Almost Mine Read online

  Warning

  This book contains adult language and themes, including graphic descriptions of sexual acts which some may find offensive. It is intended for mature readers only, of legal age to possess such material in their area.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is purely coincidental.

  Almost Mine

  ©2014 by Eden Winters

  Cover Art by P.D. Singer

  Edited by P.D. Singer

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without written permission of the author, except as brief quotations as in the case of reviews.

  First edition 2014

  Rocky Ridge Books

  PO Box 6922

  Broomfield, CO 80021

  www.RockyRidgeBooks.com

  Love and hugs to my amazing creative team: Feliz Faber, P.D. Singer, Z. Allora, Lynda B., D.H. Starr, Will Parkinson, and John, who helped form the incoherent thoughts in my head into a readable story. Y’all are the best.

  Almost Mine

  Eden Winters

  Almost Mine

  “Just go see Dad, okay?” Bobby, excuse me, Bob (can’t have a doctor named “Bobby,” now can we? Though to me he’ll always be Little Bobby) stared at me with the same puppy dog eyes once employed to con me out of cookies. Now he tried to con my sanity from me.

  “And why should I?” I huffed a breath into my tea to hide my agitation. Anyone else I’d tell to go fuck themselves. Even with my hardhearted reputation in a courtroom, I’d never say those words to my child.

  Something flickered in Bob’s blue eyes, hidden when he shifted his gaze to stare down at the table. “He’s… he’s not doing too well.”

  My resolve to not give a damn wavered. “Is he sick?”

  “No. Not sick. He’s just… not really happy these days, I guess. Nothing physically wrong.” Bob shrugged. “Just… not right.”

  Oh, not sick, just unhappy. I’d stopped giving a damn (or pretended to) the moment Bob’s other father had waltzed out of my life, giving up a comfortable life with me to go find himself or some such. Good luck with that. “I don’t see how his well-being is my concern, since he obviously wants nothing to do with me.” I pulled my bitterness tightly around me. It provided no warmth, but we’d become inseparable companions of late.

  For an aspiring doctor, my son argued better than many attorneys of my acquaintance, presenting hard evidence. “He’s still your husband.”

  And for the life of me I couldn’t recall why. I kept telling myself that the next week I’d file the necessary papers—as I’d done every day for the past two years. “A technicality easily enough resolved.” Time to break apart the Sanders-Robinson hyphenation and become Ian Sanders and Travis Robinson once more. The product of twenty years of my dream life sat across the table from me, waiting to pounce on my words. Part of my dream had included Travis and I enjoying another twenty or thirty years of affluent empty-nesting. Talk about a rude awakening—that future was gone, and for reasons I’d not worked out. Over and done. Time to move on.

  Until now I’d convinced myself I simply didn’t want to have to change my name on my driver’s license and passport, and that’s why I hadn’t officially ended my marriage. I’d never quite gotten the knack of believing my own lies.

  Our son—yes, he’d always be our son, not Travis’s, not mine—gasped at my words. Whatever’d held his attention on the table seemed forgotten in favor of skewering me with his dagger-sharp gaze. “You’d divorce him?”

  I set my cup down, lest he notice the trembling in my fingers. “I should have long before now. You know it. I know it. He wants no part of me.” The twisting behind my sternum must’ve been indigestion. Perhaps I’d eaten my baguette a bit too fast.

  The conversation died, awkwardness casting a pall over our breakfast. Snippets of conversation floated our way from nearby tables in the café. Across the aisle two thirtyish men sat with a young boy of about seven. They tried to project a casual air of good friends, but I knew what to look for. One man spread jam on the child’s bagel, while the other wiped a butter smear from a chubby cheek. A family, enjoying breakfast before sending Junior off to school.

  If time suddenly turned back, that image of domesticity would have been Bob, Travis, and me, only Travis would’ve handled both butter and jam duties, allowing me to read my morning paper. What a well-oiled parenting machine we’d been. Only, he’d done the parenting. Neither he nor Bobby had seemed to mind the arrangement. Had I ever wiped butter from Bobby’s cheek, or smeared jam on bread? A sudden flash of envy spiked my heart. Oh great. Now I’ve turned into a jealous old man, missing his glory years.

