While the Backstreet Boys finished their tour with NKOTB, I threw myself into my physical therapy sessions, wanting to be in the best shape I could possibly be in when I officially went back to work. I lifted weights, pulled on resistance bands, waved battle ropes, and tossed a weighted ball to work out my arms. I did adapted sit-ups, trunk push-ups, and balance exercises with the weighted ball to strengthen my core. I stood up in a standing frame and rode a stationary FES bike, which stimulated my leg muscles to contract by sending pulses of electricity through electrodes taped to the surface of my skin. I couldn’t feel the tiny shocks, but I loved the feeling I got when I looked down and saw my paralyzed legs pedaling the bike – even though I knew I wasn’t the one controlling them.
Some people might have looked at a guy like me and wondered what difference it made. No matter how much I worked out, I would never be able to walk again. But exercising led to better circulation and breath control, allowing me to sit upright without getting light-headed and sing without running out of air. Strengthening my arm muscles and improving my balance made it easier for me to push myself around in a manual chair and transfer in and out of it with minimal assistance. Stretching my leg muscles prevented them from atrophying or tightening too much, helping to keep them loose and lessen my spasms. Sculpting my body made me feel more confident about the way I looked in my wheelchair.
One Friday afternoon, I was working with some therapy putty while strapped into the standing frame when I heard my cell phone ring. “Would you mind checking that for me?” I asked my therapist, Corey. “I just wanna make sure it’s not my son’s preschool calling.”
“Of course.” Corey reached into the pocket of my empty chair to retrieve my phone. “It’s someone named Natalie,” he said, holding it up to show me the screen. “Do you wanna take it?”
“Can I?” I would normally never waste our time together talking on the phone, but I didn’t see why I couldn’t multitask while I was otherwise immobilized in the stander.
“Sure.” He handed me my phone. “Make it quick, though.”
I put down the therapy putty to swipe the screen, then raised the phone to my ear. “Hey, Natalie.”
“Hi, Kevin!” her perky voice replied. “Whatcha up to?”
“I’m actually at… at the gym,” I said, deciding it sounded better than saying I was at a rehab hospital.
“Oh! I’m sorry; I hope I’m not interrupting your workout.”
“It’s okay; I’m almost done. I can talk and do this at the same time.”
“What are you doing?” she wanted to know.
“I’m in a stander.” I tried to explain what it looked like to someone who had probably never seen one. “It’s like a seat that pushes me up into a standing position with pads on either side of my legs and torso. It has a tray in front so I can do other stuff while I’m standing.”
“Like talk to me?” She giggled.
I smiled. “Yeah,” I said, glancing over at Corey, who was using the break to make notes on the clipboard he carried around. “I’ve got a few minutes.”
“So, you’re standing up? Meaning, if I were there right now, I could kiss you without having to bend down?”
I felt myself blush. “Yup.”
“I wish I were there. I miss your face.”
“I miss yours, too,” I admitted.
“Hm… so, if I were to fly to Lexington sometime soon, you would wanna see me?”
“Yeah, of course, I would,” I said eagerly. “When can you come?”
She laughed. “Well, I just landed in Bogota, so not this weekend. Next weekend, I’m flying to Dubai, so that won’t work either. How would you feel about a midweek date?”
“I’m fine with that.”
“Just fine?” she asked, her tone flirtatious.
I smiled. “I would love that,” I amended.
“That’s more like it.” Even without seeing her face, I could tell she was smiling, too. “Let’s aim for Tuesday or Wednesday of next week. I’ll let you know for sure once I book my flight. That gives you some time to start figuring out where you want to take me.”
I laughed. “Sounds like a plan,” I replied, appreciating her assertiveness.
“I’d better let you go now so you can get back to your workout, but I’ll talk to you later,” she promised.
“Okay. Bye, Natalie.”
When I put down my phone, Corey looked up curiously from his clipboard. “So, who’s Natalie?” he asked in a teasing tone.
I couldn’t hide the smile on my face. “Just someone I met on my trip to London a few weeks ago. We went out a couple times while I was there, and we’ve been talking ever since.”
“Just ‘talking,’ huh?” Corey grinned.
