And every time I came home, I came back.
Boone was the breath in my lungs. Giving him up was like telling my body to stop breathing. It just wasn’t possible.
As long as I was far enough away that I couldn’t get to him, it was fine. I could deal. But the minute I came within a drivable distance to Boone, there I was, driving.
He always let me in. We always made bad decisions. Though, all of the other times those bad decisions happened, one of us was able to scrounge up enough forethought to use birth control.
That was why we were in the predicament that we were.
It was why I was standing in his kitchen, telling him that I was pregnant, when I wanted to be anywhere else.
“How far along?” he rasped, his face…shocked but pleased.
I worked my tongue over my teeth, knowing this was about to piss him off.
“Four and a half months.”
He blinked.
Then stiffened. “You’ve known for this long that you were pregnant, and you didn’t tell me?”
The heartbreak in his voice was enough to cause my heart to seize.
However, I’d had a reason for not telling him.
“I didn’t want your mother involved in my life.” I shrugged. “Plus, I knew that if I told you, you would tell me to stop playing soccer.”
He blamed the soccer I wouldn’t give up for the loss of our first baby.
He hadn’t been there and seen the life inside of me thrive after the game.
He hadn’t heard the doctor tell me that my baby was perfect and trucking along perfectly.
He only had the vision of me getting kicked in the stomach as hard as could be, then hearing about me losing the baby later that night. He didn’t want to believe that the pill I’d taken to help me sleep had caused the miscarriage.
I didn’t blame him.
I had no proof.
Only a mother’s intuition.
The deep-seated knowledge that his mother had a part in it.
When I’d gotten that soccer scholarship and left, he’d resented the sport ever since.
He blamed soccer for my not being here.
He blamed soccer for the death of our child.
He blamed soccer for the loss of our relationship.
I didn’t blame him.
I mean, it was the reason we were apart so much.
His life was here. His veterinary practice was here. His family. His friends. His club. All of it was here.
My family. My friends. My life. All of it was here, too.
