[Dalyia]

Their time in Paris was everything they had hoped. The room at the Ritz was small but elegant, they walked miles all over Paris, and ate in wonderful old bistros on the Left Bank. They went to Nôtre Dame and Sacré Coeur, and poked around antiques shops, looking for things to take back to Blaxton House. The time they shared was magical, just as it had been so far everywhere else. But Paris seemed even more romantic and particularly special. The city was meant for that.
“I’ve never been so spoiled in my life.” She tried to pay for some of their dinners, but Finn wouldn’t let her. He had old-fashioned ideas about it, although he had let her pay for a few things for the house. She wished he would let her do more. His books did well, she knew, but he had a son to support and pay tuition for. He was putting Michael through college, and even without income taxes in Ireland, a house the size of Blaxton House was a major challenge to maintain and support. And life was expensive everywhere. She had so much money from Paul that she felt guilty not helping Finn more. She tried to explain it to him one day over lunch.
“I know it’s embarrassing to have me pitch in,” she said gently, “but I got this crazy huge settlement from Paul when we divorced. He had just sold his company, and with Mimi gone, neither of us has anything to do with our money. He spends most of his time on the boat. And I have hardly any expenses. Honestly, I wish you’d let me pay for things once in a while.”
“That’s not my style,” Finn said firmly, and then wondered about something. “With Mimi gone, who are you going to leave your money to one day?” It was an odd question, but nothing was out of bounds between them. They had talked about everything, and she had thought of it herself. She had no living relatives except Paul, and he was sixteen years older than she was, and very sick. It was unlikely that he would outlive her, a thought that made her very sad. And all the money she had came from him. He had given her a staggering settlement in the divorce, over her protests, but he had insisted that he wanted her set for life, and whatever was left when he died, was coming to her too.
“I don’t know,” Hope said honestly, thinking about the money she would leave behind at the end of her life. “Dartmouth maybe, in honor of my father and Mimi. Or Harvard. I don’t have anyone to leave it to. It’s kind of an odd situation. I give away a fair amount every year now, to various philanthropic causes I care about. I set up a scholarship in Mimi’s name at Dartmouth, because she went to school there, and another one at the New York City Ballet.”
“Maybe you should fund things that you enjoy.”
“I know. It’s kind of taken me the last two years to get used to having all this money. I don’t need it. I told Paul that when we got divorced. I lead a simple life.” And her parents had left her enough to take care of the house on Cape Cod. “Sometimes I feel guilty having it,” she said honestly. “It seems kind of a waste.” He nodded, laughed, and said he wished he had her problem.
“I keep wanting to put money aside to restore the house, but it’s hard with a kid in college and houses all over the place. Or two anyway. One of these days I’ll really clean the place up.” She was dying to help him do it, but it was too soon for that too. They had been together for two months, which in the real world wasn’t a long time. Maybe in a few months, if all went well, he would let her help financially with restoring the house. She really wanted to do it.
After that, they walked in the Tuileries, went to the Louvre, and walked back to the Ritz for their last night. It had been a heavenly weekend, just like everything else they did together. They ordered room service and spent the night in bed, indulging in the luxury of the hotel. And in the morning, they took the train to London, and were back at his tiny house at noon. It warmed her heart to see it, and think of the shoot they had done there. As she had suspected at the time, they had gotten several wonderful photos out of it, and Finn had chosen one he loved for the book, when it was ready for publication. She had framed several others for him, and for herself.
She had her appointment at the Tate Modern Museum that afternoon, and Hope was startled to discover that Finn was annoyed about it, which didn’t make sense to her.
“What’s up?” she asked him, as they shared one of his terrific omelettes in his kitchen. “Are you mad about something?” He was visibly pouting at her over lunch.
“No, I just don’t know why you have to meet a curator today.”
“Because they want to give me a retrospective show next year,” she explained quietly. “That’s a big deal, Finn.”
“Can I come with you?” he asked, looking hopeful, and she looked apologetic, but shook her head.
“It wouldn’t look serious, if I brought someone along.”
“Tell them I’m your assistant.” He was still pouting.
“You don’t take assistants to meet with curators, only to shoots.” He shrugged in answer, and didn’t speak again until she was leaving the house. She had called for a cab.
“When will you be back?” he asked coldly.
“As soon as I can. I promise. If you want to walk around the museum while I talk to him, you can. It’s excellent.” He said nothing and shook his head, and a minute later she went out, feeling guilty for leaving him, which she knew was ridiculous. But he was trying to make her feel that way, and had succeeded. As a result, she rushed through the meeting, didn’t cover all the questions she wanted to ask, and was back at his house in two hours. He was sitting on the couch, reading a book and sulking. He looked up with a sullen expression when she walked in.
