15. Elena #2
An anonymous donor would never ask whether I ate lunch.
He wouldn’t know I move charts when I’m anxious or that I argue more formally when I’m avoiding something personal.
He couldn’t make me this angry with one careful question because there would be no man standing in front of me, waiting to hear whether I want him.
Dominic is standing here.
“You wanted someone anonymous because you didn’t want feelings involved,” he says. “I understood that. But our bodies, our choices, and the time we spend together stopped feeling anonymous or clinical a long time ago.”
“That doesn’t mean this has to become a relationship.”
“I didn’t say it did.”
“Then what are you asking me for?”
“Honesty.”
“I have been honest.” Except for the ovulation test. Except for right now.
“You lied about ovulating because you wanted me.”
I flinch. “We dealt with that.”
“We dealt with the lie. You still can’t say why you told it without finding a practical reason afterward.”
“I wanted to have sex with you.” I offer the fact, keeping the feeling behind it.
“Why?”
The question frustrates me because the answer is obvious. He knows I’m attracted to him. He has seen me naked, made me come, and heard the things I say when I stop thinking long enough to protect myself.
“Because I’m attracted to you.”
“That’s closer.”
“Do you need me to list the specific physical attributes?”
“No.” Dominic exhales and looks away briefly. “I need to know I’m more than a collection of things you need.”
“You are.”
“Then tell me what I am.” The real answer is a knot in my chest: everything.
It’s hard to draw a breath.
He waits.
The answer is already there. Dominic is the man I trust enough to have a child with.
The man I call when I need something handled and the man who knows when to leave me alone.
He infuriates me, steadies me, listens when I tell him no, and has spent four years watching me without ever asking me to become less so he could feel like more.
If I say any of that aloud, I won’t be able to keep treating our relationship like a possibility I can still avoid. It’s already here. Naming it would force me to admit I could lose it.
“You’re my boss,” I say. “My brother’s best friend. The person I chose to do this with.”
His face changes on the final sentence.
“Because I’m useful.”
“That isn’t what I meant.”
“It’s what you said.”
“I chose you.”
“To provide something.”
“We both agreed to that.”
“I know.” He lowers his voice. “Being reduced to a function by the woman I want feels like being used.”
The word lands hard enough that I take a step back.
“I am not using you.” I say it forcefully, as if the volume can make it true.
“I don’t think you intended to.”
“That isn’t an apology.”
“I’m not asking for one.” He rubs one hand over his jaw. “I want to be wanted by the woman I want. That isn’t unreasonable.”
The woman I want.
He says it plainly. No contract language. No reference to conception. He doesn’t soften it to make my answer easier.
“You knew I wasn’t looking for this,” I say, the word ‘love’ hanging unspoken in the air.
“For what?”
“Emotional complications.”
His mouth tightens. “I’m a person, Elena. Emotion was always a possibility.”
“That’s why the terms are clear.”
“The terms don’t change what happens when we’re alone.”
“They establish boundaries.”
“They establish obligations. They don’t turn us off when the obligation ends.”
I look toward the glass wall. No one is outside, but the exposed office gives me somewhere else to put my eyes.
“The original arrangement worked because it was clear,” I say, ignoring the fact that nothing has been clear for months.
“Did it?”
“It protected both of us.”
“From what?”
I don’t answer.
Dominic steps back, giving me more space when I’m the one refusing to look at him.
He shakes his head, a small, tired movement. “I’m not demanding a relationship. I’m asking you to stop pretending desire only exists when you can call it productive.”
I finally meet his eyes.
He looks unguardedly hurt, and I’m the one who caused it. I have taken every personal choice he has made and translated it into a service that supports my plan.
I want to cross the room and touch him. I stay where I am.
“We should go home,” I say, because if I touch him now, I won’t be able to stop.
Dominic’s face closes off.
“Okay.”
He doesn’t argue. That makes leaving worse.
At home, I open the contract on my laptop and scroll to the section addressing emotional expectations.
Neither party is obligated to enter, maintain, or pursue a romantic relationship with the other as a condition of conception, pregnancy, or co-parenting.
The clause is still accurate. Dominic didn’t ask me to revise it. He didn’t ask for a promise, a shared home, or any declaration I’m not prepared to make.
He asked whether I want him.
I close the contract and open a blank document.
Post-Conception Co-Parenting Plan appears at the top. The title sounds responsible, which helps for thirty seconds.
I begin with the easiest part.
Following a confirmed pregnancy, Dominic and I will maintain separate residences and independent personal lives.
I read the sentence twice.
Maintain is wrong. Our lives aren’t separate now. We work across a hallway from each other, speak most nights, and know details that have nothing to do with conception. He knows when I haven’t eaten. I know when a pause means he’s angry and when it means I hurt him.
I replace maintain with return to.
That’s worse.
There is no place to return to. Dominic has been part of my daily life for four years. The arrangement changed the hours we share and the future we’re planning, but he was already there.
I delete the sentence.
Medical appointments will be divided according to availability.
I picture Dominic in an exam room, asking the doctor the questions I forget because I’m nervous. He would bring a notebook. He would read every test result himself and pretend he wasn’t worried until we were alone.
I change divided to coordinated, stare at it, then delete the whole paragraph.
My phone vibrates beside the laptop.
Dominic: Did you eat?
I look at the sealed takeout container on the counter.
Me: Yes.
Three dots appear.
Dominic: Try again.
The message almost makes me laugh, which is deeply annoying under the circumstances.
Me: Dinner is here.
Dominic: That wasn’t my question.
Me: I’m opening it now.
Dominic: Thank you.
He doesn’t mention our argument. He doesn’t ask to come over or use concern as an excuse to push past the distance I created.
I open the container because he knows me too well to accept another lie.
Then I return to the document.
Each parent will establish a nursery in their respective residence.
Two cribs, two sets of clothes, and two rooms designed for the same child. It’s fair and practical. It also feels completely false.
I try to picture Dominic’s nursery and mine separately.
The image refuses to cooperate. I see him standing beside me, paint samples in hand, checking the crib instructions after I insist we followed them correctly.
I see his shoes beside the bench near my front door and his coffee mug drying beside mine.
I don’t know which home we’re in.
That should make the plan easier. It doesn’t.
I delete the nursery section.
All that remains is the title and a note beneath it.
This arrangement is temporary.
The sentence offers exactly what I need: a boundary, a clear ending, and proof that Dominic can matter now without changing the rest of my life.
I place the cursor at the end of the line.
Temporary should be accurate. We agreed to try for a child, not build a life together. I have every practical reason to leave the sentence alone.
I select it anyway and press Delete.