  Watching a scene ripped straight from my past caused clouds to gather in the normally sunny eatery. Bob tapped his fingertips against the marble tabletop. Like two gunslingers in a Western movie, we each waited for the other to draw. Bob flinched first, as he always did when discussing his other father. But it wasn’t Bob that Travis had walked out on. Bob had been away at college when the fabric of our family unraveled. “You do know what tomorrow is, right?” my son finally ventured.

  How could I not remember a date that had set me back quite a few thousand dollars and replayed itself in my head on a far too regular basis? I might not tell Bob to mind his own business or lie to him outright, but evasive answers didn’t count as lying in my book. “Friday?”

  “Besides that.” When I didn’t waltz into his trap he snorted out a breath. “Your anniversary. Your twentieth anniversary.”

  “Eighteenth.” Eight if you counted the legal service. Travis and I had always celebrated on the anniversary of our original commitment ceremony and not the mad scramble we’d made to Massachusetts the moment they’d legalized same-sex marriage. The first event had been an act of love, the second, a desperate attempt for formal recognition before our fickle government changed its mind.

  “Really? I thought…”

  “The clock stopped when he walked out.” A scowl on the face of one of the nearby fathers chastised me into dropping my voice.

  Take a good look, buddy. This is what will happen to your family in a few years when your man decides he no longer needs you. I managed to keep my warning inside my head. No need to disillusion the coddled youngster with my cynicism.

  Instead I informed my son, “We might be legally married, but I stopped counting two years ago.” Stopped the clock, as though our marriage were a taxi cab, idling, waiting for the passengers to make up their minds and either get out or move on. I worked at a law firm. How easy to open the door, pay my fare, and end the ride, but yet here I remained, in limbo.

  “He’s got his career,” I added, “and probably doesn’t even have time for me.” There had been a time when he’d given up his passion to stay home and take care of me and Bob. I thought we’d be enough. Apparently, we weren’t.

  I’d planned a trip to Paris to mark our two decades together. Then Milan for the following year, and Hawaii after that… Now, instead of a fine meal in a star-bedecked restaurant in the City of Light, I’d likely eat a takeout sandwich in a cold and empty house, on just another day of work. Bright lights and applause had replaced his need for me.

  Bob returned to his tabletop fascination. “He’s not working.”

  What? “What do you mean he’s not working? He always works.” Recently Travis had taken a page from my book and become a workaholic, making up for lost time with any and all roles available to a man more suited for a curmudgeonly father than the hot romantic leads he’d played when we met.

  Hey, just because he no longer shared my bed didn’t mean I couldn’t keep a watchful eye on the man who bore my last name, did it? I’d even attended a few of his plays. Okay, I’d attended all of his plays, sitting
away from the stage and never, ever, clueing Bob in. A fifteen year hiatus while Travis had stayed home to raise Bob hadn’t damaged his acting skills. No matter if he played Hamlet or Polonius, he owned the stage. I’d become a groupie to my own husband.

  “You know how it is; there aren’t many good parts for a man his age. At least that’s what he says.” If Bob had been under interrogation on a witness stand, I’d have moved in for the kill. Nothing in my son’s statement spoke of truth. He couldn’t even meet my eyes while uttering those words.

  Travis had recently played a doting father in a peanut butter commercial so convincingly. Years of practice, I suppose. And now to say he can’t find roles. He’d been in My Fair Lady as Professor Higgins a few weeks ago. Or maybe a few months. Strange thing, time, how quickly it slid through the fingers.

  Bob dropped his pretenses when I didn’t make the suggestion he’d hoped, and took a more direct approach. “Please, Dad. I’m worried. Just go see him, okay?”

