Thirteen Crucifixions,91

“Are we there yet?”

            “Almost.”

            “Richard’s parents live in a very nice neighbourhood.”

            “Turn left on Trimble.”

            “When did she get here, anyway?”

            “Less than two weeks ago.  She’s eight months pregnant.”

            “She already has a kid?”

            “Almost three.  A little girl.”

            This was still a hard topic between Carol and Derek.  He knew only that she’d said she was pregnant, and had lied about it in order to get rid of him.  He knew nothing about the abortion.   She still felt guilty.  She felt that she should tell him.  How should she tell him?  How could she?  But tell him she must.

            ‘Derek?”

            “Yes.”

            “I actually was pregnant, you know.  I didn’t lie to you about it.”

            “What?”

            “I didn’t tell you till, till after I ended it.”

            “You ended it?”

            “Yes.”

            “Thank God.”

            “You’re not mad?”

            “I’m mad with relief.”

            “What?  That I’ve finally told you the truth?”

            “No.”

            “That I ended it.”

            “Yes.”

            “It was the only way I felt we could finish things.  Everything just felt so out of control between us.”

            “It’s just as well, I guess.”

            “So, then, you understand.”

            “What’s there to understand?  I love you.”

            “Still?”

            “That’s a bit of a burden for me, you know.”

            “It’s a burden for us.”

            “We love each other differently.”

            “We love each other.”

            “Differently.”

            “It’s all love.”

            “Third house on the right.”

            “Is she going to live here?”

            “It appears that way. I’ve already spent quite a lot of time with her.”

            “What’s she like?”

            “Insufferable.  Spoiled little rich girl.  Snooty, imperious, puts on airs.  And her English is without blemish.”

            “What are you going to do about her?

            “I wish I knew.  She seems to have made some sort of claim on me.  We’ve shared Richard in common.  I suppose there’s something to that.”

            “Hey Carol?”

            “Yes?”

            “There’s something I want to tell you.  Later.”  How could he tell her?  He could scarcely tell himself.  In the last twenty minutes he had decided something that had already been decided for him.  He had only to accept.  For years and years and years he had resisted, had run fleeing from this choice that had been already made for him, this that he had been chosen for.  He had already phoned Anne, from the café, to end their relationship.  She was cool but accepting; he even thought he’d heard relief in her voice.  That was the first step.  And the next?  Well, to tell Carol, but what to tell her?  He knew that he wasn’t going to marry her?  Matrimony was nowhere in his future.   But neither were women?  Celibacy.  A life without sex.  Maybe.  Why not?  Yes.  In twenty minutes he had actually learned that he hated sex—no, not hated, but that it wasn’t for him.  He had only abused it.  He had utterly corrupted and defiled something that was sacred and beautiful.  He was not entitled to it.  He never had been.  Was this he?  Thinking these thoughts?  Who, what had been thinking through him?  Something or someone very different from whom or whatever had previously been thinking through him.  He was also leaving his job.  Carol returned to the car with a pregnant dark-haired young woman trailing a toddler behind her.  Introductions were made, and Derek, while focussing on driving safely through the cold rainy night struggled valiantly to not lose any of his gains of this past half hour.