"Wine?" The waiter asks and I shake my head politely. "No thank you. Just water." I look at Luka and he refuses also. The waiter bows slightly and leaves. "You didn't have to, you know. You used to drink when we were going out. This is a celebration, you can drink." I feel awkward about Luka not drinking around me. I know he likes to drink. He drank a beer most of the times we went out. Before he knew about my alcoholism that is. We never really went out since we broke up nearly three years ago. We didn't date before we got married and after that, we had a baby to take care of. No time to date, so I'd never noticed that he doesn't drink anymore.

"It's not a problem." He simply answers. I wish he would say something more. Like being with me matters much more than simple wine. He doesn't say anything so I smile and murmur a "thank you". Silence settles between us as we look at the menus. I run my eyes across the list of dishes. None of them really appeal to me. Why are we in a Mexican restaurant in the first place? I hate Mexican food. Doesn't he know that? I see nothing better than a taco salad.

The waiter comes to our table with two glasses of water and asks for our orders. I order mine and Luka orders Machaca con Huevos. Don't ask me what it is. All I know is that it doesn't sound very good. I refrain from making any comment. I don't care as long as he doesn't try to make me taste any of that stuff.

"I got you something." He says in a low, shy voice. God that voice is so sexy. Waiter, check please. Sometimes I laugh at myself for complaining about my life. I mean there are worse men I could be stuck with. It's just that it would be so easy if I didn't have to work alongside John Carter every day. I feel Luka nudging my hand with a small velvety box and I force myself to keep my thoughts on him and him only. I take the box in my hand and open it. Lying in the middle of the box, there is a simple golden bracelet. I take it gently in my hands and smile. It's truly beautiful. Simple, yet elegant. "Thank you. I love it."

His hands reach mine and he fingers the bracelet turning it around. There's a small gravure that said Abby + Luka ~ 07/12/03. I look up at him happily. "This is wonderful." I give him the bracelet. "Put it on my wrist."

Watching him happily putting the bracelet on me makes me forget about wine, Mexican food, and John Carter. I want to be truly happy, even if it's for one evening.

~o~

"I was thinking," I say as I set down the plates at the table, "we could start a family soon." Susan doesn't say anything so I go on. "We're not getting any younger, you know." She still doesn't say anything and it starts to worry me. I watch her as she sets the mash potatoes down. I hold a sigh and sit down without a word. We begin to eat as if I hadn't said anything. "Susan, tell me what's on your mind."

She sets down her fork and looks up at me. "I don't want children out of spite of Luka and Abby's situation." She says grimly. I wait for her to add more but she doesn't.

"This has nothing to do with Luka and Abby." I say firmly. If I say it with confidence and assurance maybe, just maybe, Susan will believe me. Tough luck, she doesn't. She only raises her eyebrows and continues to eat silently. I really love this non-communication between us. It's a blast. I push my plate aside and cross my arms on the table, waiting for a response from her. If she noticed my demeanor she made no comments about it. She keeps eating as if this dinner is perfectly normal.

I've never been famous for my patience and I can't sit here and wait until Susan is in the mood to talk. I try to keep my voice as low as possible and try to avoid any emotion betraying my current state of mind. "Susan?" I could have given myself an Oscar. I had just the right amount of gentleness and concern that I knew would make her talk.

"For the past two years everything has been about Abby." I tried to protest but Susan held her hand in the air to prevent me from speaking. "Let me finish. Like I just said, everything has been about Abby. You were offered an attending position at North Western while you are still a Chief Resident at County, and even though you said you stayed because of me, I know better. You stayed because of her. Even if you avoid her and she avoids you, the reason you go to work in the morning is because of her." I try to protest again but she interrupts me. "I said, let me finish. Our marriage is about her. I'm not an idiot. You felt desperate so you turned to me. I've accepted it, but a child, a poor innocent child won't." She pauses briefly to take a sip of water, and then goes on. "But I've been meaning to talk to you about something. Chloe is becoming less and less apt to raise a child and now that her husband is gone, I've been thinking about getting custody of Suzie. I've talked to Chloe about it and with a little more convincing, I think she'd let us take care of her daughter."

Adopting or fostering Suzie was definitely not what I had in mind, but I wouldn't mind having her around. And maybe with a child here, it'd convince Susan to have some of our own. Sometimes she really doesn't understand. I'm just trying to have a life outside of Abby. I'm trying to move on. Doesn't she realize that I've spent the past two years trying the best I could to avoid Abby? The reason why I didn't go to North Western was because cold turkey doesn't work for me. Not seeing Abby at all would have made me obsess much more over Abby. She would have been in my every thought and any psychiatrist would tell you that it wouldn't have been healthy.

