No Expectations

Virgínia

I couldn't hold back until the evening to try to talk sensibly with Murilo and tell him about the unwanted pregnancy. I would not be a hypocrite to say that being pregnant would not be a problem in my life, or that it would be easy.

A child requires many things that I couldn't offer at this time, but with a lot of struggle, plus one I would try to do my best, and now that I had the store, the possibilities were much better.

But commerce was something amazing, and I knew that I needed, together with Mariana, to be aware of the constant changes in the fashion market and be as prepared as possible to meet our customers' needs. We could not fail. I could not fail.

Despite the excellent value I had achieved with Murilo, I didn't want to talk about an auction anymore, that word was erased from my vocabulary, I had almost no money left from what I had received, and now I needed to save even more to wait for the arrival of this child.

I must not count on Murilo. I grew up surrounded by children who had no father present, in any sense, and I already had a good idea of how difficult this new phase that would begin in my life would be.

If I, having my father and mother together, always working to give me what they could, had already gone through several difficulties, how much more a mother alone take on all the responsibility?

I asked Mariana to take care of everything on her own, but I didn't tell her about having anticipated my meeting with Murilo.

I didn't want her to insist again about the fact that Murilo was rich and that like it or not, he needed to help me, even if only financially. I didn't think like that and would only be doing my part, which was to tell him about the pregnancy and let him decide what to do with the news.

Although I didn't believe that he could be some kind of a thug and that he could do me any harm by knowing about my pregnancy, I couldn't rule out this possibility.

The truth was that even if he wasn't a crook, he might be married or something, and if he felt pressured to take on a child he didn't want, he would eventually do something against me as well.

These were maddeningly pessimistic thoughts, but every day, we could see cases like these in the newspapers, and I feared that I would be one of them.

I even thought about not telling, but my conscience would not leave me alone if I did something like that.

But I was determined to just tell, with no pressure and no strings attached. The next step had to come from him, and with this thought, in mind, I sat down at one of the tables in the food court of the shopping center where my store was located, the ones in front of the place where I always had my meals when I was there.

I thought of waiting for Murilo and only then ordering something, but a huge desire to eat lasagna took over me and I couldn't wait for him to arrive to order a portion from one of the waiters.

Murilo had said, when I anxiously decided to call him, that he would be at the place I had arranged with him within twenty minutes and when I looked at my cell phone it was sixteen hours and twenty-five minutes, that is, it was exactly the twenty minutes that I had called.

At that moment, I noticed an approach to my table and thought it was the waiter bringing my lasagna, but when I raised my head with a polite smile on my lips, I found Murilo and all the magnitude of his manly beauty.

" I hope I haven't kept you waiting too long, " He spoke, still standing in front of me.

" Please, sit down, " I said.

I could tell by his disappointed look that he expected me to stand and greet him, as would have been the correct thing to do in a normal situation where two people meet to talk.

But what he did not yet know was that this was not a normal situation.

He looked at one of the chairs beside me, but to my satisfaction, he pulled out the chair in front of me and sat down, staring at me still with displeasure in his gaze, but which I imagined was not exactly directed at me, but rather at what I had done. Or failed to do, would be more correct.

Murilo seemed to be a very transparent person in what he felt, and he used to make all his emotions clear.

I looked at him carefully and prepared myself for the difficult task ahead of me, and seriously considered the possibility of giving up, moving on with my life, and trying to raise my son the best way I could.

I felt a pang of guilt as I thought about how considerate Murilo had been to me the two times we had met and even when he didn't owe me anything, like when we were in that room together at the Season Hot nightclub, he was still an extremely kind and caring man and if there was no trauma for what I did, he had all the credit for it.

The least I could do to reciprocate was to tell him about my pregnancy and the fact that he would be a father very soon.

"From your expression, I can deduce that something has happened.”

Since my expression couldn't have been better at that moment, he already had a good idea about the content of the conversation.

" I have something to tell you and I don't think you will be at all pleased," I said.

I intended to make it clear from the start that I was not expecting anything from him.

"I don't think I don't understand a thing.”

"To answer your question directly, something did happen. And this "something" is…”

" Excuse me... " The waiter spoke, approaching me with my large portion of lasagna accompanied by a large glass of soda.

When the waiter left, Murilo looked at the table set with my meal and, frowning, smiled charmingly, with just one corner of his mouth, and if I already considered him handsome before, now he had just gained another attribute.

" Didn't you have lunch? " he asked, trying to be polite.

I wanted to resist the wonderful smell of lasagna in front of me and finish what I wanted to say to Murilo and only then eat, but I wasn't strong enough and grabbed the cutlery, preparing myself to be as rude as ever.

" I did eat lunch. But I couldn't resist this wonderful lasagna " I replied.

I said this without any embarrassment, and before speaking again, I first needed to put some of the lasagnas in my mouth and check if it tasted as good as it smelled.

" Back to our subject... " I was already putting another bite in my mouth.

" Wait a minute " Murilo interrupted me, his forehead even more frowny than before and an understanding expression on his face "Are you pregnant?”