"That was..."
"One hell of a first meeting," I finish Nathan's sentence. "Yeah, it really was. This is not at all how I thought this night would turn out."
"I'm so sorry about this, Caroline." Nathan pulls me closer to him so I can snuggle up to him on the couch. "I had no idea he was gonna show up here. I mean, sure, I gave him a key and told him to crash here whenever he wants to, but I swear I didn't know-"
"I know," I interrupt him. "It's fine. He's a nice guy, although I'm not a fan of his timing. So now tell me, Nathan... Am I accepted? Or did he tell you to dump my ass?"
Nathan grunts and pulls me in for a kiss. "Like anyone could ever convince me to break things off with you. Not even Sean could do that, Caroline. And as a matter of fact, he seems to approve."
"What did he say?" I sit up straight so I can look him in the eye. Sean may not be like my friends, but every single human being gossips. I know for a fact that the moment I left the room, Nathan and Sean started talking about me.
"You don't want to know," Nathan replies with a grin.
"Now I really need you to tell me!" I gave him my stern teacher look. "Spit it out, Nathanial."
He laughs when I use his full name on him. "He said you have a great rack and that I must be serious about you to bring you here."
"Oh God," I grunt, hiding my face in my hands. "You talked about my boobs?"
"You were standing in front of him without a bra on, wearing a revealing shirt. Of course we talked about you breasts," he teases. "Only for a minute though. He mostly talked about his fight with Jillian's father."
"Tell me about that." I grab my glass to take a sip of wine and settle in for him to tell me more about Sean.
We spend another half hour downstairs while Nathan fills me in on the highlights. Sean works at the same law-firm that Nathan does. They met in college, back when Nathan had no idea what he wanted to do with his life after just getting back on his feet. Sean's dad was a realtor and Sean wanted to join him at his firm. The way he talked about it got Nathan excited as well, so Sean's dad offered to let Nathan tag along for a week so he could figure out if that was a career he wanted to pursue. That's how Nathan ended up working as a real estate agent at Cullen & Parker Realty. Sean's dad has retired since, leaving Sean as the big boss, since the other owner, 'old man Parker' as Nathan calls him, only works a few hours a week since he's technically retired.
That's all nice to know, of course, but I'm more interested about the fight with his father-in-law. Apparently, Jillian's parents are filthy rich. Her father is a corporate lawyer and managing partner at his firm. All he ever wanted was for his daughter to follow in his footsteps. Instead, Jillian met Sean in college, fell in love, got pregnant when they'd only been together for a few months and decided to drop out of college to take care of her kid. Her parents had offered to pay for everything from the baby's needs to Jillian's school, as long as she promised to break off her engagement to Sean. Jillian did no such thing and stopped talking to her parents when they didn't even show up to the wedding.
Jillian made things right with her parents when she got pregnant with their second child years ago, but her father never accepted Sean as a part of the family. He likes to show up unannounced, stay over for a full week and make Sean's life a living hell every single second he's in town. Since Jillian wants their four kids to have a good relationship with their grandparents, Sean usually bites his tongue, but it's always a matter of days before Sean ends up at Nathan's place to hide out until the in-laws are gone.
"So Jillian is a stay-at-home mother?" I ask, trying to keep the judgement out of my voice. The feminist in me doesn't approve of women giving up their career to take care of the kids while the husband makes the big bucks.
"Yes," Nathan says, frowning at me. "She is. Why are you looking at me like that's a bad thing?"
I shrug. "It's not."
"You think that being a stay-at-home mom is a bad thing, don't you?" Nathan realizes. He doesn't sound thrilled about that.
"No, no," I say, trying to find a way to explain this. Although I have to admit the idea of giving up my job to take care of the kids sounds like torture to me. Surely he wouldn't expect me to do that if we ever had kids... right? "I just can't imagine wanting to stop working. I care about my independence too much."
"That doesn't surprise me one bit," he replies with a smile, although he still seems a little off. "Just because you don't want that life for yourself doesn't mean that it's wrong if someone else chooses to stay home and take care of the kids."
"Of course," I agree immediately. "From what you're telling me, though, Jillian got pregnant when she was young and dropped out of college because she didn't have money when her parents cut her off. That's not really a choice, now is it? Why is it always the girl making the sacrifice? Why is it Sean that has the career and not Jillian?"