I shrugged. “She lives in Atlanta, so that’s all we can do right now. I haven’t seen her since mid-April. But she called to ask if she could come up here to visit next week.”
“Wow, she’s coming all the way from Atlanta to see you? That’s like, what, a six-hour drive?”
“Or a one-hour flight,” I said, smiling. “She’s a flight attendant. I’m sure she can fly for free.”
“Ooh, a flight attendant… nice.” He nodded approvingly.
“Yeah… I really like her,” I admitted. “Not sure what she sees in me, but-”
“Don’t sell yourself short, man,” Corey scolded me. “You’re a good-looking guy. She must think so, anyway, or she wouldn’t waste her time making a trip to see you.”
“I guess that’s true,” I said with a shrug. “I still don’t get it, though. This girl is gorgeous; she could have any guy she wants.”
“Sounds like she wants to be with you,” said Corey, raising his eyebrows. He glanced at the clock on the wall. “You’ve been in that stander for more than twenty minutes. How ya feelin’?”
“I’m starting to get a little light-headed,” I admitted, though I wasn’t sure whether the dizzy feeling was the result of my blood pressure dropping from standing up too long or Natalie making my head spin.
“Let’s sit you back down.”
“Wait,” I called as Corey moved behind the standing frame. “Can you take a picture of me first? I wanna send it to Natalie so she can see me standing up.”
He smiled. “Sure.” I handed him my phone and held my head high, smiling while he snapped a photo. Then he lowered me back to a seated position. Once my light-headedness went away, he unfastened the straps that held me in place and helped me slide back to my wheelchair. “Great work today, Kevin,” he told me, clapping me on the shoulder. “I’ll see you next week.”
I texted the photo to Natalie from the privacy of my truck. “Since you said you missed my face,” I wrote, adding a winking emoji.
“Tall, dark, and handsome!” she texted back a few minutes later, along with a smiling emoji that had hearts for eyes.
My smile lasted the whole way home.
***
On Tuesday morning, I picked up Natalie at the airport. I was waiting in the terminal lobby with flowers in my lap when she came down the escalator near baggage claim. I spotted her first and waved to get her attention. When she finally saw me sitting there, her face split into a wide grin. She stepped off the escalator and hurried toward me, rolling her small carry-on bag behind her.
“Hi!” she said breathlessly as she bent down to hug me.
“Hi,” I replied, wrapping my arms around her back. “It’s so good to see you again.”
“You too!” She straightened up when I released her. “You didn’t have to come in to get me, though; I could have met you out front.”
“I don’t mind. Chivalry isn’t dead,” I said, handing her the bouquet of pink and lavender roses I’d bought at the gift shop.
Natalie beamed. “You’re so sweet! These are beautiful.” She brought the bouquet to her nose, smelling the pastel-colored blossoms.
So are you, I thought as I gazed up at her. Her long, brown hair was pulled back in a French braid that day, and she was dressed casually in jeans and a t-shirt. “Did you check a bag?” I asked her.
She shook her head. “Nope, I’ve got everything I need right here,” she replied, patting the top of her carry-on. “I’m an expert at packing light.”
“I used to be, too,” I said, turning my chair around. “Now, I have to take everything but the kitchen sink with me when I travel.” Natalie laughed, but as I rolled toward the exit, I regretted letting that slip out. She would learn soon enough just how high-maintenance my disability had made me; I didn’t want to risk scaring her away any sooner.
I led the way to my truck, which was parked in a handicapped spot at the front of the short-term parking lot. I opened the passenger door for her, then went around to the driver’s side. “I didn’t realize you drove,” she remarked as the lift raised me into the truck. “This is a pretty cool set-up you’ve got here.”
I nodded. “Thanks. I love driving. It’s a lot better than being shuttled around in a van, which was my only other option before I learned how to use the hand controls.”
“I swear, I spend more time being shuttled to and from airports in a van than I do actually driving my own car these days.” She watched with curiosity as I put the truck in reverse to back out of my parking spot. “I tend to stick pretty close to home when I’m not working.”
“Well, I appreciate you coming here to see me on your days off.” I shifted gears to go forward, accelerating with my left hand while I steered with my right. “Where should we go first? Do you wanna drop your bag off at your hotel? Or are you hungry? We could grab a bite to eat.”
