A Xmas Gift: The Sperm Donor (8 page)

I’ve had enough of this so-called relationship. Break up with me. Go on. Tell Daddy it was all your idea.

Abby stares at him. Tears spool from her eyes.

“I love you, Justin. I love you so much, can’t you see that?”

His chest constricts. “Abby . . . you are smothering me. I can’t do anything without you tailing me. You’re even having me followed, for Chrissake. You’re violating my privacy . . . who I am.”

“I want you so badly, Justin. I need you. I can’t live without you. Please, please come back to me. I can’t live with this woman and this . . . this child in your life. We can get married. I can give you lots of children. We’ll be so happy, you’ll see!”

His heart sinks. She’s never going to break up with him, he knows that now. Her love for him is real, and heartbreaking, and bordering on obsession. He also can see now that he can’t live with a woman who loves him as obsessively as Abby does. He can’t live with a woman who makes him the center of her universe – whose happiness will flourish and wane at his every word, his every deed. He can’t live with a woman whose sole existence of living is because of him.

I can’t bear to have that responsibility.

His guts are wrenching with the realization of knowing what he has to do.

“Abby,” he says gently, “we can’t be together anymore. I can’t live like this.”

The blow that hits her face is almost physical. She actually quails.

“No, don’t say that.”

“It’s true, Abby. I can’t live with you like this, not trusting me, keeping tabs on me wherever I go. I’m not happy. I haven’t been happy for a long time, and I couldn’t put a finger on it . . . but now I can. I can’t be with you.”

“No!” Her voice is so broken that he winces. It’s a soul being torn into half.

“You love me too much, but I’m a trophy to you to show off to your friends. It’s not like I’m a real person. I can’t live like that, Abby. And you can’t either. It’s not fair to either of us.”

The tears are pouring down her tormented face. Her shoulders are slumped. She’s actually cowering like a prisoner who has been repeatedly rained with punches. His heart almost rips to see her like this – because he does care about her. Even loves her in his manner – though not in the obsessive manner she craves – but he knows it has to be done.

He could never live with himself if he allowed this façade to continue.

She keeps muttering “No, no, no, no” over and over.

He slowly moves to sit beside her on the couch. After a while, he puts a tentative hand on the small of her back.

“I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you.”

Her face is covered by her hands. She is shaking like a fragile leaf.

“You can’t break up with me,” she says, the desperation clear in her voice. “You can’t.”

He pauses. Then he says, “Do you want me to drive you home?”

“No.”

“Do you want me to call someone? A . . . friend?”

She shakes her head again.

He lets her cry like this for a long, long time. He doesn’t move, just continues to stroke her back. Outside, the darkness descends upon the lounge like a harbinger of things to come. Sunset at three thirty in the afternoon. What an awful winter.

Finally she says in a dead voice, “I want to go home.”

“I’ll take you.”

He takes her silence for assent.

Moving around laboriously, they gather her things and exit the apartment like a coda.

13

Breaking up with Abby had been harder than he thought.

It was complicated how he felt for her. He did love her, though he wasn’t exactly in love with her. He didn’t have that overwhelming, omnipresent, head-over-heels feeling that he did when he was in love with Elise – back when they were teenagers. He did care a lot about Abby, and he hated having to hurt her.

But it was necessary, he keeps telling himself. Painful but necessary. He couldn’t go on a minute longer living like he did.

Looking back, he realizes now that he was deluding himself, thinking he could have a real relationship with Abby. Some men might be cut out for that kind of relationship, but he isn’t. He had thought it would be one of those relationships where love would grow over time. It had been instantaneous for her, of course. She had fallen violently in love with him at first sight, and that love had sharpened its razor edge to border upon dependency. Her insecurities took over, and the more he tried to loosen the ties that bound them, the more she clung on to them.

I did the right thing
, he assures himself.

His cellphone buzzes. He looks at the display, half-afraid it might be Abby.

It’s not. It’s Elise’s London SIM number.

“Hi,” she says brightly.

“Hi.”

“I just thought of something. I called the clinic, and asked them if you could jerk off in a more conducive environment . . . like your apartment. They said no problem, and – ”

“Elise, I broke up with Abby.”

Silence.

“Justin, I didn’t mean – ”

“No, it didn’t have anything to do with you.” Even as he said it, Justin realizes that it’s not totally true. Elise’s return had made him see with stark clarity what was real and what wasn’t. “It was between Abby and me.”

More silence.

“I’m sorry.”

He heaves a long-drawn sigh. “I can’t talk. I’m driving.”

And so he was. The dark highways stretch out ahead of him. He’s going nowhere in particular, driving around in circles. From Brent Cross to Westfield in Shepherd’s Bush. From Petticoat Lane to the hallowed walls of St. Pancras Station. As much as he told himself he didn’t really love Abby, it hurt. It hurt him to have to hurt her.

And he did care very much for her. Their relationship did mean something, even if it was not all they had hoped it would be.

“Do you want some company?” Elise asks.

He hesitates for a long time before saying, “OK.”

14

The pub in Knightsbridge is crowded and noisy. They are huddled in one corner, perched upon high stools. Their glasses and more than a few bottles are placed on the high table between them.

Justin’s shoulders are slumped. His rich chestnut hair is in disarray. A few tufts stick out here and there, and his cheeks are ruddy. But he still looks carelessly marvelous. Elise notices several women glancing over in his direction for more than a few times.

