It all seemed so simple. Boy meets girl. Girl thinks boy is hot. Boy thinks girl is hot. All is well for our hero. Or is it? This situation wasn't quite so simple. We are adults and with that adult status come the complexities of life.
We met at our children's school. We would see each other there and I tried to turn off any attraction to him that I felt. But then I laid that BS down and we began meeting for coffee and movies and dinners and jazz. The rest is history.
Somewhere in the back of my mind though I worried (and sometimes still do) that once the folks at the school pick up on the relationship, all hell will break loose. Why? I am not sure considering that I am a parent. I am not a pillar of the establishment or anything. LOL Anyhow, I wonder what will happen and time and time again, he has said that he doesn't care what they think and that it will be just a day in the life once things are settled. *Tuck this statement away for future reference. It will become an integral part of this story...
So fast forward to New Year's Eve. He planned a night full of board games, movies, and fun for us and our three beautiful daughters. There was pizza, music, sparkling blueberry lemonade and us. What more could a girl ask? So the ball dropped and everyone ran around hugging and then it was movie time. Around 3 a.m., it was bedtime for the little ones and I must admit he and I had the same picture in our heads as to how that part would go.
The girls would be exhausted. Put on their PJs and crawl into bed and fall asleep. His teen daughter would keep watching her movie and laughing. We would continue playing Monopoly sprawled out on his living room floor while talking trash to one another. Seamless plan, right? The execution of that plan was something altogether different.
The girls got into bed and I read them a story. My daughter had already begun asking if I was going to stay the night and I had tried -- unskillfully, I must admit -- to deflect the question. Too late though because it hung in the air.
As he and I took a moment to regroup from our restless, five-year-olds. We sat on the couch and had the talk. He said that things had taken a turn and he worried about how this would be broadcast at the school by our children because of my daughter's concerns. He then went on to state that he didn't want to have to explain himself or our relationship to his ex-wife or anyone at the school right now.
Could I be hearing this correctly? I thought to myself. I felt like a little kid. I wanted to take my ball and go home. This could not possibly be the man that said that I would have to face the very real possibility of his ex-wife running into us somewhere and that I should not worry about what other parents may say. I was furious and saddened. I cannot lie.
My daughter wanted to stay so I tucked her into his oldest daughter's bed as my little one looks up to her and wanted to sleep there. By candlelight, I kissed my sleeping daughter's head and tried to fight back the tears surfacing in my eyes. When I came out, he said that since it was late, he would sleep around the corner at his father's. But for me, the damage was done. I was out.
I had checked out mentally when he let himself say what he had and I could not allow myself to stay. He hugged me and I felt void. I still had those same tears threatening to make an appearance, but I felt too hollow to allow them to fall. He asked me to stay. I told him I could not and he walked me to my car. I drove home and called when I settled in. I let him know exactly how I felt when he said what he had and the conversation was punctuated by my sobs. He was quiet and apologetic. I told him that now I knew that somewhere in his mind, those thoughts still had a place and how that made me feel.
Later that morning, I came back to get my daughter and we did not reference the conversation. He made breakfast for all of us. We talked and laughed. Kissed and smiled. Even napped while the girls ran amuck. So now I know what I am up against and he knows that I know...
