Daddy

“And you'll do the play?” He could hardly force the words out.

She nodded slowly, with a look of tension in her eyes. “I guess so.” And then reaching out and taking both his hands in her own, she begged him, “Can't we work this out? Can't we at least try a compromise? I love you. Nothing has changed.” She looked desperate, but Ollie knew better.

“Not now maybe. Not yet. But eventually, it'll just be too much. We'll be strangers. You'll live in New York, with your own life, your play. I'll be here, with my job and the children. What kind of life is that?”

“Difficult, challenging, but worthwhile. Other people have done it and survived. Ollie, I swear I'll do all the commuting.”

“How? You have two days off. One day to fly here, one day to go back. What does that leave us? A night at the airport? How long do you think that would last?” He stood up finally, and walked around the desk to face her. “You've made the right choice. You're a talented woman, Charlotte. You have a right to the best.”

“But I love you.”

“I love you too. But I can't make something work that isn't going to. I've learned that lesson before. The hard way' The scars were too deep, the pain too great, and as he looked at the woman he loved, he knew he had already lost her.

“What happens now?” She looked broken, but she didn't fight him.

“We hurt for a while. We both grow up. We go on. You have your work. I have my kids. We take comfort from that, and eventually it stops hurting.” Like it had with Sarah. It had only taken a year of constant agony. Only that. And the prospect of losing Charlotte seemed worse somehow, they had had so much hope and joy and love, so many plans, and now it was over.

“You make it sound awfully simple, Ollie.” She looked at him with grief-stricken eyes, and he gently reached out and took her hands in his own.

“That's the only trouble. It isn't.”

She left his office a few minutes later in tears, and he poured himself a stiff drink at the bar before going home, to find Aggie and Sam watching the news as they fed Alex dinner. The announcer was just telling greater L.A. that there was a rumor that Charlotte Sampson was leaving her show and going to New York to be in a play on Broadway.

Sam laughed out loud, as Aggie handed the baby another cookie. “That's dumb, isn't it, Dad? Charlie's not going to New York. She's staying here, and we're getting married.” He looked up at his father with a broad smile, and suddenly his face froze. Ollie looked glazed as he turned from the TV to Sam and shook his head, as though in a stupor.

“No. I don't think so, Son. She's had a very good offer to do an important play. It means a lot to her, Sam.” Aggie and the boy both stared at him, as Benjamin let himself into the kitchen and saw the drama unfolding, without knowing what had caused it. Alex let out a squeal and reached chubby arms up to his father, but for once, no one seemed to hear him.

“Are we going back to New York, too, Dad?” Sam looked both frightened and hopeful, but his father shook his head, feeling as though he had aged a hundred years in a single day.

“We can't, Sam. You're all in school here. And I have an office to run. I can't just pull up stakes and move once a year.”

“But don't you want to?” Sam couldn't understand what had happened. But for that matter, neither could Ollie.

“Yes, I do. But I also don't want to interfere in someone else's life. She has her own life to lead, and we have ours.”

There was a moment's silence, and then Sam nodded, quietly wiping a tear from his cheek as Benjamin and his father watched him. “Kind of like Mom, huh?”

“Kind of.”

Sam nodded and left the room, as Benjamin gently touched his father's arm, and Aggie took Alex out of the high chair and took him with her to check on Sam. It was easy to figure out that hard times had struck again, and Sam was going to take it hard. He had been crazy about Charlotte. But then again, so had his father.

“Is there anything I can do, Dad?” Benjamin asked quietly, touched by the look of grief in Ollie's eyes. But Oliver only shook his head, squeezed Benjamin's arm, and went upstairs to his own room. He lay on his bed thinking of her all that night, and he felt as though he'd been beaten in a bar brawl by morning.

It wasn't fair that it was happening to him again. It wasn't fair that he was losing her. As he lay in bed alone, he wanted to hate her, but he couldn't. He loved her too much, and the irony of it struck him with full force again in the morning, after a sleepless night, as he threw out the brochures of Bora Bora. He had a knack for falling in love with women who wanted more out of life than just plain marriage. He couldn't imagine ever loving anyone again. And as he stared out the window, thinking of her, he couldn't hold back the tears. He wanted her desperately, but he knew it would never work. He had to let her go, no matter how painful it was to break the bonds that had held him.