“I could go for some food,” she said, nodding. “My bag will be fine in your truck. It’s too early to check in to the hotel, anyway.”
I took her out for brunch at a local cafe, where we caught up over plates of pancakes, bacon, eggs, and hash browns.
“Oh my goodness,” Natalie groaned when she finally put down her fork and pushed her plate away. “That was way more than ‘a bite’ to eat. I pity the poor horse that has to hold me on its back. I hope I can still fit in the saddle.”
I laughed. “Oh, please. If anything, you should pity the poor horse that has to haul my dead weight around.”
Despite my attempt at self-deprecating humor, I was looking forward to the date I had planned. Dawn had helped me brainstorm ideas for something fun and different we could do together besides have dinner and drinks. “What kind of stuff does Natalie like?” she’d asked me.
“Well, she likes sports… hiking… animals…” I’d listed the interests I remembered Natalie talking about, already thinking of reasons why none of them would work for a date. It was the wrong season for football or basketball, and I couldn’t take her to a baseball game because neither the Wildcats or the Legends, Lexington’s minor league team, were playing at home that night. Hiking was no longer an option for me, and the only activity I could think of that involved animals was going to the zoo, which would require driving over an hour to either Louisville or Cincinnati.
“What about horseback riding?” Dawn had suggested. “I used to take Michael to a place near Bowling Green that had therapeutic horseback riding for people of all ages and ability levels. I’m sure we could find somewhere like that around here.”
“Really?” I remembered the rehab hospital in California having therapy horses, but I hadn’t ridden since before I was injured. “I would love that. I bet Natalie would, too.”
Dawn and I did some searching online and found a horse farm that offered horseback riding for both able-bodied and disabled adults. There were even trails through the woods that Natalie and I could take together. She had seemed excited when I ran the idea by her, so I’d called and made a reservation for the two of us.
After we finished brunch, we drove out to the farm, where we were met by a woman wearing a baseball cap and a polo shirt that were both embroidered with the name of the farm. Her blue jeans were tucked into a pair of tall riding boots. “Hi, I’m Hannah,” she introduced herself, shaking each of our hands. “I’ll be your instructor and personal guide for your ride today. Have either of you ever ridden a horse before?”
“Not since I was a kid,” Natalie said.
“Not since I was paralyzed,” I added, looking down at my useless legs. “I’m a little nervous.”
“No worries!” Hannah replied, flashing me a friendly smile. “Our horses are very tame and trained to work with people of all experience levels. Follow me to the stables, and I’ll get you acquainted with the ones you’ll be riding today.”
She led us down a paved path. “Want a push?” Natalie asked, playfully grabbing hold of my push handles without waiting for an answer. I didn’t need one, but I decided not to protest, letting her push my chair to the large barn where the horses were housed. Two of them were already saddled up and waiting for us when we went inside.
“This is Butterscotch,” Hannah said, stroking the neck of a beautiful palomino mare. “Natalie, you’ll be riding her.”
“Hi, Butterscotch!” Natalie cooed softly, stretching out her hand as she took a step toward her horse.
“And, Kevin, your horse is named Chewbacca.” Hannah patted the hindquarters of the second horse, a huge chestnut gelding that was wearing a modified saddle with a high back and harness. “We call him our gentle giant. He may be big, but Chewy’s as docile as they come and used to carrying riders with disabilities.”
“Well, hey there, Chewy. I hope you’re more even-tempered than your namesake,” I said with a chuckle as I rolled up to my horse, hoping he couldn’t tell how nervous I was. He was even bigger up close.
Having grown up around horses, I had never had a fear of them before, but now that I found myself sitting in front of one, faced with the reality of being hoisted high up onto its back, I felt surprisingly anxious. I trusted Hannah when she told us the horses were tame and well-trained, but I also knew how unpredictable animals could be. What if Chewbacca got spooked and suddenly reared? Without control over my core muscles, I could barely keep myself balanced on an unmoving object, let alone one that was actively trying to throw me off its back, and I couldn’t hold on tight with hands and legs that didn’t work. If I fell out of my saddle, I would have no way to catch myself. What if I landed on my head and got hurt even worse?
