He was silent for a while before he spoke. ‘I need to feel like I’m enough for you.’
I bit back my first response, which was to fling myself at him and tell him that of course he was, he was more than I could ever, ever deserve. ‘Will you tell me what that means? What that looks like?’
‘I need to be able to hold your hand in public,’ he said. ‘I need to be able to kiss you where people can see. I – I don’t want to be in the closet with you, Fiona. I need you to be able to introduce me to people and saythis is my partner, notI can explain.’
Oh shit. That was what I’d said to Michelle the night she’d caught us beside the bins, wasn’t it?
‘I know I’m younger than you,’ he went on. ‘And I know how I look, with the glasses and the hair and the pins – like I’m not… not a serious person. But I am serious, Fiona. I’m so serious about you, and I don’t want you to – I need you not to hide me away.’
I closed my eyes. ‘Oh, Satoshi,’ I said. ‘Satoshi, I’m so sorry.’
He let out a long breath. ‘No, I’m sorry,’ he said quietly. ‘I understand why you need to – that it’s complicated, with the kids, and—’
‘No, no, that’s not what I mean.’ I opened them again. ‘I’m so sorry I made you feel that way. Like I was… ashamed of you.’
I kissed his knuckles again. ‘Because I’m not,’ I said. ‘Yes, I’ve been worried about what people would say, but not because of you. Because of me.Look at Fiona, hooking up with someone way out of her league. She’s just going to get her heart broken again, because there’s no way someone like her can be what someone like him needs.And…’
I wanted to close my eyes while I said what I had to say next, but I made myself keep them open. I owed him that much. ‘And they might not be wrong. I might not have been wrong either, the other night. Even if we tell the whole world about us, I don’t know if I can give you what you need.’
‘What I need isyou, Fiona.’ It was Satoshi’s turn to kiss my hand. ‘Just you.’
‘But can I really make you happy?’
I pulled my hand away and crossed my legs under me so we weren’t touching. If he touched me, I might melt, and I needed to be strong. This was not the kind of thing that could be fixed with a conversation, a few words that could paper over a misunderstanding and make it all right. He had put his heart in my hands, and I had a responsibility to treat it with care and respect.
‘You deserve the very best, Satoshi,’ I said. ‘You deserve someone who can make you their whole world, who can meet you on your level, and I just – can’t. The boundaries of my world were set a long time ago. And I… I know you want kids, and I – I really don’t know if I can do that again.’
He opened his mouth to respond, but I held up a finger. ‘I know what you’re going to say. It doesn’t matter, that you want me anyway, but—’
‘No, actually.’
I blinked.
‘I was going to say,’ he said, ‘that this is why I fell in love with you.’
He carded his fingers through Yquem’s golden hair. ‘Your first instinct, always, is kindness. To put the needs of everyone around you before your own. I should have anticipated this, really – that you’d try and break up with me for my own good.’
Yquem mewed, nuzzling her head into his hand. He scratched behind her ear. ‘If you won’t be selfish, then I will. I want you, Fiona. I love you. And we are going to be together, because I’m going to be miserable if we’re not, which will probably mean me working myself to death – and you wouldn’t want that, would you?’
My laugh was short, sharp, surprised.
‘This is where you say, “It’s your bar, Satoshi”,’ he said, winking. ‘?“You’re the boss.”?’
‘It’s not that simple, though.’ I let out a long breath. ‘The kids thing. That’s not just going to go away.’
‘Where has this come from?’ He nudged me gently with his knee. ‘We’ve never talked about kids.’
‘Kieran. I went to him for a massage – long story – and he told me.’ I bit my lip. ‘I’ve been too scared to ask you about it. I love being with you so much, and I was terrified of your answer.’
‘I get it.’ His voice was soft. ‘I’ve been terrified to tell you how I really feel about you. How much I love you. I’ve been so frightened that if I let it slip before you were ready to hear it, I’d scare you away.’
‘I love you too.’ I bit my lip again, tasting blood. ‘But I can’t promise I’ll ever be ready for another baby. And if you really want kids, Satoshi… I can’t take that away from you.’
‘What I really want isyou.’ He nudged me again, more emphatically this time. ‘You want a relationship non-negotiable? That’s it, Fiona. It has to be you. Nothing else matters.’
Yquem sprang off Satoshi’s lap as he reached out to me. ‘I do want kids,’ he said, taking my hand again. ‘But the idea of them being biologicallymine– that wasn’t important when I thought I’d have them with Kieran, and it’s not important now either. I adore your kids. I’d do anything for them. And if there was a future where you’d let me be some kind of parent to them, I would love them just as much as if I’d been there the day they were born.’
My eyes filled with tears.
