Read Online A Xmas Gift: The Sperm Donor by Aphrodite Hunt - Free Book Online
Authors: Aphrodite Hunt
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with this woman and this . . . this child in your life. We can get married. I can give you lots of children. We’ll be so happy, you’ll see!”
His heart sinks. She’s never going to break up with him, he knows that now. Her love for him is real, and heartbreaking, and bordering on obsession. He also can see now that he can’t live with a woman who loves him as obsessively as Abby does. He can’t live with a woman who makes him the center of her universe – whose happiness will flourish and wane at his every word, his every deed. He can’t live with a woman whose sole existence of living is because of him.
I can’t bear to have that responsibility.
His guts are wrenching with the realization of knowing what he has to do.
“Abby,” he says gently, “we can’t be together anymore. I can’t live like this.”
The blow that hits her face is almost physical. She actually quails.
“No, don’t say that.”
“It’s true, Abby. I can’t live with you like this, not trusting me, keeping tabs on me wherever I go. I’m not happy. I haven’t been happy for a long time, and I couldn’t put a finger on it . . . but now I can. I can’t be with you.”
“No!” Her voice is so broken that he winces. It’s a soul being torn into half.
“You love me too much, but I’m a trophy to you to show off to your friends. It’s not like I’m a real person. I can’t live like that, Abby. And you can’t either. It’s not fair to either of us.”
The tears are pouring down her tormented face. Her shoulders are slumped. She’s actually cowering like a prisoner who has been repeatedly rained with punches. His heart almost rips to see her like this – because he does care about her. Even loves her in his manner – though not in the obsessive manner she craves – but he knows it has to be done.
He could never live with himself if he allowed this façade to continue.
She keeps muttering “No, no, no, no” over and over.
He slowly moves to sit beside her on the couch. After a while, he puts a tentative hand on the small of her back.
“I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you.”
Her face is covered by her hands. She is shaking like a fragile leaf.
“You can’t break up with me,” she says, the desperation clear in her voice. “You can’t.”
He pauses. Then he says, “Do you want me to drive you home?”
“No.”
“Do you want me to call someone? A . . . friend?”
She shakes her head again.
He lets her cry like this for a long, long time. He doesn’t move, just continues to stroke her back. Outside, the darkness descends upon the lounge like a harbinger of things to come. Sunset at three thirty in the afternoon. What an awful winter.
Finally she says in a dead voice, “I want to go home.”
“I’ll take you.”
He takes her silence for assent.
Moving around laboriously, they gather her things and exit the apartment like a coda.
13
Breaking up with Abby had been harder than he thought.
It was complicated how he felt for her. He did love her, though he wasn’t exactly in love with her. He didn’t have that overwhelming, omnipresent, head-over-heels feeling that he did when he was in love with Elise – back when they were teenagers. He did care a lot about Abby, and he hated having to hurt her.
But it was necessary, he keeps telling himself. Painful but necessary. He couldn’t go on a minute longer living like he did.
Looking back, he realizes now that he was deluding himself, thinking he could have a real relationship with Abby. Some men might be cut out for that kind of relationship, but he isn’t. He had thought it would be one of those relationships where love would grow over time. It had been instantaneous for her, of course. She had fallen violently in love with him at first sight, and that love had sharpened its razor edge to border upon dependency. Her insecurities took over, and the more he tried to loosen the ties that bound them, the more she clung on to them.
I did
His heart sinks. She’s never going to break up with him, he knows that now. Her love for him is real, and heartbreaking, and bordering on obsession. He also can see now that he can’t live with a woman who loves him as obsessively as Abby does. He can’t live with a woman who makes him the center of her universe – whose happiness will flourish and wane at his every word, his every deed. He can’t live with a woman whose sole existence of living is because of him.
I can’t bear to have that responsibility.
His guts are wrenching with the realization of knowing what he has to do.
“Abby,” he says gently, “we can’t be together anymore. I can’t live like this.”
The blow that hits her face is almost physical. She actually quails.
“No, don’t say that.”
“It’s true, Abby. I can’t live with you like this, not trusting me, keeping tabs on me wherever I go. I’m not happy. I haven’t been happy for a long time, and I couldn’t put a finger on it . . . but now I can. I can’t be with you.”
“No!” Her voice is so broken that he winces. It’s a soul being torn into half.
“You love me too much, but I’m a trophy to you to show off to your friends. It’s not like I’m a real person. I can’t live like that, Abby. And you can’t either. It’s not fair to either of us.”
The tears are pouring down her tormented face. Her shoulders are slumped. She’s actually cowering like a prisoner who has been repeatedly rained with punches. His heart almost rips to see her like this – because he does care about her. Even loves her in his manner – though not in the obsessive manner she craves – but he knows it has to be done.
He could never live with himself if he allowed this façade to continue.
She keeps muttering “No, no, no, no” over and over.
He slowly moves to sit beside her on the couch. After a while, he puts a tentative hand on the small of her back.
“I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you.”
Her face is covered by her hands. She is shaking like a fragile leaf.
“You can’t break up with me,” she says, the desperation clear in her voice. “You can’t.”
He pauses. Then he says, “Do you want me to drive you home?”
“No.”
“Do you want me to call someone? A . . . friend?”
She shakes her head again.
He lets her cry like this for a long, long time. He doesn’t move, just continues to stroke her back. Outside, the darkness descends upon the lounge like a harbinger of things to come. Sunset at three thirty in the afternoon. What an awful winter.
Finally she says in a dead voice, “I want to go home.”
“I’ll take you.”
He takes her silence for assent.
Moving around laboriously, they gather her things and exit the apartment like a coda.
13
Breaking up with Abby had been harder than he thought.
It was complicated how he felt for her. He did love her, though he wasn’t exactly in love with her. He didn’t have that overwhelming, omnipresent, head-over-heels feeling that he did when he was in love with Elise – back when they were teenagers. He did care a lot about Abby, and he hated having to hurt her.
But it was necessary, he keeps telling himself. Painful but necessary. He couldn’t go on a minute longer living like he did.
Looking back, he realizes now that he was deluding himself, thinking he could have a real relationship with Abby. Some men might be cut out for that kind of relationship, but he isn’t. He had thought it would be one of those relationships where love would grow over time. It had been instantaneous for her, of course. She had fallen violently in love with him at first sight, and that love had sharpened its razor edge to border upon dependency. Her insecurities took over, and the more he tried to loosen the ties that bound them, the more she clung on to them.
I did
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