I look up and find Susan staring expectedly at me and I realize that I hadn't responded. "I think we should think about it seriously. If your sister has been in and out of drugs for the past two years, it would definitely be better for Suzie to come live with us."

Susan nods, but doesn't say much else. I hate how I can't read her.

~o~

As I lay naked in bed next to Luka, I feel cheap. The same overwhelming feeling I have every time we make love. He is so gentle and loving, and somehow I can't reciprocate. Not to the same level. Sometimes I wonder if he even realizes it. If he realizes that my heart is never truly in it. But I try. God, I try so hard.

One time, I thought about John. When Luka embraced me, I imagined it was Carter's arms encircling my body instead of Luka's. I felt extremely guilty and I made sure I would never do such a thing again. I am such a horrible person. Here is an extremely good looking, sensitive, and caring man, who only asks to love and be loved and I pretend I'm with another man. How selfish, how uncaring, how self-centered.

And the other times when I don't pretend he's someone else, I feel like a prostitute. But instead of being paid with money, I'm being paid with his fatherly care for my child. I sleep with this man because he takes care of my daughter.

I'm a fallen woman in every way. I'm a prostitute, a divorcee, I've given birth to a child unwedded, and I've had an abortion. And I wonder why John Carter rejected me. His grandparents plan grand evening like balls at the National History Museum and his parents' routinely travel around the country and Europe while my manic-depressive mother is on and off her meds and my father is God-knows-where. Our life and entourage is so different that it now seems ridiculous that I ever thought that I could be with a man like him.

But I can't help loving him. When I think of him, the emotions are so overwhelming that I feel like a schoolgirl. When I see him, there's a huge lump settling in my throat and it takes hours after he has gone for the lump to disappear. How have I become such a romantic? I have no idea. Maybe it's from the distance between us. He's so close yet so far; like this mirage of twisted reality. Am I making him out to be the white knight in shinning armor that you dream about as a little girl but who never truly exists? Is he as wonderful as I have come to believe in the past few years? Am I creating this dramatic romance just to escape the harsh reality of being married and having the child of a man that I'm not really in love with?

I couldn't bear it if it were true, I couldn't. Reality or not, I'm suffering from the lack of John Carter in my life. If this sufferance would be based out of air, out of nothing, it would be devastating. At least now I can imagine myself as a heartbroken lover, doomed to be away from her love, but who will join her other half in the after life.

Oh how stupid I am! What is with this romance novels nonsense? The reality is that things didn't turn out the way I wanted to, just like everything else in my life. It doesn't mean I'm doomed, it just means that Carter and I just weren't meant to be. It's better this way. If I could just get a hold of myself and stop this ridiculous obsession, I could truly enjoy my life. I could fully enjoy Magda for the treasure that she is and I could fall in love with the man lying next to me, who takes such good care of my daughter and I.

~o~

I will try to be a good role model for Suzie. So I won't fail Susan like I've failed Abby. I will show Susan that I can be a father no matter if the child is biologically mine or not. I made the mistake once, I won't make it twice.

I think Abby would have let me be Magda's father. Not that she would have refused Luka his parental rights, but I believe she would have arranged things so that Magda would sort of have two fathers. But I acted like a jerk. I turned my back on her at a time when she needed me the most. I couldn't stand it, I couldn't stand the fact that when we were close to finally being together, she went out and slept with Luka, creating a child. I couldn't accept the humiliation, the disappointment, the failure at the start of our relationship. Nothing was going the way it was supposed to. And that doubt that I had all year about her feelings for Luka resurfaced. Why did she go to him in the first place? Why not me? I would have walked on the moon for her. I would still do it. But she knows it. She must. The way she looked at me today, it's like I was the most important man for her. Like she truly cared, as if she loved me.

Could she love me? Did she ever love me? And if she did, would she love me still, after everything that's happened? My sun, my star, my reason to live…

Now next thing I know, I'll start reciting Shakespeare, but I can't help it. I love her. Deeply. Being with her brings me so much joy, but so much pain at the same time. It's like giving you the sweetest thing in the world but taking it back just after the first taste. It's tantalizing, torturing.

Having Suzie around maybe will keep me more grounded. I'll be able to take my mind off her. I can gain some focus on things. I hope.

~o~