He Will Be Mine (New Horizon Book 1)

Reality Check: Matt

Late Sunday morning, following some hangover pancakes and lots of hydration, I tell everyone I need to head to the library to get caught up on some homework. It is true, and I might eventually end up doing that, but for now I just need to get away and find some privacy so that I can call Aly's mom. I need to just get it over with. At worst, it will be the most uncomfortable thing I've ever done, but hopefully she is as good of a confidant as Aly says.

I get in my van and drive back to the nature park where Aly and I were a few weeks ago. Not only is there no one around, but it seems appropriate to make the call in the same place she suggested it to me.

I take a deep breath, allowing my thumb to hover over the green call button next to her mom's name and number in my contacts. Finally, I force myself to just do it, and slam my thumb down to make the call before I can change my mind.

As I hear the line ringing, I start to panic. What am I even going to say to this woman? This stranger I haven't even met before. Then I realize that is a good thing. Sometimes, it's easier to talk to someone you don't know.

"Hello?" I hear a woman's voice say. She does kind of sound like Aly, so it must be her mother.

"Mrs. Bentley?" I ask. I mentally kick myself when it occurs to me that I didn't even say hello.

"Yes, this is she. Is this Matt?" comes her response, catching me off-guard. I guess Aly must have given her my number too. That was smart. That way if I chickened out and hung up before she answered, she would still know I called.

I clear my throat, hoping to clear some of the nerves. "Uh, yeah, this is Matt. Aly's friend." Ugh, she knows that already.

"Hi, Matt. I've been hoping to hear from you. Aly always has such good things to say about you."

"Uh, she does?"

She laughs. "She does. Does this surprise you?"

"I mean, yeah, a little. I would have guessed she would mostly tell you what a jerk I am."

"She doesn't seem to think you are. Why would you say that?"

I think she might already be shrinking me, or whatever you call it. Aly did say she's a counselor or something like that.

"I just, uh, I don't know. I guess I feel like a jerk because I know Aly likes me and I feel like I keep yanking her around."

"But you've been clear about being with someone else."

I guess Aly is pretty close to her mom. She seems to know all about the situation. Not sure if that's a good thing or bad thing.

"Well, yeah, I have, with my words at least. My actions, though, might make her think otherwise. I don't know why I'm telling you this. It isn't why I called, to debate whether I'm a jerk."

"Isn't it?" she laughs. I decide I like the sound of her laugh. She's like Aly, laid back and not judgmental. She's not laughing at me; she's laughing because she enjoys me. I think.

"Well, alright then, tell me why you did call, Matt," she prompts. "Don't worry about who I am or what I already know, tell me what's on your mind, in however much detail you're comfortable with."

"Okay, well, uh, I don't even know where to begin. I guess I should start by saying I saw Aly a long time ago, when we were teenagers. I didn't really get a chance to meet her or anything, but she stuck with me. I had this secret crush on a stranger, and she became this standard I compared all other girls to. Not the real her, obviously, but the person she was in my mind. Honestly, now that I have met her, there isn't a lot of difference between the two. She's just as smart, funny, outgoing, athletic, and beautiful as I always pictured her to be."

"That's really sweet, Matt," Mrs. Bentley chimes in after I have gone quiet for a moment.

I kind of chuckle awkwardly, wondering if I should thank her for the compliment or just keep going. I choose the latter.

"So, fast forward a couple years or so, and I meet Jessica, my now fiancée. She was one of my best friends' roommates when we all started college together, and we started hanging out a lot because of it. At first, I didn't really like her, but over time she grew on me. She comes off as this complete b***h to most people before they get to know her, but I eventually realized it's a defense mechanism. She likes to keep people at bay until she knows she can trust them. She has lived this weird paradox of a life where on one hand, she has been completely spoiled and always had everything she ever asked for delivered to her on a silver platter, and on the other hand, she has never been able to count on the people in her life to be there in any meaningful way, including her parents. They're distant when it comes to their time and affection, but if ever there is something they can throw money at to make her happy, they're all over that."

"So, you got close to her," she prompts when I pause again.

"Yeah, I did, and it happened before I really realized it. One day, we were just friends, or more like acquaintances, and the next thing I know, we're making out at this party and I'm into it. Like really into it, in a way I hadn't experienced before. There are still some things about her personality that annoy me, for sure, but they're not important things. Especially if it is just us and she doesn't feel the need to put on that performance she gives everyone else, she can be really sweet. It feels good to have someone give me that kind of attention, too. I've never really had that."

"So, the trouble started when I ran into Aly again," I continue explaining. "Up until then, it was all about Jessica, and when we had a talk about where our relationship was going, it wasn't hard for me to decide that I was going to marry her. If the choice is between marrying her or losing her, it's easy. Marry her. But then it was only a couple weeks later that ..."

"Hold on, I'm sorry to interrupt," Mrs. Bentley cuts in, "but I want you to go back to what you just said. The part about where your choice was between marrying her or losing her. Why were those your only two options?"

"Uh," I find myself feeling nervous again. I hate having to admit this part. I know it makes Jess look bad. "So, you know how I was saying Jess has some serious trust and abandonment issues? Well, that comes into play sometimes, and she starts questioning my devotion to her, and one of those times she as much as gave me an ultimatum. She said that since we've been together over two years, it's time to start thinking about whether we have a future together. Then she said that unless I get serious about her and ask her to marry me soon, she would have to break it off and move on because she didn't want to waste any more time on someone who just sees her as a college girlfriend, a stepping stone rather than my forever relationship. It stunned me, because honestly, I wasn't planning on thinking about anything like that until after graduation and finding a job, but she isn't wrong. Two years is a long time, long enough to know whether you see a future with a person."

