“I know, right? Decrepit.” He chuckles at what must be a horrified expression on my face. “So I’ll be fifty, Kira will be starting college, and I’m going to be…regional manager at Chili’s?” He slaps his hand on the steering wheel. “These are the things I lie awake and think about at 3a.m.”
“You have 3a.m.existential crises? You seem like the kind of person who makes decisions and doesn’t waver.”
“That’s the thing about having a kid—they put things in perspective. I have this compass always pointing me in the direction that’s best for my child.”
It sounds too easy.
“What if it’s not the best direction foryou?” I ask. “Don’t you lose some piece of yourself when your needs always come second?”
I fidget with the strap of the seatbelt, which feels too tight across my collarbone. In my effort to make polite conversation, I’ve inadvertently led us into territory that feels too personal. Too uncomfortable to explain to someone who chose parenthood, when I didn’t.
“When I’m lying in bed,” he says, “worrying about the rest of my life, thinking about Kira gives me that automaticwhy.I do everything for her and because of her. I don’t have an option not to.”
I’ve been desperately searching for variouswhys for most of my adult life, but I also made the decisionnotto have a baby at age twenty. At that point, the onlywhyin my mind was sort of a distraught “why is this happening to me now?” I’m certain it would have sent my life down a much worse path. Maybe that’s not something you confide to a parent who’s completely devoted to their child.
The light turns green.
I stare at Nick’s profile, silhouetted in light from the streetlamps, trying to decide if this conversation adds a layer to his seemingly unflappable personality or further justifies my mom’s belief that he’s simply a “good man” in need of a Shawna.
Meanwhile, I’ve forgotten to watch out for our destination.
“Oh! Slow down,” I exclaim, inadvertently touching his arm. “It’s up here on the right.” I tap on the window. “The building that looks like a white cinder block castle.”
“You’re joking.” He turns his blinker on and slows down for the turn into the parking lot. “Is this punishment for springing a driving lesson on you?”
“I mean, the proper way to do this would be to wait until 2a.m.and then eat the meal in the car. But we should go inside for the more elevated experience.”
He makes a sound that’s somewhere between a sigh and a laugh and pulls into a parking space in the mostly empty White Castle lot. I’ve never met anyone who laughs this easily.
“You’re a little close to the line on the right side here,” I say.
“Shut up.”
“See, they’re steamed,”I explain. “So it’s almost like they’re these little bao buns, not burgers. Free your mind of the traditional idea of a hamburger.”
The White Castle cashier taps on her point-of-sale monitor impatiently while Nick looks up at the menu board.
“We’ll have a ten sack with American cheese and two drinks,” I say. “Oh, and let’s do an order of chicken rings.” Nick looks downright concerned by this order, so I add clam strips, just to scare him.
I choose the only booth that doesn’t require us to brush crumbs off the tabletop. It’s the first time we’ve sat face-to-face.I find myself considering the way my mom paused before declaring Nick not traditionally handsome. Not that the fluorescent light is doing either of us any favors, but I prefer offbeat faces. My first fictional crush was Beetlejuice, for fuck’s sake.
“So if youcouldlive anywhere you wanted,” I say, because I’ve inherited my mother’s anxiety about prolonged silences, “where would you go?”
He removes one of the sliders from its little container.
“When Nora and I got together, we talked about working for the National Parks Service or running a kayak rental place. She liked that I was untethered. When she was pregnant with Kira, we said we can move somewhere else, we can travel. Having a child doesn’t have to stop us. But the thing is, it makes a lot of sense to live in the city where you have access to free childcare. Nora’s parents live here, and that’s been great for Kira.”
He finally takes a bite of the slider.
“I know I sound like a selfish childless heathen, but does it bother you that the last ten years of your life have been dictated by someone else’s needs?”
Nick gives me a surprised, almost offended look as he’s chewing, so I take the opportunity to rephrase: “What I mean is, don’t you ever want to put yourself first?”
“Oh, I did that,” he says, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “For most of my life. I spent about ten years on tour with bands.”
“Right.” I look at the U2 “LaundroMerch” shirt. “Are you a musician?”
“No. I mean, I’ve been in bands. Not professionally.” He laughs to himself. “I did a lot of different jobs on tours, but I was mostly a lighting tech.”
