Page 41 of Mistletoe Dreams
For him, the only hurdle he had to get over was his son's permission.
"I think she's awesome. She's always teaching me new things. I learn something new every day. It's always interesting too. And she has great stories about when she was learning to be a doctor and even in school. Did you know that they cut up dead bodies?" Mason asked, sounding amazed.
Well, this wasn't exactly where he thought the conversation was going.
"I believe they're called cadavers."
"Yeah. That's what she said too."
"I guess I did know that. But it's not something I think about a lot," he said, trying to keep the irony out of his voice.
"Why? Hannah is a good influence on me. You're always talking about how I need to have good influences. You weren't going to make me spend less time in the medical center, were you?" Mason asked, pausing as he picked up the wood that Ben had just split and looking at his dad with concern.
"No. On the contrary, I was hoping we could spend more time with her." He paused and then took a breath. "I was hoping it would be okay with you if Hannah and I dated. I'm interested in her, and I guess I wouldn't date her lightly. I would be thinking about marrying her eventually."
Maybe that was too much for his kid, but he didn't see the point in pretending anything else.
Mason stood staring, holding the wood, although it seemed to be forgotten in his arms.
"Like Dr. Reynolds would be my mom?"
"Your mom will always be your mom. But... I guess she'd be like a second mom, yeah. Eventually. I haven't asked her yet, but I wanted to make sure it was okay with you first."
Mason's face had fallen, and he stared at the ground, his nose wrinkled a little, obviously thinking hard about it. Ben preferred thatover an off-the-cuff answer that maybe didn't take everything into consideration.
Of course, Mason was not an adult, and it wasn't like he wouldn't change his mind a million times.
"Do you think she'll leave?" he finally asked, looking back up at Ben. "Do you think she'll decide that she doesn't like me after all?"
That cracked his heart. He hated the fact that was what Mason had taken away from the experience with his mom. That she would leave, and that it meant she didn't care for him.
He didn't want to defend his ex, and he didn't want to say anything that wasn't true. But he also didn't want Mason to carry around scars from what someone had done to him, and a parent had the power to hurt a child more than any other person in the world.
"Sometimes people do things and we can't control those things. It has nothing to do with us, and it has everything to do with them. I know that's a really hard lesson, and it's kind of hard to differentiate between what's their responsibility and what's our responsibility. But if someone leaves you or doesn't seem to like you, it's not necessarily your fault." He paused. "I'm not saying we can't always look at ourselves and try to be better, but when you're talking about a parent, it's not the child's responsibility to be the kind of person that will make a parent stay. Does that make sense?"
Mason's brows had drawn down, like he was thinking about what Ben had said.
"I guess so. You're telling me that it's not my fault that Mom left."
"Right. I could've been a better husband, I could've been a better dad, I could've been a better person, but that really has nothing to do with your mom leaving. She had to make the decision to do what she said she was going to do and fulfill her responsibilities. She chose not to. That's not our fault."
"I guess I understand. But you're right. I do wonder if sometimes—if I had been a better kid, maybe if I'd gotten better grades orhadn't caused so much trouble. There was a time I colored on the wall and one time I scratched the table with my knife?—"
"Stop. All of those things are normal things that kids do. I could go on and on about the things I did too. But again, when people around you don't meet your expectations, that doesn't mean you get mad at them and leave. That means you love them anyway. And that's what we have to do. I guess your mom can decide if that's what she wants to do or she wants to do something else, and that's where we have to realize that we can't control her. We can only control ourselves."
"That makes sense. But I guess it doesn't really answer my question about Dr. Reynolds. Is she going to stay?"
"She's the kind of woman who does. Yeah." He hoped he was right about that. It was part of the reason why he felt like he was falling in love with her. Because she was the kind of person who did what God wanted her to do rather than what she wanted herself. She was also the kind of person who looked around to see who she could help rather than looking around to see how she could help herself. Those were two of the main things that he loved about her.
Did he love her? It seemed a little soon to think so, but the kind of love he was thinking about wasn’t the kind the world thought of. It was deeper and better than that. He should tell her.
"I guess there aren't any guarantees in life. We can't say for sure that she will or she won't. We can only control ourselves."
Mason said the last two words with him, and they laughed.
"I guess what I was asking is if it was okay with you, I would like for Dr. Reynolds to eventually be part of our family. But you're part of this family too, and every decision I make affects you as well."
"If I say no, are you going to not date her?"