I thought of Christopher Reeve, who had broken his first two cervical vertebrae after being thrown headfirst from his horse. I was already a C5-C6 quadriplegic. If I reinjured my neck any higher, I could lose the function I had worked so hard to regain, including the ability to move my arms and breathe on my own. Was it worth the risk?
But when I looked over at Natalie, who was lovingly stroking Butterscotch’s nose, I knew I couldn’t back out now.
After fitting us both with helmets, Hannah helped me into my saddle first, using a hydraulic lift that was similar to the hated Hoyer lifts they had used to transfer me in the hospital. First, she slid a fabric sling behind my back and under my legs, fastening the straps to secure it around me. Then, with the help of a pulley system suspended from one of the barn’s crossbeams, she lifted me out of my chair and lowered me onto Chewbacca’s back. “It’s like one of those swing rides at the fair, right?” I said to Natalie, forcing a smile to hide how self-conscious I felt while I was hanging in mid-air with my legs dangling limply out of the sling. I hated being so helpless, having to be hauled around like a piece of cargo.
“I guess.” She giggled. “I was gonna say it looks like some sort of sex swing.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Wow… really?” I snickered. “That is not what I was expecting to hear out of your mouth,” I replied, wondering how much experience she had with sex swings. Blushing furiously, Natalie buried her face in her hands. “Not that I mind,” I added quickly as Hannah strapped me into the saddle, biting down on her bottom lip to hide her smile.
Natalie lowered her hands and looked up at me with a sheepish grin. “It’s not like I have one,” she said. “It’s just… Well, with my weird schedule, I watch a lot of late-night TV, and I’ve seen infomercials for ‘toys’ that look kinda like that.”
I laughed. “They would use a sling like this to hoist me in and out of the hydrotherapy pool when I was in the rehabilitation hospital right after I got hurt. It always made me feel like Shamu the whale to be lifted out of the water that way, but you just gave my old ‘Free Willy’ jokes a whole new meaning.”
Still blushing, she burst out laughing along with me. Somehow, she looked even prettier that way, with bright pink cheeks and little crinkles at the corners of her lips and eyes.
“Sorry,” I told Hannah as she tightened a pair of straps around my legs to hold them in place. “I swear, we won’t talk dirty the whole time we’re riding.”
“Hey, you paid for a private ride,” she replied, holding up her hand. “As long as it’s not directed at me, y’all can talk however you want.” She unhooked the sling and slid it out from under me. “How do you feel in that saddle? Is everything tight enough?”
I tried leaning a little to one side, but the harness around my torso held me firmly in place. “Pretty good,” I said, feeling more relaxed. “I think it’ll be fine.”
Natalie didn’t need any help mounting her horse. I watched enviously as she put her foot in one of the stirrups and boosted herself up, swinging her other leg over Butterscotch’s back in one easy movement. Hannah showed her how to hold the reins and how to use them and her legs to guide her horse.
“Now, Chewbacca has been trained to respond to voice commands,” Hannah told me, “so you can control his movements with your words alone.” She taught me a series of commands: “walk” to get him to go forward, a click of the tongue to take him up to a trot, “easy” to slow him down, and “whoa” to make him stop. We took a few laps around the barn to practice. Once Natalie and I both had the hang of it, Hannah mounted a horse of her own and escorted us outside.
By the time we made it onto one of the trails, I had forgotten my fear. I loved the feeling of being up high with my head at the same level as Natalie’s, my body swaying gently back and forth as we rode side by side. Hannah stayed a few yards behind us, watching from a distance to give us some privacy. Looking between Chewbacca’s ears at the dirt path that lay ahead, winding its way through the woods, I could almost pretend I was able-bodied again. Aside from the fact that I couldn’t feel the horse’s flanks between my legs, riding didn’t feel all that different than it had before my accident.
“Are you having fun?” I asked, looking over at Natalie. She had a huge smile on her face.
“Yes! This was such a great idea,” she replied.
I nodded in agreement. Why hadn’t I thought to do this sooner? I wondered. This was glorious! “You can thank my nanny, Dawn,” I said. “It was her idea. She had a son with muscular dystrophy who did adaptive horseback riding at a place like this.”
“Really? Well, please thank her for suggesting it… unless you’re planning on taking me back to your place later,” she said, giving me a sly glance. “Then I could tell her myself.”
