“So they are together but just divorced?” Harry looked confused again.
“No, they aren’t.” I sighed. “My mom is dating a doctor and my dad is dating a Salsa teacher.”
“And their partners don’t mind that they live together?”
I shrugged. “I dunno.”
“You don’t know?”
“I’ve never met them.”
“What?!?”
“It’s a long story.” I played with my hair and stared up at the ceiling. “I just wish they would get back together. I know they still love each other. My dad still buys her anniversary gifts.”
“Do they still sleep together?”
“It’s not always about sex, Harry.” I turned over to face him. “Sometimes two people are just meant to be together. It’s fated. God made them for each other. They are two parts of a whole.”
“Whoa God? That’s a bit heavy, isn’t it?” Harry raised an eyebrow at me and I stared at him earnestly.
“No. It’s true. Everyone has a soulmate. Someone that just gets you and loves you for who you are, forever and always.”
“Forever and always?”
“Yeah. Someone you can just lay with and not say anything. Someone who knows what you’re thinking.”
“Oh someone with ESP?” Harry’s lips twitched and I frowned.
“No. And I don’t think it’s nice to make fun of me. What’s your problem?”
“I don’t have a problem, Sarah. I just don’t want you to be disappointed.” He came and lay down on the bed with me. “You’re still young. I don’t want you to waste your life away waiting for some perfect man to come riding along on a white horse. Real life is not like that.”
“Just because you’re not like that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.”
“Edward Cullen is a fictional character, Sarah.”
“What?”
“Isn’t that who all you youngsters love now? He’s not real.”
“Never.” I rolled my eyes at him. “Plus, I’m team Jacob anyway.”
“Team what?”
I laughed and rolled into him. “Do you always have to act your age and not know anything I’m talking about?”
“Maybe.” He smiled at me gently and stroked my hair.
“So tell me again why you don’t believe in love?” I paused. “Your parents are still together, right?”
“Yes, they are. They’ve been together for forty years now.” He smiled wistfully.
“And while they infuriate each other, they do seem to have something real.”
“So why don’t you believe in love?” My voice expressed the confusion in my brain.
“It’s not a real emotion, Sarah. Humans are selfish beings by nature. No-one will love you more than they love themselves. Which means that ultimately they will always do what benefits them the most.”
“That’s not true.”
“Yes. Yes, it is.”
“Your parents are still in love.”
“I don’t know if my mom would have loved my dad if he was poor.” His voice cracked and he looked away from me.
“What? What do you mean?”
He sighed and looked at me with sadness in his eyes. “When I was sixteen I saw my mom in bed with another man.” He paused. “It was my father’s best friend, our butler.”
“Your butler?”
“Yes. John is his name. He’s a good man. Anyway, his father had been our family butler and so he and my father had grown up together. My mom had met John first and was actually dating him when she met my father.”
“Oh.”
“She promptly left John and was married to my dad within six months. But it seemed that it was John that she really loved.”
“Wow. She told you this?” I felt horrible for John hearing Harry talk.
“No. Of course not.” He sighed. “But I heard them talking. She apologized to him and told him she was sorry and that she would always love him.”
“Oh wow.” I pulled him close to me. “I’m sorry, Harry.”
“That’s okay.” He sighed. “But that was when I knew. If my own mother, who everyone thought was deeply in love with my dad could pull the wool over everyone’s eyes, then anyone could. If John had been the one with the money she would be married to him now and not my dad.”
“You don’t know that for sure, Harry.”
“Women are attracted to the man that can best take care of them, regardless of love. They will leave the man they think they love for the man with power.”
“Not all women.”
“I’m not willing to take the chance.” He frowned and trailed his hand across my br**sts. “Besides, I like meaningless sex with different women. It’s a lot more exciting.”
“Yeah, I guess it is.” I smiled weakly at him, trying to not let him see how much pain his words had caused me I didn’t want to be the girl he had meaningless sex with. I wanted to be more special than that.
Chapter 12
I was scared to meet Harry’s family. I wasn’t sure what they were going to think of me. I knew what I would think if I was a family member of his. I’d think that I was some young gold digger who was just after his money. I mean, I was really really starting to like Harry. More than I wanted to admit but I knew most people wouldn’t think we had much in common. And in reality, we really didn’t. But we were comfortable together and while he laughed and shook his head at my kookiness, he didn’t act embarrassed to be around me. I didn’t see him making weird faces when I started acting goofy and I appreciated that. I had never had good luck with guys and my most serious boyfriend wanted me to change who I was. I’d never forget when he told me to grow up and act like an adult when I had pretended to be royalty in a restaurant. He’d gone beet red as I had spoken in a French accent. I’d thought it was really funny because everyone knew there hadn’t been any royalty in France since the French Revolution but he didn’t seem to get the joke.
I sat in the car with Harry and pretended to be asleep, although I was peeking at the houses through my eyes. His family lived in some town in Connecticut and as we kept driving the houses got bigger and bigger. When he finally pulled into a long driveway, I thought my eyes were going to pop out. I mean, I knew he was a billionaire but I had never had any reality of what that meant. But staring at the grand mansion that looked bigger than Buckingham Palace, I was beginning to understand.