Not angry. Just braced.
“I can’t,” I say softly. The words hurt coming out.
His face doesn’t change much, but I know him well enough now to see the impact anyway. A slight tightening of the jaw. The way his grip on the ring box firms just a fraction.
I step closer before that silence can turn into damage. “It’s not ‘no’ forever,” I say quickly. “It’s ‘no’ now.”
He says nothing.
So, I keep going, because he deserves the truth and because I owe this to myself too. “I love you,” I tell him. “I do. And I love this baby, and I know what we are, or at least I know enough of it to say that part out loud now.”
His eyes stay locked on mine.
“But I just almost died,” I say. “I gave birth early. I’m standing in your house holding together by tape and hormones and blind optimism. You’re in the middle of a war. I am still learning how not to panic every time I close my eyes. And if I marry you now, I will always wonder whether I chose it because I was ready…”
I take a breath. “Or because I was scared to lose you.”
He looks down at the ring once, then closes the box slowly. When he speaks, his voice is quieter. “You think I’m rushing you.”
“Yes.”
He nods once. “That’s fair.”
The simple acceptance of it almost undoes me worse than if he’d argued.
I look at the closed ring box in his hand, then away.
There it is again. That old, ugly feeling. Not loud, but familiar. The one that whispers that people like him do not marry women like me. That sooner or later, no matter what he says, I become the story they tell about his bad judgment. The girl from the recordings. The scandal. The mistake.
He must see it on my face, because his expression changes. “What is it?” he asks.
I shake my head once. “Nothing.”
“Zatanna.”
His voice is too steady for me to dodge.
I let out a breath. “It’s stupid.”
“Tell me anyway.”
I look up at him. “It’s just...” I hesitate, then force it out. “I know how people see me. Or how they think they do. Your office. Your mother. Alena. All of them had some version of what I was supposed to be.”
His face hardens immediately at the mention of his mother, but I keep going.
“And I know you say it doesn’t matter. But sometimes I still feel it. Like if I stand next to you long enough, people will always look at me and think I don’t belong there.”
His jaw tightens. “That’s not because it’s true.”
“I know,” I say quickly. Then, more firmly, because I need to hear myself say it too, “And I’m not going to let what your mother said get into my head. I won’t. Because it wasn’t true.”
Something in his face softens.
“She wanted me ashamed,” I say. “She wanted me small. She wanted me to believe that if you loved me, it made you weak, and if I loved you, it made me cheap.”
His voice comes out pained, as he shakes his head. “No. I’m done doing her work for her. No mother would do what she did. She’s no worse than my father.”
“I’m sorry you had to go through that,” I say. “I have my share of shitty parents. The money you sent me as a bonus went to my mother and she never even said thank you.”
