lap, bouncing up and down on her toes.
“Really?!”
I love the fact that I can make her so happy with such a little thing.
“Really, and whenever you are missing them, you can let me know and I will let you video call them whenever I’m home.”
She jumps up and down, pumping her arms in the air.
“Yay! Thank you, Daddy!”
Every time she calls me Daddy, my heart expands three sizes bigger, and I have to swallow back the tears that rise in my throat. Just a few weeks ago, I never thought I would have this; I never thought I would have Tanya back, and now here stands our little girl.
Kayla appears in the doorway and smiles at Sophia as she digs out stuffed animals from her bag.
“Your momma wants to know if you’re ready to go, missy. Did you choose which stuffies are staying here?”
I find it odd that Tanya sent Kayla in here to get her, but I don’t say anything about it in front of Soph.
“Yep! Daddy is going to keep them for me, and he said I can video call them whenever I want.”
Kayla smiles at her but avoids eye contact with me.
Alright, now I know something is wrong.
I stand from the bed and say to Soph, “Aunt Kayla can help you gather them for me; I’m going to talk to Mommy really quick.”
Before Kayla can say anything, I make it out the door and down the hall. Tanya is in the kitchen, cleaning out the fridge. I’m assuming from things that will go bad in the next week.
Is she doing this to avoid me?
“Hey, you. I wanted to say goodbye to you too.”
She moves around the island to grab the trash can as I make my way toward her.
“Is everything okay?”
“Yep, I’m just trying to get everything done. We need to make it back before it gets too late so Soph can go to bed at a decent hour for school tomorrow.”
It’s a valid reason, but something tells me it’s not entirely the truth.
“Right, of course.”
An awkward silence falls over the room, and I’m at a loss for what to say to her. Last night had been amazing, and I felt like it had opened a door for us, and now she won’t even look at me. Kayla and Sophia come into the room just as Tanya closes the fridge.
“Alright, sweet pea, give your daddy a hug and a kiss. We’ve got to get going.”
Sophia skips over to me, and I kneel down so that she can wrap her arms around my neck. I hold her close to me for a moment, not wanting to let her go. I wish we were at the point where they didn’t have to leave. I want them to be living with me already, but I understand that Tanya wants to take things slow. No matter how much I want to move things along, I will move as slow as she needs me to. I won’t risk losing her again. I almost didn’t get to meet my daughter, and now that I have, I can’t even imagine what my life would have been like.
I let Soph go and stand. Kayla ushers her out of the apartment, and as Tanya tries to rush past me, I put my hand on her stomach.
“I’m not sure what’s happened between last night and now, but when you’re ready, I’ll listen to whatever it is.”
I kiss her temple, breathing in her scent for a moment before pulling back.
“Let me know when you make it there, please. No matter how late.”
I step to the side, and she looks at me before walking out and following our daughter. It kills me to watch them go.
The week goes by slowly, and by Wednesday I’m ready to cancel all meetings and drive to Willow Creek. I’ve barely spoken to Tanya or Sophia this week; my schedule has been jam-packed with meetings. I miss my girls and knowing that they are just an hour away is worse than before, when I didn’t know what happened to Tanya. They are just out of reach now.
I glance at the clock and see that it’s just before five in the evening, so I decide that the rest of the work can wait until tomorrow. I want to get home at a decent hour and FaceTime Sophia so she can see her stuffies. So far, she’s only called one other time to see them.
After I pack the things I want to take home, I wave goodbye to Jillian and head out. On days like this one, where I’m exhausted and want nothing more than to lay down, I’m even more grateful to have Steven under my employment. I didn’t want to have to fight five o’clock traffic.
As soon as I get into my apartment, I notice that the cold chill is back. Even though Soph and Tanya didn’t stay here with me, they were still present, warming it up simply by being near to me. I send Tanya a text to see if I can call to talk to her and Soph, and as soon as I get the go ahead, I hit the button and wait for them to pick up.
Soph’s sweet face fills the screen.
