Page 16 of Get Me to the Starting Line
Leah: I’ll find a race.
Julien: a half marathon?
My pride won’t let me do anything more than admit defeat today, so I shut down my computer before answering. Or taking it back. My heart rate increases just thinking about a half marathon, and I drop my head into my hands.
Thirteen miles. I think it’s thirteen. How am I supposed to run thirteen miles? I got winded hustling from the couch to the fridge for a snack during an ad break yesterday when I was watching TV.
I’ll need to give myself a lot of time. We won’t even be able to do the race until the Whales season is done. It’s October, which givesme eight months, assuming they make the playoffs. They usually do, so I’ll just have to plan for that.
I’m about to suck it up and search for a race when I hear Levi’s little voice call me from his room. He’s so cute right after his naps, his wayward brown hair sticking up all over the place, with the slightest curl at the ends.
He looks up with his big green eyes, the exact same shade as mine, and my heart stutters in my rib cage. I never knew I could love someone this much. It’s a wholly different feeling than the love I have for my parents and my sister.
When I fell in love with Ian, it was a roller coaster of anxiety and emotions. There was the thrill of chasing after him, of catching him when I thought he was so far out of my league.
He was popular and super outgoing with lots of friends. I was the quiet girl—nerdy, uncoordinated, and inexperienced. I should’ve known from the start that he was a red flag in disguise. He made me feel like I could never do any better, as if he was god’s fucking gift to mankind and I was lucky he’d graced my life with his presence. I didn’t know any better.
My dad died when I was thirteen, and I was old enough to understand that I was now responsible for helping my mom. I was the next oldest in the family, after all, and Paige was almost eleven. I threw myself into helping out any way I could—making dinners, baking, taking care of Paige while my mom fought like hell through her pain and supported us.
Until I met Ian, all I knew about love was it was unconditional. My dad’s love for us, my mom’s fierce devotion, my sister’s unwavering belief in me.
So when Ian told me he loved me, I believed him. I believed him when he told me it was my responsibility to make sure I was attractive for him—men need that. I believed him when he said he was helping me with my career. I believed him when he said he would never leave.
And then he left. I was so heartbroken when he left me after I took the pregnancy test. Not only was I losing the person I thought I’d spend the rest of my life with, but Levi would also grow up without a father. I’d lost my dad when I was a teenager, but at least I had him growing up. Levi would never have that.
I’m so glad he has Adam now, even Thomas. But it’s not the same. And I can’t bear to bring another man into his life just for him to leave too. I couldn’t bear it for him or for myself. Those familiar green eyes marvel at me as if I’m the only thing he needs.
How can I ever be enough for him?
Not wanting him to see me cry, I scoop him up and attempt to cuddle with him. But like any eighteen-month-old, he wiggles and squirms because he doesn’t put up with being confined.
“Can you say, ‘down’?” I ask Levi.
“Mamama,” he babbles.
Sighing at the futility of trying to get him to talk, I put him down and he toddles out of the room, straight for the kitchen. I don’t know what I’m going to do when he’s a teenager. He’s already eating me out of house and home.
I get him his lunch and sit down to eat my own food.
“You know, Levi, Mommy is going to start running,” I tell my oblivious toddler, who’s more interested in ripping the already cut up croissant into tinier pieces and shovelling them into his mouth than listening to me.
“Yup, this mean man is forcing Mommy to run thirteen miles! Isn’t that crazy?”
No response from my son, who is now smushing avocado in his little fists.
“Oh right, you’re a Canadian boy now. You want to know how many kilometres that is?” I take out my phone to Google it.
“Twenty-one! Holy shit,” I whisper.
“Shit,” Levi copies perfectly.
My eyes go wide. “Seriously?!”
I glare at my kid, whose first word was mama and now, his second word is shit. I’m a terrible mother.
Honestly, I’ll take it.
Even if the only words he says are swear words, I’ll be happy he’s speaking. The wait-list to see a doctor is so long, the appointment I got with the paediatrician is still two months away.
