Mr. Unavailable #111: Giving Him the News

See Could it Be?, It's Not Him, It's Me, The Recovery, We're Just Not That Into Each Other, The Continuation, The Curse is Broken, Unfortunately, The Make-Up Date, The Phone Call, The Negotiation, Dates 9 Through 12, Dates 13 Through 15, The Public Sex Talk, Bridging the Chasm, The Shut Down, All Kinds of Good, Meeting the Friends, Part 2, Hamptons Getaway, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Happy Birthday to Me, The Drunken Text, Jeckyl and Hyde, The Layoff, One-Man Show, A Boy in Man's Clothing and The Doctors Visit for the background on this one.

I was petrified to tell him. After all the things he'd said about how his ex's friends used to talk about getting pregnant by the next guy they met--just to have a baby--I was afraid he'd have thought I'd done it on purpose somehow. And after how he behaved during the breakup, I wasn't even sure if I would hear back from him at all. I decided to wait until the classes he taught were over for the day and left him a message. "It's Tara. When you have a chance, if you could call me back tonight, that would be great. It's kind of important."

Then I waited. A few hours later, he called.

"I have bad news..." I said. "...I 'm pregnant."
"I thought that's what it might be," he said.
"I figured you'd figure it out."
"Maybe we should talk about this in person," he said, and then he started to ask how it could have happened. I said I didn't know and became flustered and he said, "It's OK, I know."
"What do you want to do?" he asked.
"Under the circumstances, I really don't think it would be a good idea to have it," I said.
"Listen, we should talk about this in person, I'm going to come down. I'll be there in about an hour."

I was stunned. I never thought he'd race downtown to talk about it. He always seemed so annoyed whenever anything remotely tricky came up (tennis taking a long time, me not immediately offering him gum, etc.) that I thought this would be too much for him to handle.

An hour later, he came up the stairs and when he saw me had a look on his face that I'd never seen before--sort of open and concerned--not the closed-off "intense" expression he always cultivated. We sat down and he asked if I knew how far along everything was. I told him maybe five weeks, but they couldn't tell because they couldn't find it and it might be ectopic and the doctor seemed more freaked out than I was, which only freaked me out more...again, I became overwhelmed.

"It's OK," he said. "Let me talk for a minute. I felt like such an asshole when I left here last week. I was such an asshole for all those things I said to you."
"Why did you say those means things?"
"Because you were right. Everything you said was true. I didn't realize I did those things until you said something."

I forget the exact order of the conversation, but at one point he was talking about me...

"I hope you don't take this a patronizing, but you carry yourself with such ease. Even with your friends I see it..." and then he went on "...and a lot of people are self-deprecating and it's because they really don't like themselves, but you're self-deprecating and not like that at all." It was a compliment delivered almost morosely. In retrospect, I realized he was telling me he didn't have those things.

"That's not patronizing, that's very nice," I said. I told him it came from working on myself for a number of years (therapy, etc.) and how when I started dating again in earnest, I met a guy (#100) and told Heidi how comfortable I was with him and she said, "It's probably because you're comfortable with yourself."

"You used that line on me," he said. "That you never felt as comfortable with anyone before."

"I felt more comfortable with you than I did with that other guy."

"Why did you not date much for five years?" he asked.

"Because I think I was shut down on some level," I said, and then told him how at the end of last year I decided I didn't want to be alone anymore and that's when I started dating more. "I'm learning what I want and who I want to be. I want to be in a relationship where I can reveal who I truly am and not get rejected--and for the other person to reveal who he truly is. I don't want to be in any other kind of relationship. I don't want to be a walking dead person. There are too many relationships like that."

He just nodded. As we talked, he was slumped a little on my sofa and was looking straight ahead. He was on the verge of tears.

"Do you want to be alone?" I asked him.

He shrugged. "I don't know. I'm fine alone. I'm fine with someone..."

"Well, I think it would be a shame if you were alone because you have so much to offer if you'd just let yourself."

He didn't say anything at that. I could see him welling up again.

At one point I said, "I don't think you were going to break up with me. I think you're emotionally unavailable and when I got laid off you felt some sort of weird pressure."

"No, I was going to end it," he said (and that stung), "but you're probably right, I probably am emotionally unavailable. If I were more self-aware, I'd probably know that."

"That's funny," I said. "You're always talking about how self-aware you are."

"You know what they say about people who talk a lot about being a certain way, they usually aren't."

"Methinks he doth protest too much," I said, totally stealing Heidi's line.

"You're probably right," he said, "You're very smart, you know. Very smart."

The conversation came to a sort of natural close and he said, "I'd like to go with you to your appointment tomorrow."

I told him I'd like that and said I'd see him there at 9 a.m. He used my bathroom for a second time and I said, "I thought I was the one who was supposed to be peeing all the time."
"It's sympathy peeing," he said.

When he left, I was ecstatic. I didn't know what any of this meant, but I wondered if there was hope.

Diagnosis: Ironically, our relationship just got the depth it needed in the breakup. Or maybe he could only tell me these things because we have broken up. He has finally let himself be open and vulnerable, and it's beautiful. This is what I've been waiting for, but has it come too late?