“Hi, Daddy!”
I smile at her.
“Hey, baby girl. How was your day at school?”
I listen as she prattles on about everything that she did at school. Happy that I can just sit and listen to her talk. I show her the stuffies that I set up along the cushions of the couch in my office and she has me put the phone up to each one so she can inspect them. Once she has looked over each and every one, her mother calls her to take a shower.
“You go take your shower. Hand Mommy the phone so I can talk to her, okay?”
I watch as the cabin flashes by on the screen as Soph runs through the rooms, and I listen as Tanya tells her to make sure she washes everything. She puts the phone up to her face for a moment.
“Just one second, Chandler.”
She puts the phone back down, and as I wait for her to walk to wherever she is going, I shift around in my seat. I feel like a teenager again. Nervous to talk to my crush. She sits down, and I can see the stairs behind her, which tells me she is in the living room. Far enough away from Sophia that she can’t hear us talk, but close enough so Tanya can still hear her if needed.
“Sophia said you wanted to talk to me.”
Something is still wrong, and I can’t wait to see her in person to find out. If we are to get married, even if she thinks it’s just for the status, I need to make sure she’s happy.
“Are you finally ready to tell me what’s wrong? You’ve been acting off since Sunday.”
She studies me through the phone, something that I’ve noticed she does a lot.
“I was upset Sunday, but I didn’t want to say anything in case it was just a timing thing, but the last few days have shown me that it wasn’t.”
I clench my fist around the phone. I don’t like that she has been upset with me and never said anything.
“So why haven’t you called me? Communication is important in a relationship, Tanya. You can’t just be mad at me and expect me to figure it out on my own and fix it.”
My tone is ruder than I intended it to be, but I don’t like mind games.
“I don’t know how to be in a relationship, Chandler! You keep on acting like this should all be as if nothing ever happened to me. Like I should have known you and remembered everything from nine years ago as soon as I saw you, but that’s not going to happen. All I know are the last nine years.”
Realizing that she is right and that I’ve been acting like we were never apart, I take a deep breath to try and calm down. We are both angry, and if we don’t calm down, we aren’t going to get anywhere with this conversation.
“Fine, I’m sorry. I don’t know how to handle all of this either. I’m going to fuck up, and I need you to tell me when I do. Now, why have you been mad at me this week? I thought what happened Saturday night was amazing.”
She blushes, and I take it as a good sign.
“It was, but the next day, when you chose to work instead of being with Sophia and I on our last day with you, it wasn’t.”
My head jerks back in surprise. I didn’t realize that’s what I had done. Yes, I got busy with work, but I didn’t choose it over them.
“Anytime we are with you, whether you are here or we are there, you work. Don’t get me wrong, I admire your drive, but it shouldn’t be more important than your daughter. You still haven’t shown her the roof because you keep getting pulled away for work. This isn’t how you get to know people and bond with them, Chandler. How am I supposed to know that I can trust you if you aren’t around? And the fact that you chose to work after what happened Saturday really hurt. It was like it meant nothing to you.”
I feel like I’ve been punched in the gut. I’ve always been somewhat of a workaholic; it’s just who I am, and everyone seems to understand that. Hearing that I hurt Tanya and let Sophia down guts me.
“How are we supposed to be a family if you would rather work?”
I blow out a breath and lean forward, holding the phone in one hand and my head in the other.
“I didn’t think of it that way. It’s no excuse, but it’s what I’m used to. I’m sorry that I hurt you. I will work on working less.”
I can see her trying not to smile at my choice of words, and I smile sadly at her.
“I’m really sorry. I’ll make it up to you and Sophia.”
Her sigh sounds tired.
“You don’t need to make it up to us, you just need to decide what is more important. Your work or us. I’m not saying you have to stop working, but you do need to realize spending time together is important for our daughter, regardless of if it’s convenient for you or not.”
I nod, feeling like an absolute ass and like a terrible father.
How am I going to prove to her that I can be a good father and husband when I have no idea what I’m doing?