  Should I go? I weighed the pros and cons, the twisting in my chest worsening. What if my husband’s not working turned out to be something more than lack of opportunities? The hurt he’d caused whispered in my ear, See, he can’t make it without you—serves him right. Another part of me, the part that remembered the poor man pushing himself to the breaking point to nurse me and Bob through a horrible stomach bug said, Would seeing him be so bad?

  Actually, yes, it would. The man who was almost mine. But not quite.

  If I visited, maybe he’d tell me why he hadn’t filed for divorce, since my busy schedule didn’t allow much time to drop by one of the junior attorneys’ office for the ten long minutes it’d take to get the ball rolling.

  My curiosity alone made a visit worthwhile. Maybe seeing him, witnessing fizzling sparks where once an inferno raged between us, would get it through my thick head that what we had was over for good. And then what?

  Maybe it was time to admit defeat, to finally close the door on a failed romance once and for all. “I’ll go see him,” I said. For my son and my own peace of mind.

  ***

  This can’t be the right place. Another glance out of the car window didn’t improve the view. When had Travis moved to such a rundown neighborhood? What happened to that great little condo he’d leased uptown?

  “You have arrived at 550 Kennedy Street,” the navigation system confirmed. I found a parking space a few blocks away, in a slightly more secure area. With any luck, the owners of Travis’s dilapidated apartment complex were hard at work on renovations, starting with the inside—and my car would still be here, tires intact, when I returned.

  After stepping through the front door into the foyer of the building Bob insisted his father lived in, I amended my observation to: maybe the owners are renovating inside the apartments.

  The place fell somewhere between “dump” and “pigsty”. My meticulous husband couldn’t possibly live here. Some effort kept a disdainful curl from my lips. I’d promised a meeting—but nothing more. How he chose to live his life wasn’t my business—anymore. The scent of boiled cabbage and cheap cleaner followed me down the hallway.

  I’m doing this for my child, not for myself, and definitely not for Travis. I tapped on the door to room 113. Unlucky number, unlucky day. Cue the gloom and doom music.

  A thin figure opened the door, face partially hidden by a shock of lank hair. “I’m sorry,” I said, “I must have the wrong apartment. I’m here to see…”

  “It’s me, babe.” The man slowly raised his head. Clear green eyes seemed out of place against pallid skin. Travis’s eyes, but in someone else’s face. The high cheekbones models would once have paid any price for now stood out in pointed contrast to hollow cheeks.

  Oh. My. God. “Travis?” All the way across town I’d held tight to the image of the man he’d been twenty years ago. I’d last seen him (at a distance) in his role as Professor Higgins. Either he’d been heavily made up then or he’d gone downhill fast. My chest tightened.

  “In the flesh.” He stepped aside and invited me in with a flourish of his hand. His jeans sported more holes than might be fashionable; his thin T-shirt hung from his frame. His feet were bare.

  A shudder crept up my spine. Like hell would my bare feet and the dirty brown carpet meet in this life time. My first instinct was to grab the man and get him out of this dump. No matter what hard feelings currently stood between us, my son’s other father shouldn’t have to live here.

  “Bob said you wanted to see me?” Best be about business and get on my way home. If Travis needed money, I’d write a check. Hell, I’d buy him a condo. This man had shared twenty years of my life and helped me raised a son. He deserved better. Whatever he needed, I’d do. Even—the hardest thing of all—talk to him. That might be all he’d accept. Maybe it was time to divvy up our material things, just to get him the hell out of here.

  “You’re looking good, Ian,” my erstwhile husband said, eyeing me up and down.

  “And you’re looking…” What could I say? He didn’t look well. Even so, his brief hint of a smile inspired a heart flutter.

  Travis snorted in reply. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately.” He closed the door and traipsed across dingy carpet to flop down on the bed. A bed, a hotplate, and mini-fridge. I’d seen bigger hotel rooms. He flipped on the light to drive back the gloom in the windowless apartment. I braced for scuttling insects darting across the floor. Illumination didn’t help the appearance of the apartment, or the man, one bit. Damn, there was no other word for it—he looked bad. When we’d first met, my heart had skipped a beat every time I laid eyes on him. Now, he appeared much older than his forty-seven years.