She’s not sorry he has broken up with Abby, of course. It’s for his own good. Abby was getting too possessive, too smothering, too overpowering. Elise would never want to see her ex-boyfriend, whom she once loved deeply, fall into a trap with someone who won’t let him breathe.

But she doesn’t say anything about Abby to him, of course. No point rubbing salt into an already festering wound.

She just let him talk all night. And she listened. He talked some more, and she listened.

“Justin,” she says gently, taking hold of his bunched fist below the table. “You’ve had enough. It’s time to go home now.”

“Can’t drive,” he slurs.

He’s right. She can, but she only knows how to drive on the wrong side of the road. For this country, that is.

“I’ll call you a cab,” she says.

For answer, his head droops over his neck, and he almost collapses on the table.

She takes hold of his shoulder and shakes him. “Justin?”

He tries to rouse himself, but he has trouble keeping his head up. She sighs.

She can’t leave him alone like this.

*

She has no idea where he lives. Correction: she has some idea, but she doesn’t have his address, and in his state, he is incoherent. She is not direction-equipped to drive in London anyway. So she takes him via taxi to the only place she knows – her inn.

She helps him past the reception, just glad to be out of the cold. He has not dressed right for the wintry weather. He is merely clad in a Burberry overcoat, the only outer later item he has brought with him. Underneath this, he wears only a black wifebeater and jeans.

The South Asian Indian receptionist smiles.

“Need help getting him to your room, Miss?” he inquires.

She’s a slight girl and Justin is a tall man. Already, he feels like deadweight with his right arm slung across her shoulders. He is barely standing up.

“Yes, please.”

Together, they half-drag, half-carry Justin to her warm little room on the second floor. The inn is actually a series of townhouses whose adjoining walls have been knocked down and made into one continuous building. As a result, there are plenty of steps everywhere. She did have to drag her suitcase all the way up two flights of stairs when she arrived, seeing as there are no elevators.

Once in the room, they flop Justin onto her double bed.

“I’ll take it from here. Thanks,” she says to the receptionist. She fishes in her wallet and gives him five pounds in coins.

“Thank you, Ms.”

“No. Thank
you
.”

“If you need any help at all, just call me.” He indicates the sleeping form of Justin.

“Thanks again.”

She waits till he has shut the door firmly behind him, and then she turns back to the prostrate form of Justin. He’s sleeping soundly, snoring a little.

God, but he’s still beautiful.

Sighing, she starts to take off his shoes and socks. He wears Gucci loafers, she notes. He has certainly come up in the world of dressing since she had known him. With difficulty, she eases off his overcoat. She unbuckles his belt – also Gucci – and slips it off his slim waist. She debates whether to undress him any further.

You’ve seen everything he has to offer.

Yeah, but he was a boy then. He is now a man. More powerfully built than ever. Some things might even have improved, she thinks in chagrin.

She settles for taking off his top and his jeans. He’s only clad in his underwear now – a pair of white briefs with a crotch that ill conceals his obvious bulge. She roams her eyes over the planes of his body. The hard muscles of his abdomen, the sculptured chest, the erotically pointed nipples. He is still a work of art.

Why did she ever let him go?

Oh yes, she realizes it now. She was missing him away at Princeton. She was young. Restless. Foolish. The farther away he was, the more her mind drifted. She had thought she could find someone else who would stay in Arizona. She had thought she could find someone else who was less likely to wander elsewhere for the sake of his ambition.

But she also knew she couldn’t contain Justin. He was too smart. Too destined for bigger things.

She covers him with the blanket. The room is warm from the old-fashioned radiator – a white metal grill that emanates heat and a soft gurgling sound of liquid. So different from the gas burners they have back home. Then she undresses down to her brassiere and panties, and gets into bed beside him. The bed is queen-sized, and it’s an uncomfortable fit. But his flesh is warm and comforting, and with her back to his back, she manages to find an equilibrium.

She lies awake in the dark, fully conscious of his nearness – his warm, breathing form. She lies awake for a long, long time, thinking of the times they had together. His kisses. His melting, hazel eyes as he gazes at her. The feel of his arms around her. The crush of his body above hers as he moves with her as one.

She thinks of what is to be – when his child is finally conceived within her. She pictures the three of them together at the child’s birth. Herself in a hospital bed, clutching the child.

She would never impose upon him, no matter what his circumstances are. The contract he signed does not permit that.

She finally falls asleep, dreaming half-dreams that are not meant to be.

15

Elise is awoken by Justin stirring in the wee hours of the morning. His arm flails out and touches her body. They are both tucked in very cozily.

“Elise,” he murmurs, and she doesn’t know whether he’s fully awake or he’s still dreaming. But he’s saying her name and not Abby’s.

“Justin?” She sits up. She debates whether or not to switch on the tiny lamp.

For answer, he rolls over her and presses his body onto hers. Her pulse flutters at her neck, and she wonders if she should stop this. His mouth searches for hers in the dark and he finds it quickly. His lips latch onto hers, devouring her mouth with passion. He tastes of the three glasses of Scotch he has downed.

He kisses and kisses her with mounting urgency. He deepens each kiss, tongue twisting upon tongue, imbibing her scent, plumbing her depths. She finds herself responding as only a warm-blooded woman can. His hands grope her arms, her forearms, her breasts still encased in her bra.

She should really stop him before he gets too far.

Before he does anything he will regret.

“Justin?” She tries to push him away, but she’s helpless to move him. He’s a big, strapping man more than twice her weight. It occurs to her how fragile she really is.