by A. M. Gilbert

Created on: August 01, 2011   Last Updated: August 07, 2011

"So this is awkward." He says it with a laugh, as if he thinks he can make things okay with a joke and a wink. She knows better, so she doesn't react. He clears his throat and tries again. "Yeah. Awkward." Still nothing. “Kind of like when you had one too many at Pete's Christmas party and went on that mistletoe rampage? Man, I will never forget his grandma's -"

"What is wrong with you?" She says it quietly, slowly, but there's no mistaking the hurt in her tone, and now he's the speechless one. "John, you... you can't fix this by ignoring it.”
“And what if I don’t want to fix it?” He knows that she won’t know what to say back so he turns on the radio and fixes his eyes on the road. This tactic lasts for all of thirty seconds before he cuts the volume and sighs. “I just don’t know what to do, Ash. I love you. You know that, don’t you?”
“Yeah.Yeah, I know.”
“I want to marry you. I want to be with you for the rest of forever. But I don’t want...” He trails off, unwilling to verbalize it again.
“But I do! God, I do. That’s the next step. That’s how we keep growing. First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Ashley with the baby carriage.” He can hear the decidedly adult longing even as she recites the childish rhyme. And his heart breaks for her and for him and for everything he knows he’s about to give up. He wishes he had made this stupid trip alone and wishes he hadn’t let her spend so much time with his brother’s kid; but he didn’t.
“I can’t ask you to not be a mother for me.”
She makes a strangled sound that’s something between a snort and a groan and a scoff. “How noble. But I can’t not be a mother for you anyway.”
“So this is it, then?”
“That’s up to you.”
He nods but steadfastly looks forward. More than anything, this just hurts.

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