Page 66 of The Comedown

Never? Before he made that big of a decision, he didn’t even consider the idea of having children?

“Do you think you’ll ever get married?”

He lifts his fist to his mouth, biting the ring on his thumb.

Is that a yes?

“What if your wife wants kids?” I don’t know why my voice rises or why I’m pushing this. It’s his decision. It’s his wife. His. Wife.

Assuming he lives long enough to get one.

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Do you want more kids?”

“Yes,” I say automatically, and his head whips back like he was just in a car accident.

“Then why haven’t you?”

And now I feel like I’m the one in the crash.

I push out of my seat, going over to the floor-to-ceiling window. “I wanted more kids. It’s probably not going to happen now.”

“Why? Because you’re not married?”

I wasn’t married to Bodee when I got pregnant with Holter, but I wasn’t trying to get pregnant then. I was just young and stupid. Two things I’m not anymore.

“Because…” Because I haven’t found anyone I even like enough for a second date, let alone tie my life to by making a baby with. Because I’m constantly traveling and any spare moment I have goes to the child I’m already failing. Because I. Because I. Because I. “Because I’ll be thirty-four in September,” I say, settling on the one reason that isn’t my own doing.

I should’ve considered my words more carefully before answering Julian. It’s just…I have always wanted more kids. Ever since I was one myself, I’ve dreamed of having a houseful of kids. Then my parents surprised me with tickets to that Bodee Keys concert for my sixteenth birthday and my life took a sharp left turn on to the road that ultimately led me here today. I haven’t taken my foot off the gas once and that’s why I don’t have more children. Because I’ve been too busy outrunning my past to even consider my future.

Now I’m on the cusp of thirty-four with zero romantic prospects and even less of a chance of slowing down to find one. The truth is I wouldn’t know how to have more kids while touring still. Touring is all I know how to do, so I try to make sure I do it really fucking well. It’s why I’m such a failure as a mother.

I catch the tears clinging to my bottom lashes with a knuckle.

“So what? There’s some kind of cut-off?”

“What?” I spin around, finding Julian’s watchful eye trained on me. “Oh, um, not exactly a cut-off. For women, having kids past their thirties can be…riskier, I guess. In some cases, anyway. Pregnancies have the potential to be more complicated the older a woman gets.” It’s not just Hollywood trying to tell me I’m old, it’s science, too. At only thirty-two, women’s chances of getting pregnant already start to decrease.

Just one more example of how double standards rule over our entire fucking existence.

“Would you even want to get married again? Or did Bodee—”

“Bodee was no husband.”

“He was yours.” Julian’s voice is low and gritty, like worn sandpaper that can still rub you raw at just the right angle.

“For one day.” Which was one too many.

“Long enough to get you pregnant.”

“Me having kids has never been, and will never be, dependent on if I’m married or not. That’s an outdated belief that I didn’t even buy into back then.” I’d like to be married again one day, and I’d like to have more kids, but neither concept is reliant on the other. Even separately, they’re unrealistic. Together? I won’t be holding my breath, not when I have sold-out concerts to perform in.

“But then…”

“I was pregnant before the wedding. That’s why we moved the date up, so the pictures wouldn’t show my growing belly,” I relay exactly like I’ve done numerous times before.