I felt my face warm up. “Honestly, I wasn’t planning on it – but not because I don’t want to,” I said quickly. “It’s just that my son is there, and I’d rather wait to introduce you to him until… until we know where this is going.”
Natalie nodded. “I understand. You can always come up to my hotel room instead… so we can ‘talk’ about where this is going,” she said with a smile and a wink. Then she looked away, pretending to be interested in a tree on the other side of the trail.
My face burned. Her flirting was turning me on, but I wasn’t sure how well that would translate below the belt if and when we ended up in her hotel room that night. I could tell she wanted to take things to the next level, but I didn’t know what that would look like for me. Would I even be able to make out with her from my wheelchair?
I wished I had paid more attention when we’d talked about these topics in the quad class I’d taken in rehab. At the time, I had been so overwhelmed with grief over losing my wife that the thought of being intimate with another woman was about the furthest thing from my mind. I had managed to tune out most of the conversation, telling myself it didn’t apply to me since I would never love anyone else the way I had loved Kristin.
But now, I found myself watching Natalie as she rode next to me, noticing the rhythmic way her body swayed along with the walking gait of her horse. My eyes traced every line, following her braided hair along her neck and over her shoulder to the swell of her breast, then continuing down to the curve of her hip. I was admiring the way her legs looked in her tight jeans when she suddenly turned her head toward me again. I quickly faced forward, feeling my cheeks redden as I refocused my gaze between my horse’s ears. I hoped she hadn’t caught me staring at her. I may not have been in love with Natalie yet, but I was certainly attracted to her.
Behind us, Hannah cleared her throat. I had almost forgotten she was there. “There’s a pretty little pond coming up on the left if y’all wanna stop and take a picture together!” she called.
I looked back at Natalie, who nodded eagerly. “Let’s do it!”
Hannah clicked her tongue, coaxing her horse to canter ahead of us. She dismounted and led our horses off the trail on foot, taking us to a clearing in the woods, where there was a lovely pond surrounded by tall grass and wildflowers – a perfect place for the deer and other woodland animals to find fresh water. I worried I would fall forward if Chewbacca decided to lower his head to take a drink, but he was as well-trained as Hannah had assured me. He remained upright, following her commands and coming to a halt in front of the pond. Hannah turned him and Butterscotch around so she could take our picture with the pond behind us. “Smile!” she said as she held up Natalie’s phone.
I had forced plenty of smiles over the past four years, but I didn’t have to fake it that time. I could see it on my face in the photo: I looked genuinely happy, sitting tall and proud on my horse next to Natalie’s. To someone who didn’t know any better, I didn’t even look disabled – the straps that held me in my saddle were hardly noticeable. It was one of the few times since my accident that I’d felt totally “normal” again.
“Will you text that to me?” I asked Natalie.
“Of course!” she said, smiling at me. “This one’s definitely a keeper.”
With Hannah’s guidance, our horses returned to the trail and eventually circled back to the farm.
“That was so much fun!” Natalie gushed once I was back in my wheelchair. “Thanks for bringing me here!”
“You’re welcome.” I smiled at her. “I had a great time, too.”
We said goodbye to Chewbacca and Butterscotch, thanked Hannah for all her help, and headed to the truck. “So, where to next?” Natalie asked once I was behind the wheel.
“Do you wanna stop by your hotel? Just so you can check in and change clothes or whatever,” I added quickly, not wanting her to misread my intentions. I knew I would need to use the bathroom before long, but I didn’t mention that part.
“Why, do I smell like a horse?” she said with a grin, wrinkling her nose.
I shrugged. “No more than I do. I don’t mind.”
She laughed. “Me neither. Farm girl, remember? But, sure – that sounds good. I probably should freshen up a little.”
I drove her to the hotel and went inside with her, waiting while she checked in. We took the elevator up to her room, where she dropped off her bag and the bouquet of flowers I’d brought her and disappeared into the bathroom. She emerged a few minutes later in a cloud of perfume, wearing a casual sundress and sandals.
“You look great,” I told her, trying not to stare at her cleavage, which happened to be at eye level when she was standing in front of me. I lowered my gaze to her bare legs before forcing myself to refocus on her face.
