Daire and Aspen

Chapter 14: Aspen

Thinking hurts sometimes. And all I've been doing since Daire and I talked four days ago is think to the point of having a headache. I'd watched him walk out to his car that day, stop and then come back to me. 

"Aspen, I've been thinking a lot about second chances, and what it takes to earn one, to deserve having the person you fucked over look at you someday and say I forgive you. Is working on yourself to be a better person ever enough to make up for all the ways you hurt someone? And even if the person you hurt does say the words to you, did you really earn them? Can anything you do make up for hurting another person, especially in all the ways I hurt you?"

I'd looked at him steadily as I really thought about my answer. "That's a hard question, Daire. I don't know if you can make up for hurting someone. You hurt them. No changing that fact. But can you show them regret? Can you show them that you've changed? If the answer to those two questions is yes, then I think you can show them that the way you've hurt them before is not going to happen again. That's what I think people are looking for -- it's not so much about the past hurt as it is about needing to know it won't happen again."

He'd nodded at me and then left me to Elly and my thoughts. He'd left me alone every day except for a text every morning, bright and early.

You OK? Do you need anything?

And every day I texted back the same thing.

We're fine and no, but thanks.

I could almost feel him wishing I'd needed something so he could come over and see us. I knew he was missing Elly and that it killed him leaving both of us alone so I could think things through.

Forgiveness is a tricky subject. There's nobody in this world who hasn't hurt someone else, and if there were no forgiveness or second chances, we'd all be living lonely, solitary lives. You can't go back and change the past. When I'd said that to Daire, it'd been the absolute truth. All you have the power to change is the present and the future.

I'd run into some people who were quick to point fingers and determine this person or that person didn't deserve forgiveness -- but those were often the very same people who would be the first to demand forgiveness for some wrong they'd committed. That worried me. Was I like that? Was I a person who wanted to be judge, jury and executioner if someone wronged me -- but also a person who would demand forgiveness for my own mistakes? Was that what I had been doing with Daire all these months after he apologized?

Elly provided a wonderful distraction from these heavy thoughts these last four days. While I played with her, I marveled at the perfect little girl Daire and I had created, wishing I could preserve her innocence and happiness forever. When I hid my face behind her little blanket and then popped my face out at her, her delighted belly laugh made me laugh...and miss Daire being around to laugh with over our pride and joy.

If I had to tally the list of sins Daire had committed against me, I also had to tally the ways he'd been working to make them right. It's one thing -- a really easy thing, honestly -- to throw out an apology, but it's an entirely different matter to make your apology with words and actions. Daire had not only apologized with words, but he'd also shown me very clearly through his actions that he sincerely regretted the way he'd treated me and that it would never happen again in the future. 

When he'd opened up about his sister, that hadn't excused his horrible response to me the day I told him I was pregnant, but it had helped me to understand it. Good or bad, right or wrong, he'd reacted to our situation based on pure fear. From saying he wanted nothing to do with Elly to becoming a devoted father showed that his response to the news of my pregnancy had been based on a fear that had its origins in his childhood.