“Was that fast enough for you?” Now she sounded annoyed, because she had hurried through the meeting, to get back to him. He just shrugged. “Why are you being like this? You’re not four years old. Sometimes I have work to do. So do you. It doesn’t mean I don’t love you.”
“Why couldn’t you take me with you?” he said with a wounded expression.
“Because we’re two separate people, with separate lives and careers. I can’t always be part of yours either.”
“I want you to be. You’re always welcome to join me.”
“And most of the time, you are too. But I don’t know this curator, and I didn’t want him to think I’m a flake by mixing business with romance. It doesn’t look serious, Finn.”
“We’re together, aren’t we?” he questioned her with an injured look, which annoyed her even more. She had no reason to feel guilty, and resented what he was doing. And he had succeeded in making her feel bad. It didn’t seem fair. She loved him too, but he was acting like a two-year-old.
“Yes. But we’re not Siamese twins.” It was his fusion theory again, which she had never agreed with. He wanted to do everything together, and sometimes she just couldn’t. He couldn’t come to shoots either. And she couldn’t write a book with him. And however much he wanted it to be otherwise, they were not one person, they were two. She was very clear on that. He wasn’t. “That doesn’t mean I don’t love you,” she said gently, and he ignored her while he went on reading.
He didn’t respond for a long time, and then he surprised her again. He looked up at her and closed the book. “I made an appointment for you tomorrow. For us.”
“With whom?” She was puzzled. “What kind of appointment?”
“With a doctor. A fertility doctor who specializes in people our age who want to have babies.” They both knew that his age was not a problem, hers was. He was being kind in how he said it and she looked at him wide-eyed.
“Why didn’t you talk to me about it before you made the appointment?” It seemed a rather high-handed thing to do, and she had told him she wanted to wait, for a while at least.
“I got the name, and I thought it was a good idea to meet her while we were in London. At least we can hear what she has to say, and what she recommends. You might need to start preparing for it now, if we’re going to do it in a few months.” He was moving very quickly, just as he had with their relationship in the beginning. But this was a much bigger commitment and decision. A baby was forever. And she wasn’t sure yet if they were.
“Finn, we don’t even know if we want a baby yet. We’ve only been together for two months. That’s a big decision. A huge decision. For both of us to make, not just you.”
“Can’t you just listen to her?” He looked like he was about to cry and she felt like a monster, but she wasn’t ready and she felt panicked to be talking to a doctor about it already. “Will you talk to her?” His eyes pleaded with her, and she hated to hurt his feelings and turn him down.
Slowly, Hope nodded, but she wasn’t happy about it. “I will. But I don’t want to be rushed into this. I need time to make that decision. And I want to enjoy us first.” He smiled when she said that, and leaned over to kiss her.
“Thank you, that means a lot to me. I just don’t want us to miss out on having a baby of our own.” She was touched by what he said, but still upset that he had gone forward with it, without at least asking her first. She wondered if it was his way of getting even for not taking him to the museum meeting with her. But she knew it was more that he was desperate to have a baby with her. The problem was that it was too soon for her, and she had said that to him clearly since he first brought it up. He was very stubborn once he got an idea in his head. He seemed unfamiliar with the word “no.”
They went to Harry’s Bar again for dinner that night, and Hope was quiet, and then they came home and made love. But for the first time, she felt some distance from him. She didn’t want him making her decisions for her, particularly not big ones. Paul had never done that to her before the divorce. Before they had made all their big decisions jointly with lots of mutual consultation. It was what Hope expected of Finn, but he was much more forceful about his ideas. They were two very different men.
And she was even more upset the next day when they got to the doctor. It wasn’t an appointment for a consultation, it was a full workup for a fertility screening, with a battery of tests, some of them unpleasant, which she wasn’t prepared for. She balked when she discovered what was planned, and said something to the doctor about it, who seemed even more surprised that Hope didn’t know what the appointment would entail.
“I sent you a folder of information on it,” she said, looking at them with a confused expression. She was a very nice woman, and undoubtedly competent, but Hope was visibly unhappy at the news of what she was expected to do that day.
“I didn’t get the folder,” Hope said simply, looking at Finn. He was instantly sheepish. He had obviously gotten it when he made the appointment but not shared it with her. For the moment, this was his project, not hers. “I didn’t even know about this appointment until last night.”