“Thanks,” she said, smiling. “I hope I smell better, too. Hint taken.”
“Hey! I wasn’t dropping hints – I swear,” I insisted, holding up my hands in defense. I felt my face heat up, but I wasn’t sure if the hot flash was because of embarrassment or a full bladder. “Do you mind if I use your bathroom, too?”
“Not at all. Go right ahead.” She stepped aside so I could roll past her.
The bathroom wasn’t designed to be wheelchair-accessible, but it was just big enough for me to maneuver my chair up to the toilet. Luckily, I didn’t need much room. I fumbled around with the supplies from my bag and drained my bladder, doing my best to hide the disposable catheter by putting it back in its packaging and folding it in half before I tucked it discreetly into the wastebasket under a wad of Kleenex. As far as I was concerned, it was too early to discuss bodily functions with Natalie, and I didn’t want her to find it and feel disgusted. When I was done, I washed my hands and wheeled back out of the bathroom.
Natalie was perched on the foot of the king-size bed, scrolling through her phone. “All good?” she asked, looking up at me.
I nodded. She must have noticed by now that it took me a long time to use the bathroom, but, thankfully, she didn’t ask any follow-up questions.
“Are you getting hungry yet?” I asked her.
She shook her head. “Are you kidding? I’m still full from brunch!”
“Well, how about we go for a drink then?”
Natalie nodded. “I can always go for a drink,” she said, smiling.
As she turned to grab her purse off the table, I noticed a small tattoo near her right shoulder blade. It was of a black bird, its feathery wings extended as if in mid-flight. “I love your tattoo,” I told her, a lump rising in my throat as I looked at it. It reminded me of the bird I had hallucinated in my hospital room. High on pain medication that made me paranoid, I had seen it as a death omen at first, but later, it had become a symbol of hope. “What is it, a raven or a blackbird?”
“Neither. It’s a crow,” she corrected me. “For my last name, Crawford. It comes from the words ‘crow’ and ‘ford,’ meaning a river crossing. I thought it was pretty fitting, considering how often I fly across bodies of water for work.”
“Ah… that’s cool. I like the meaning behind it.”
“Thanks!” she said, beaming as she slung her purse over her shoulder.
We went back downstairs to the hotel bar to kill some time before we felt hungry enough to head to a restaurant for dinner.
“Do you have any plans for Mother’s Day this Sunday?” Natalie asked, making conversation as we nursed our drinks.
“Mason and I will probably go over to my mom’s.” I shrugged. “Mother’s Day is kind of a weird holiday in our house, since Mason’s momma is in Heaven, and his nanny, Dawn… well, I told you she had a son with muscular dystrophy, right? Unfortunately, he died about five years ago, before she came to live with us. He was her only child, so it’s a hard day for her, too.”
“That’s awful.” Natalie’s face fell. “I’m so sorry.” I’m sure she wished she hadn’t brought it up.
“It’s okay. You didn’t know,” I said. “So, what are you doing for Mother’s Day?”
“Well, I’ll be in Dubai, so I won’t get to see my mom on Sunday, but I’ll send her flowers,” said Natalie. “She’s used to my work schedule.”
I nodded. “I know how that goes,” I said, thinking of all the holidays and birthdays I had spent in the studio or on the road. Was I crazy for giving up my “normal” life to go back to a musician’s lifestyle?
As if she could read my mind, Natalie asked, “How does your family feel about you being a Backstreet Boy again?”
“They’re happy for me, mostly. Of course, my mom’s worried about the toll it will take on me – you know, I’m not as young as I was the first time around, and I get tired more easily now ‘cause everything takes so much more effort. But she supports my decision. She just wants me to be happy.”
“And are you? Happy, I mean.”
“Yeah… I am.” I smiled across the table at her. “It’s taken me a long time to get to the point where I can honestly say that, but life is good. Not perfect, by any means, but certainly better than it was four years ago. It helps having something to look forward to again… and someone who makes me happy,” I added, looking her in the eye.
She blushed, smiling back. “You make me happy, too,” she replied, leaning forward in her chair.
“I bet you say that to some guy in every city you fly to,” I teased her.
She bristled, her smile abruptly twisting into a frown. “What are you trying to insinuate? That I’m a slut?”