  “Is there anything you need to tell me about…” I waved my hand to indicate his body, “…your current condition?” Please, God, no. We aren’t together anymore, he’d deserted me, but please don’t let this meeting be our final goodbye.

  For a split second, fire appeared in his eyes, and I braced for a good scolding. In the end he released a sigh. “Would you listen if I did?” He muttered the words so softly I barely caught them. Louder, he replied, “No.”

  I didn’t believe him. How many times in the past had he told me “It’s nothing” when he wasn’t feeling well? He’d always kept illnesses to himself. The lawyer in me demanded more evidence.

  Travis patted the bedspread. Sitting next to him on a bed wasn’t a good idea. Memories flooded back, the two of us, racing to the bedroom at the end of the day, clothes strewn down the hall, barely getting the door closed before attacking each other. I shook my head and remained standing.

  “Suit yourself.” A forced smile erased a few years from his face. “Remember when we met at Pride?”

  How could I forget? Against better judgment, I’d allowed a friend to rope me into attending the festivities. At our third club in as many hours, I’d glanced up and fell into the same green eyes staring at me now. For the next few months, Travis had been the center of my world.

  I loved the law—I was good at it, and it rewarded me. With my handsome income I could lavish my darling with all kinds of good things. We’d had so much for just us two—we could take care of someone else. We’d moved in together a year after meeting, and adopted Bob a year after that.

  “And the first time we saw Bob, how he hid behind that social worker?”

  When I’d first met my son he’d been a tiny boy with the biggest blue eyes I’d ever seen—eyes that had seen way more than a five-year-old should have to. He’d cried a lot at first, and many a night I’d woken to an empty bed, only to find my son and my husband nestled together, asleep on the couch, tears staining Bob’s face. With Travis’s love and guidance, Bob had blossomed, overcome the horrors of his early years, and would soon start a residency.

  Our son came into our lives, and the clubs, concerts, and theater faded away We quit marching in feathers and sequins—Pride became something to celebrate at home, with each other and our little boy, blowing soap bubbles for his pupp
y to catch.

  Darker times now overshadowed any pleasant memories. “What do you want?” I reached for my billfold. “Is it money?”

  “No.” The smile fled Travis face. “You do know what today is, right?”

  Why was everyone so determined to remind me of the date? Both of us in white suits, Bob standing with us to watch his fathers marry. It wasn’t the kind of thing easily forgotten. “It’s our anniversary.” One of them, at any rate.

  “You never divorced me.” A statement, not a question.

  “I didn’t want to upset Bobby…umm…Bob.”

  A touch of challenge appeared in the stiff set of Travis’s shoulders and chin. A faint echo of the fire he’d once possessed. “Is that the only reason?” His voice held none of his onstage confidence.

  “Yes.” Lying awake, tears streaming down my face, turning to hug a vacant pillow. The man who’d abandoned me didn’t need to know the truth.

  He wafted out a weary-sounding breath that must have started at his toes. “I know I have no right to ask this, but I want one more night with you.”

  “You want what?” What the fuck? Why did he sound so fatalistic, like one of his stage roles delivering bad news? He’d no right to me or my bed anymore. Who else’s bed had he shared? Did he want sex?

  “You heard me. I want one more night, like it used to be.”

  Like it used to be. The two of us, unable to keep our hands off each other. The sheer ecstasy on his face when he came. The way he’d worshipped me in bed.

  Travis picked at lint on the bedspread, eyes following the path of his fingers. It’d take a lot of picking to clean the frayed fabric. Voice scarcely above a whisper, he added, “I want to go out to dinner, see where the evening takes us. Then I’d like you to spend the night.”

  None of the eloquent speeches I’d prepared on the way over covered this particular turn of events. “Travis, I…”

  “Oh.” Travis glanced up, a world of hurt in his eyes. “You’ve found someone else.” His breath gusted out in a whoosh, fluttering the edges of his too-long hair. “I guess I deserved that.”