"You barely know anything about them and you're acting like Sean is somehow a villain for agreeing to let Jill stay home with their kids." Nathan isn't pleased with me, to say the least. "For your information, Sean offered to find a job and support them so Jill could finish college, but she didn't want to. She could have gone back to school anytime she wanted to, but she wanted to have a big family and raise those kids herself, not having to miss a single second of it. And since Sean has crazy work hours being the boss and all, it works out for them. He wouldn't have taken over his father's company if he Jillian hadn't been okay with being the one to take care of things at home." He pauses to take a deep breath. His eyes are dark when they meet mine. "I didn't think you were the kind of person to judge someone just because they made the conscious decision not to work."
Oh hell. I'm screwing this up completely. That's not the kind of person I am and I hate that Nathan thinks that about me. "This is coming out all wrong. I just..." I grunt and drag a hand through my hair. "You're right. They're your friends. You know them best. And Sean seems really nice. I'm sure that he and Jillian made the choice about their family and careers together. I was wrong for judging either of them. And I'm not. Not really. I just know that not every woman is as lucky as Jillian. A lot of women don't get to make the conscious decision to raise the kids while the husband goes off to work. Many are forced to do that because they get pregnant and aren't able to get a proper job because of the fact that women aren't treated the same way that men are in job interviews. And don't even get me started on the stupid notion that when a woman has a job, she always gets asked how she can combine her job with her home life. Men never get asked that question."
"I get that question almost every week," Nathan counters, surprised by my outburst.
"Yeah, sure." I roll my eyes at him. "But when people ask you about how you do it, they say it because they admire you. I bet it's mostly women asking you and they say it like this: oh, Nathan, how do you do it? You're such an amazing father and you still have a great career. How on earth do you manage to be so awesome, sexy and successful all at the same time?" I use a flirty high-pitched tone to drive my point home.
He grins, the mood lightening a bit. "Not exactly like that, but yeah, I get your point."
"I would bet everything I have that Elise doesn't get asked that question in the same way. She probably gets the same question my mother always got: How do you do it? Don't you feel guilty about leaving your kid all alone? Don't you feel bad for choosing your career over your kid? Or even worse, they tell you that you're so lucky that your husband allows you to work after having his kids." I am fuming by now, remembering how my mother used to come home crying when another one of those awful stay-at-home mothers gave her one of those snarky remarks. My mother worked part-time when I was little and didn't go back to working fulltime until I was in high school, yet she still got treated like she was a horrible mother who left me all on my own. And even if she had chosen to work every single day from the moment I was born, that still wouldn't have made her a bad mother. I hate society for making my mother feel inferior to all those other moms. My father has worked fulltime his whole life, yet he never gets shit for it, because everyone expects the man to be the one to pick up the bills while the women cleans his house and raises his kids. So unfair. To the men as well, of course, because I'm sure some men would love to work less to see their kids grow up, but society frowns on that as well. Goddamn traditions.
"Caroline..." Nathan puts a hand on my arm to calm me down. "I'm sorry that Magda had to face such utter stupidity. And I agree that every woman should be able to choose whether she wants to work or not. At the same time, you're no better if you judge stay-at-home mothers. Jillian loves it. And in a way, she's lucky that Sean earns enough money for her to not have to work. Not all couples are that lucky. If Jill and Sean are happy with the way they structured their lives, then that's all that matters, isn't it?"
I nod, knowing that he's right. I have no right to judge her any more than those vile women on the playground had to judge my mother. "Do you..." I hesitate. Is it too early to ask this question?
"Caroline, I'd never tell you what to do," Nathan tells me before I can finish my sentence. "When we have kids, we'll just talk about what we want to do and I'm sure we'll figure something out. If you want to work, you'll work. And if you don't, we'll do the math to see if my salary is enough to keep us afloat. Maybe I'll want to work part-time myself, who knows? The thought already crossed my mind a few times the past years, since I'd love to see more of Rose." He smiles at my surprise. "I think you know me well enough by now to know that I'll never treat you as anything other than my equal. It's too early to make decisions about things like that, but I have complete faith in us working things out when we get to that point. Don't you?"
"Yes," I agree without even having to think about it. I love how he talks about us having kids like it's not just a possibility, but something that's going to happen for sure. A vision of him with a baby in his arms pops into my mind and I can't get it out even if I wanted to. "I love you."
"I love you too," he replies, pulling me in for a kiss.
My hands make their way to his pants, unbuckling his belt for the second time that night. He grunts against my lips when I slip my hand into his boxer shorts and stroke his already erect penis. When I break away from him to take off my shirt, he grabs my hands to stop me.
"Sean's upstairs," he says, breathing hard. "We can't..."
"Does your bedroom have a lock?" I ask. I'm already too turned on to stop now.