Page 48 of With This Lie

“No, it’s okay, I can appreciate the question.” I pause for a moment, collecting my thoughts. “The truth is a bit more complicated. But the honest answer is a few and none. And I know what you’re thinking. But what I mean is, yes, I’ve seen other women, but none like Dani,” I say.

Charlotte squints at me again and her expression is stone cold. She turns to Dani. “Dani, my love, can you give us just a moment? I need to speak with him alone. About your birthday too,” Charlotte says.

Dani hesitates for a few moments. I grab her hand beneath the table and squeeze it. I smile at her. She gets up and walks to the entrance of the courtyard.

“Listen, Lucas. You seem like a very nice man but I’m just a little confused. You and I both know a married man would never be meeting the mother of a woman he’s seeing on the side. Let alone making a forty-five-minute drive north to meet one in prison. Come on, what gives?” she asks. She pulls no punches. Just like her daughter.

“I mean, I don’t really know what to say, I just like her.” I offer. I think I’m starting to sweat. My tongue feels thick and everything is sticky. She’s staring at me and she’s calling me out and I feel like the collar of my shirt is rapidly tightening.

“Married men don’t leave their wives, Lucas. So you’re either stringing Dani along or you’re entertaining an idea you’re never going to have the guts to go through with, but either way my Dani gets hurt and I can’t allow that.” She crosses her arms on the table in front of her and shifts her weight forward. Somehow it feels like she’s towering over me despite being smaller than me in every way.

“Well, it’s a little more complicated than that, ma’am, I um…”

She cuts me off. “Don’t call me ma’am. I’m Charlotte. And you’re not good for my daughter. Now I don’t know what’s happened but for whatever reason she seems to have fallen for you. She doesn’t do that, which makes it even worse. Because you’re going to leave.”

“Look, I mean no disrespect, but you don’t know my intentions,” I say.

“Oh yeah? Look, I know this game. Let me tell you a little story, Lucas. My first John was a married man. I fell in love with him despite the warnings I received. I fell hard. He said he loved me too. He said he was going to leave his wife for me. And you know what happened? I got pregnant with Dani. And guess what? I never heard from him again. So don’t tell me about intentions. Don’t tell me about what men plan to do and what married men want. Because you all want the same thing. You want to have your cake and eat it too,” she says. She sits back and smiles, I assume for Dani’s sake.

“I don’t know what to say,” I say.

“You don’t have to say anything. Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to give my baby girl a birthday to remember because she’s never had one. You’re going to make it the very best you can because I can’t. And she deserves it. And you’ll go on for a time and then you’ll end it because it’s what you planned on doing anyway. But do it sooner rather than later, Lucas. For her sake. Don’t let her fall too much further. Don’t make healing be any harder than it already will be,” she says.

I nod my head because I don’t know what else to do. Charlotte straightens up and I feel Dani’s hand on my shoulder. I put a smile on quickly and shift my body language to try to feel more positive.

We finish our visit and Dani hugs her mother. I shake Charlotte’s hand again and she squeezes it—a reminder of the private conversation we’d just had. Dani and I walk back to the car in silence, holding hands. She has her head on my shoulder and I can tell she’s a little bit sad to be leaving her mother. We reach the car and get in.

“Well?” she asks.

“Well what?” I ask.

“What did she want to talk to you about?”

“Oh she was just being motherly. Just intentions and your birthday. You know,” I lie.

Dani looks and me and tilts her head. I try smiling to ease her worry, but she looks like she can see through me.

“I don’t believe you,” she says.

“Really, it was nothing, I promise,” I say. I reach over and kiss her lips then turn and start the car. I back out and we start our drive back to the city.

There are more patches of silence on the ride back. Both of us are in our separate clouds of thoughts for most of the drive. I steal glances of Dani staring out the window and I leave her alone to think about her mother. I know what it must be like to miss her the way she does.

And I’m left alone to think about Charlotte’s words.

In so many ways, she’s right. I’m not good for Dani. Or good enough for that matter. I hate myself for that. I hate myself for lying to her. I hate myself for this lie. What have I done?

I look over at Dani again and realize all I had ever wanted to do was make her happy, see her laugh. I think of the first time I heard her laugh. I think about how I told myself I’d do anything to hear it again. How I wanted to be the source of it. Now, I have to come to terms with the fact that I would be the source of her pain. I was going to make her hurt. How would I live with myself after such a thing?

Maybe her mother is right. Maybe sooner would be better. Maybe it would be easier in some ways. Maybe it would hurt a little less.

We pull up in front of Dani’s apartment and I put the car in park.

She turns to look at me. “I’m sorry,” she says.

I shake my head. “What for?”

“For my mother. For what she said, how she acted,” she says.