A New Hope (Thunder Point #8)(88)

“Of having a baby?”

“Of having a life I wasn’t right for! Of eventually being held captive on a farm with a bunch of kids, shunned by the Basque women because I can’t cook or sew or grow anything! Of never having any fun again because your idea of fun and mine were completely opposite and it just felt...” She lifted her chin a notch. “It felt like the end. To me it felt like the end. But since I did it I’ve felt nothing but grief and regret and I don’t know how to fix it.”

“I told you not living on the farm was okay,” he said. “We decided not having a bunch of kids was okay. I said that was my work but didn’t have to be yours.”

“You said, but you didn’t mean it,” she said. “You didn’t have time for me, for our life. And we were always at the farm for family things, family things all the time. And the family, they made me feel stupid and out of place and awkward. They never liked me. Your words were all about, ‘It’s okay, honey, whatever you want,’ unless I wanted to go dancing or out to dinner or to a party my friends were throwing or to brunch at the Monaco or to a concert at Roy’s. Does this woman you want to marry by Christmas fit in? Because if she doesn’t, you should warn her before she does something that hurts so much.”

She started to cry.

She’s right, he thought. He’d always talked a good game but his life was the farm and the family and he secretly, deep down, thought she’d come around. If she never fell in love with his work she’d at least fully understand his love of it.

He reached over and gave her chair a tug, pulling her closer to him. “Come here,” he said. “Tell me what hurts so much,” he asked softly.

“God,” she said. “You think I didn’t want us to live happily ever after? You think I wanted to have an abortion? I couldn’t keep spending Sunday at the farm in my best clothes, my best, the clothes that all the girls on campus envy, only to have your mother and family speak Spanish or whatever that is in the kitchen and laugh, your brothers and their wives shake their heads like I was some stupid child, to have you put me in a fireman’s carry to get me across the barnyard...” She sniffed and wiped at her tears. “I thought maybe I’d be able to figure it out someday, that maybe it would grow on me and I’d start to enjoy the same things, though it wasn’t looking good for that. And then what happens? Married less than a year and I get pregnant!”

He felt his mouth go dry. “You couldn’t talk to me?” he asked.

She laughed through her tears. “Matt, you always said, ‘okay, fine.’ Then you did what you wanted. I said those family dinners were awful for me and you said, fine, we won’t do so many. And we went just as often. I said I didn’t want to be a farm wife and you said, fine, you don’t have to be—but you were at the farm twelve hours a day, sometimes seven days a week. And if you had a day off, which you hardly ever did, we never did what I wanted to do.”

“Never?” he asked.

“Hardly,” she said. “But that’s not the point. I couldn’t talk to you because I already knew what you’d say. You’d say, that’s great! And tell your family and everyone and then disappear into the trees again. And I’d be alone. Then I’d be alone with a child I wasn’t ready to have. I knew eventually you’d get me on this damn farm! Turn me into a drudge.”

“Wait,” he said. “George’s wife isn’t a farm wife—she’s a physical therapist and has a career.”

“And she wasn’t at all the family dinners, either. She was busy. She made her own life, but George stayed on the farm. I wasn’t sure I could do what Lori did— Lori’s so smart and independent and no one ever rolled their eyes at her.” She wiped her cheeks. “But I loved you. So much.”

He smiled sympathetically. He was guilty as charged. He had ignored her complaints and hoped she’d get over them. He’d married a prissy model and his mother had thought he’d lost his mind. He kept bringing her back to the farm even though she didn’t like the landscape, the people or the food. The truth was—he didn’t want to go dancing. He didn’t give a shit about brunch at the Monaco and thought modeling was shallow and a waste of time.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I think I wasn’t a very good husband.”

“But...did you ever love me?” she asked.

“Oh-ho,” he said, laughing. “I loved you like a freight train! You knocked me out. And I didn’t want you to be any different, either. I wanted you to be just exactly the way you are. But I think you’re right about me—my expectations were unfair. You couldn’t be the way you are with me or with my family. I’m sorry. I thought I was ready to be a good husband. And maybe you thought so, too.”

“Are you ready now?” she asked. “Because if you’re ready now...”

“Natalie, we made a mistake. We had some good chemistry but that was the beginning and end of it. Everything else we faced as a couple? We couldn’t handle it. We were too different. We’ll always be too different.”

“But now that we know...”

“Now that we know, we have a chance to be smarter the next time around, but I’m afraid not with each other. I’m in love with someone else now.” He gestured over his shoulder. “See this RV? I think we’re going to live in it while I build a house right over there. An RV, just like all those gypsies in the Lacoumette family.” He shook his head. “You don’t want me or my life. And, for what it’s worth, I still think you’re the most beautiful girl in the world. But that won’t make it work.”