There isn't meant to be this level of unadulterated pleasure in life. The place they went when they were together, at least it seemed to him, was downright otherworldly – the more time he spent with her, the more access she gave to him, the less he felt like venturing out of the apartment to do his job, to eat, to attend to anything that has to do with what life's really like. The place they went with their lovemaking was not of this world, but the world still had them, and it had extracted its payment.
What happened 15 years ago, there was nothing new in it. He'd gone over this territory so many times in his head, how the slap of consequence stood out as a starkly carved figurine against an otherwise misty landscape of what he thought might have been love. What struck him tonight had nothing to do with that history. It was the few steps beyond, the road not taken, the divergent path existing possibly on the parallel plane of what might have been. He had never let himself go there before, never had to, yet -- What if she had gotten pregnant?
She wouldn't have kept the baby, he was fairly certain of that. She had her Ph.D and her trips to India and her ascent to figurehood on the world's stage squarely fixed ahead of her, and she wouldn't have given that up, not for him, not for any ethical dilemma. He wouldn't have had a baby to deal with, not with her. The anxiety he felt the morning after - as he dutifully accompanied her around the city, fumbling for a role he felt he ought to have been trained for, unsure whether he should be supportive or decisive or neutral, completely at a loss for any idea what empathy might look like in this case – all this anxiety was sufficiently tempered by the knowledge that he had chosen a woman who did not have that maternal trigger, or... at least would never admit if it were there. The anxiety were more like what he would feel if he were interviewing at a company that his dad owned: where the outcome was nearly assured, but it was still important to get the performance right so as to deliver the proper, favorable impression. The crippling effect of even this minor role was exactly why he was in no shape to take on a child.
No, the impact of the question of pregnancy was not one of having a baby. Pregnancy rather raised the unbearable fact of his responsibility, of a very real requirement on him to step up in personal matters, which he avoided frenetically at that age, and more strategically in his maturity.
But tonight, for some reason, that next thought-step clicked into place. He saw about himself what he hadn't been able to face a decade and a half ago.
If there was a baby on the way, his tactic would be definite, unquestioned, and pursued with a steely, cloaked resolve. In seeing the course he would have taken, his mother suddenly made sense to him for the first time in his life. The impetus just revealed in himself was the same program his mother had tyrannically pursued regarding his father during his boyhood. The plan with the child would be simple, swift, effective: make it hate her.
Make its mother evil. Tell the story from the beginning, before it could speak. Hang the injustice of the world around the neck of this woman he wanted to die with but who could never give him all he demanded. Be the better parent, the victim, the caring one – and never let up on the plotline that mother was the villain.
He didn't know why he would do this. He didn't know where it came from or what all he gained by it. He only knew, with a clarity like the glare that cuts a summer morning's haze, that he would've done this. He would have dug up and exploited all evidence, lured the child to his side, made it his ally, grateful and loyal and dependent on him, and turned it against its mother, for as long as they both shall live.
Just like that, he knew how his mother felt as he had gestated in her belly. Understood the look of being emotionally battered in photographs of his infant face. The tirades against males that made him hate both his gender and any woman who would not regard him. The estrangement from his Dad, a campaign carried on unceasingly, although he felt he had never quite looked at his father or the question of whether he wanted this. His own sexuality, understood by him only through the comments and gazes and dominance by his mother. In one unspeakable impulse, his life made sense.
The road less traveled was not a better one. He had dodged a bullet and spared the world one unnecessary violence. His gut had told him that he would terrorize a child, because as a child terrorism is what he had known.
He returned to his apartment, where he had no child, and he had no partner. And he sat.
What happened 15 years ago, there was nothing new in it. He'd gone over this territory so many times in his head, how the slap of consequence stood out as a starkly carved figurine against an otherwise misty landscape of what he thought might have been love. What struck him tonight had nothing to do with that history. It was the few steps beyond, the road not taken, the divergent path existing possibly on the parallel plane of what might have been. He had never let himself go there before, never had to, yet -- What if she had gotten pregnant?
She wouldn't have kept the baby, he was fairly certain of that. She had her Ph.D and her trips to India and her ascent to figurehood on the world's stage squarely fixed ahead of her, and she wouldn't have given that up, not for him, not for any ethical dilemma. He wouldn't have had a baby to deal with, not with her. The anxiety he felt the morning after - as he dutifully accompanied her around the city, fumbling for a role he felt he ought to have been trained for, unsure whether he should be supportive or decisive or neutral, completely at a loss for any idea what empathy might look like in this case – all this anxiety was sufficiently tempered by the knowledge that he had chosen a woman who did not have that maternal trigger, or... at least would never admit if it were there. The anxiety were more like what he would feel if he were interviewing at a company that his dad owned: where the outcome was nearly assured, but it was still important to get the performance right so as to deliver the proper, favorable impression. The crippling effect of even this minor role was exactly why he was in no shape to take on a child.
No, the impact of the question of pregnancy was not one of having a baby. Pregnancy rather raised the unbearable fact of his responsibility, of a very real requirement on him to step up in personal matters, which he avoided frenetically at that age, and more strategically in his maturity.
But tonight, for some reason, that next thought-step clicked into place. He saw about himself what he hadn't been able to face a decade and a half ago.
If there was a baby on the way, his tactic would be definite, unquestioned, and pursued with a steely, cloaked resolve. In seeing the course he would have taken, his mother suddenly made sense to him for the first time in his life. The impetus just revealed in himself was the same program his mother had tyrannically pursued regarding his father during his boyhood. The plan with the child would be simple, swift, effective: make it hate her.
Make its mother evil. Tell the story from the beginning, before it could speak. Hang the injustice of the world around the neck of this woman he wanted to die with but who could never give him all he demanded. Be the better parent, the victim, the caring one – and never let up on the plotline that mother was the villain.
He didn't know why he would do this. He didn't know where it came from or what all he gained by it. He only knew, with a clarity like the glare that cuts a summer morning's haze, that he would've done this. He would have dug up and exploited all evidence, lured the child to his side, made it his ally, grateful and loyal and dependent on him, and turned it against its mother, for as long as they both shall live.
Just like that, he knew how his mother felt as he had gestated in her belly. Understood the look of being emotionally battered in photographs of his infant face. The tirades against males that made him hate both his gender and any woman who would not regard him. The estrangement from his Dad, a campaign carried on unceasingly, although he felt he had never quite looked at his father or the question of whether he wanted this. His own sexuality, understood by him only through the comments and gazes and dominance by his mother. In one unspeakable impulse, his life made sense.
The road less traveled was not a better one. He had dodged a bullet and spared the world one unnecessary violence. His gut had told him that he would terrorize a child, because as a child terrorism is what he had known.
He returned to his apartment, where he had no child, and he had no partner. And he sat.
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