"Maybe so, but I'm just going to come right out and say this – ultimatums are not signs of healthy relationships. I would call that a red flag, honestly."

"I know. I just feel like I understand where she is coming from and why she worries the way she does, and if it makes her feel more secure having a ring on her finger that tells her we're something serious, then it's not a big deal to just give her that."

"It is a big deal, though, Matt. It's a huge deal because it's not just a ring. It's a promise to marry her, which means a promise to plan a wedding with her, and that means a promise to spend the rest of your life with her. Promising a lifetime is not something to be done lightly to make someone feel better. It's something that must come from the heart. When you say those things, and when you do things like put a ring on her finger, you have to mean it. Otherwise, you're part of the problem. Lying to her to make her feel like she can count on you when she really can't is just as bad as being someone she knows she can't count on. Maybe worse, because you deceive her in the process, and then later when she finds out the truth, she learns she can't even trust herself to tell who is good for her."

My heart sinks as she goes on talking and saying out loud the things I've been worrying about privately for a while. It hurts to hear them, but this is what Aly promised me. I know I needed to hear it. And yet, I still feel a need to try to defend myself.

"I hear what you're saying, and trust me, I think about exactly that all the time. But I just need you to understand that when I asked her to marry me, I thought it was what I wanted, beyond a shadow of a doubt. I mean, yeah, I would have preferred to wait, but I figured if the outcome is the same in the end anyway, then it doesn't matter when."

"But now you have doubts."

I nod, though it occurs to me as soon as I do it that she can't see me. "Now I have doubts," I confirm out loud. "Part of me wonders if I always had doubts, but they were just easier to ignore before."

"I wonder that, too. In fact, I suspect that is the case."

I sigh heavily. "Me too. Ever since Aly came back into my life, and this time for real as someone I can talk to, and touch, and be friends with, I can't keep those doubts pushed down. She literally gets in my face and calls me out on them, but even before that, just seeing her made me rethink things a little. She was always my standard of what the right girl for me would be like, and Jessica is so different from her. Things feel so easy and natural with Aly, and yet Jess and I have history together. Plus, I would hate to be just another guy who gets her hopes up and lets her down. I don't know if I could live with myself for doing that."

"If you have doubts now, just imagine how much bigger they will get before the wedding, or after. What you need to do is sit down and think carefully about why you are getting married in the first place. You want to make sure it is for the right reasons, and not because you panicked at the idea of breaking up with your long-term girlfriend, and not because you want her to feel better or to think of you as a certain kind of person. You have to mean it. You have to be certain that she is the one person you can picture yourself spending the rest of your life with, living a happy life together."

"You think Jess isn't the one for me," I conclude. Of course she does. Jess isn't Aly.

"Honestly, Matt, I don't know. I'm not in your head, or in your heart. I only want you to be certain that she is the one before you dig yourself into a deeper hole. I'm urging you to think about it very carefully and not rush into anything because other people are pressuring you. An ultimatum is not something given out of love, it is meant to manipulate you, to corner you into deciding a certain way. That's not right. If she's your best choice of partner, let her prove it. If you need some time to think more about it, ask her for that. Tell her you need to hit pause for a little bit. Is she going to have feelings about that? Of course she will. But she needs to have faith in you and be able to show you that she has faith in you. If she can't trust you now, how will she ever trust you when you're married? What gesture will you be able to think up to help soothe her doubts when she already has that ring she so desperately wanted?"

"I suppose that's a good point," I concede. I've been wanting to talk to Jess about some of this but have been avoiding it because I'm afraid how she will react. Mrs. Bentley is right, though, that I'm not the only one with something to prove here.

"And I sincerely hope you take it to heart. It's okay to need time and space to think. It's okay to ask for the things you need too and not always be the guy going around making sure everyone else is taken care of before you. And you know what? You don't only have two options here. It isn't a matter of choosing Jess or Aly. It's a matter of choosing what is best for Matt, and the answer to that might be neither of them. The answer might be some time to yourself to sort out your head and figure out what matters to you and what you want from life."

"Wow," is all I say to that for a moment. It's kind of mind-blowing to hear someone say that I just need to worry about me for a change. "But that feels kind of selfish to just be thinking about me in all this."

"No, you're not just thinking about you if you choose to focus on yourself. You would be choosing what's best for all of you if you don't feel ready to jump into something serious with either of them. Commitments are meaningless if you don't mean them. Going into something half-hearted and full of doubt is the selfish choice, Matt. Figure out what you really want, feel it in the deepest part of your soul, know for certain that it's right for you, and then act. Not before. Not if you care about those girls and want them to be loved the way they deserve. Because the truth is, if you're not all in, there is someone better out there for them."

She hit me right in the feels with everything she told me, and I feel like I got punched in the gut. It's a good feeling, though, as weird as that seems. I feel like someone is giving me permission to be conflicted and telling me to demand what I need. I needed that, to start with. I needed someone to be in my corner and rooting for me. I know my next move needs to be to talk to Jess, as much as it turns my stomach just thinking about it.

As far as Aly, though, potential in-laws go in the pro column for sure. Before we hung up, I made sure to ask her mom if I can call and talk to her again sometime, and she told me I had better. I need more people like that in my life.