“Of course not!” I said quickly. “I was just kidding.” Way to put your foot in your mouth, Kev, I thought, horrified that I had offended her.
“I know.” She winked. “I was just messing with you.”
“Oh.” I chuckled. “Phew. So, does that mean I’m the only one?”
“Honestly, I haven’t been in a relationship in over a year. So, yes,” she said, her smile returning. “You’re the only one.”
She had never talked about her dating history, but now I found myself curious about what kind of guys she had been with in the past. “You know what happened with my last relationship,” I said. “What about yours? How did it end?”
“With him cheating on me,” she said, shaking her head. “We were actually engaged until I found out he’d been having sleepovers with one of his female coworkers while I was out of town.”
“Ouch,” I said, cringing.
“Yeah… I dodged a bullet, though. His last name was ‘Titsworth.’ So if I had married him and taken his name, my name would have been…”
“Natalie Titsworth.” I snickered. “That’s terrible.”
She nodded. “In hindsight, I probably never should have accepted his proposal, but we’d been together for two years, and my parents were pushing me to get married and start a family like my perfect sister did,” she said, rolling her eyes. “He popped the question in front of them on Christmas Eve, so I felt pressured to say yes. Plus, I had just turned twenty-nine, and… I dunno; I guess it’s true what they say about a woman’s biological clock ticking. Something about being almost thirty made me feel like I should settle down and start trying for a baby before it’s too late. And now, I am thirty, and I have nothing to show for it.”
“Try being forty,” I replied with a wry smile. I had always known Natalie was younger than me, but until I heard her talking about turning twenty-nine, it hadn’t hit me just how much younger. “I get it, though. Kristin was a year older than me, and she felt that same sense of urgency to start a family once she hit her mid-thirties. She was almost thirty-seven when we had Mason. So, don’t worry – you still have plenty of time to start a family, if that’s something you want in the future.”
“I think I do… someday,” she said hesitantly. “But I also like my life the way it is now. I like the freedom of being able to fly anywhere in the world without having to worry about who I’m leaving behind.”
“But what about your cat?” I flashed her a playful smile. “Don’t you miss Colby Jack when you’re gone?”
“Of course,” she said, grinning back. “But you know better than I do that having a cat isn’t the same as having a kid. I bet it’s a lot harder for you to be away from Mason, isn’t it?”
I nodded. “For sure.” As much as I was looking forward to going back to London with the Boys in July, I knew I would miss Mason like crazy.
“I figured. When I have more seniority, I’ll be able to work a normal, nine-to-five type of schedule if I want to: wake up in Atlanta, work a domestic flight to a different city, turn around and fly back home, and sleep in my own bed. No nights. No weekends. Perfect for a family. But, frankly, that sounds boring to me. I like working long-haul flights, seeing cities all over the world, and having more days off each month to do whatever I want. Does that sound selfish?”
“Not at all. Having kids is a big commitment.”
“I know.” She sighed. “That’s what scares me.”
“It’s worth it, though,” I added, smiling. “Having Mason is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I would love to have more kids someday.” I paused. “Does that sound selfish?”
“No…” Natalie frowned. “Why would it?”
“Because I’m forty years old… and because I’m disabled. I would do anything for my son, but I can’t be the kind of hands-on dad I always wanted to be.”
She looked at me with sympathy in her eyes. “I’m sure he loves you, no matter what.”
I shrugged. “He doesn’t know any different. He was only six months old when I got hurt, so he has no memory of me the way I was before the accident. And maybe it’s better that way. He doesn’t realize how much he’s missing out on. But I do.”
“Don’t sell yourself short,” she said, offering me a reassuring smile. “You can still do a lot of things. Heck, you went horseback riding today! And soon, you’ll be back to touring the world with your band. When he’s old enough to understand what you do for a living, Mason’s gonna realize how lucky he is to have such a cool dad.”
“Thanks,” I said, smiling back at her. I knew she was only trying to make me feel better, but I supposed she had a point. There were still plenty of activities Mason and I could do together – with some modifications – and traveling was one of them. I couldn’t wait to take him on tour with me and show him the world. But, until then, I was content to take in the beautiful view right across from me.
***