Trapped

“Ugh, I don’t want to get up,” I groaned, dismissing my alarm and pushing my body further down into the bed.

“Babe… You know I’m OCD,” he whined, adjusting the corners. “And I’m the most OCD about these sheets. Here you are just coming along and messing them all up, without a care.”

“I told you, I bring nothing but chaos to this apartment yet you still ask me to come back.”

He chuckled, “It’s okay, mi amor,” melting into the covers with a deep sigh. “I love this blanket so much. I’m going to be like Michael Jackson and name my kid Blanket.” His analogies were always over the top. I rolled my eyes at the thought and smirked, “Have fun with that…”

He studied me with a sideways grin, venturing, “What you mean have fun with that? It’s gonna be your kid too.”

The smile fell from my face and the joke was no longer a joke. I could feel him testing me as I slipped into silence. The concept of starting a family seemed like pushing off the inevitable for as long as I could. Diving deep underwater, holding my breath, and seeing how long it would take for me to come up for air. All my life there seemed to be a logical progression of things. Fall in love, get married, have a tribe of ruffians to shuttle to soccer practice. As much as I’d played through this in my mind, that was never going to be me. I would feel the ping of denial in the pit of my stomach with the thought of one day knowing full well that I couldn't let that happen. It’s not even the thought of kids, or kids themselves. It’s the impending knowledge that I will eventually be a huge disappointment. I wouldn’t show up enough, love enough. I would never be enough.

The idea that he was even suggesting such a thing, so strategically, felt like walking blindly into a minefield. I’ve always been the one to call the shots, and here I was as the co-conspirator. I had never let anyone in, yet I was defenselessly watching him cross every line. By slipping up, I was giving him the power to trap me in a way that I could never forgive. It was time to take back the reins.

Photo Credit: Matheus Ferrero