by his admission, Anne looked at the man she had once thought of as the love of her life. It took her more than a moment to find her tongue.
“You know, over the last dozen years, I must have imagined this scene a hundred different ways. The only thing all those scenes had in common, besides your apology, was that I always felt relieved when I heard you apologize. I felt somehow vindicated.
“But I’m not vindicated, not relieved,” she told him with feeling. “I’m just...sad, I guess. Sad about all the years in between that were lost. Why did you leave like that?”
Dan shook his head. That was something he didn’t want to get into. It was a secret he would most likely take to his grave rather than burden someone else with.
“I didn’t have a choice,” was all he allowed himself to say.
Anne frowned ever so slightly. That excuse just didn’t hold any water for her. “Everyone always has a choice,” she told him.
“I didn’t,” he replied.
There had to be more, something he wasn’t telling her. “But—”
Dan changed the subject. “I also wanted to tell you that I’m happy for you.”
For a moment, still trying to understand what Danny wasn’t telling her, she was caught off guard. His last words completely confused her.
“What did you say?”
“I said I’m happy for you,” Danny repeated. “Happy that you’ve moved on. That you found someone you cared about and got married. That you went on to have a beautiful daughter.”
She’s your beautiful daughter, she thought, an unexpected wave of anger filling her.
Anne continued staring at him. “You’re happy for me,” she repeated in disbelief, like someone who didn’t quite understand the gist of the words she was saying.
Dan nodded, forcing a smile to his lips. “Yes, I am.”
Did he even have a clue how much it stung to hear him say that to her? How much it actually physically tore her apart?
Why didn’t you come back to me? Why didn’t you show up on my doorstep years ago and tell me that you couldn’t bear to live without me? Why did you just vanish out of my life without a trace, leaving me to face being pregnant all by myself?
But she couldn’t say any of that, couldn’t risk him knowing the truth, at least not yet. Perhaps not ever. There were other people to consider.
So, instead, she asked, “Where were you all these years?”
Anne struggled to keep the accusation out of her voice, doing her best to sound like just an old friend trying to catch up with another old friend instead of a spurned lover who’d given her heart away and had it torn in two more than a decade ago.
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