It has been several years since I have been this nervous. Unfortunately, I remember that time quite clearly. It was the day Carrie and I had met for lunch, and I had to make the words come out of my mouth that I was engaged. Up until I saw her that first time in the Hamptons, I had been fairly successful in convincing myself that I was over her. Well, I had convinced my head….Evidently my heart was slow in getting the message.
Christ…Thinking about the past is not going to do me any good while I am trying to close this deal. And that's what I have to think of it as, or I will never get through it.
Because…what will happen if this blows up in my face? How will it all play out? It won't change anything on my end, but one way or the other, people will be hurt. And no matter the way everything plays out, it will be Carrie who is hurt. And that is the one thing I promised myself (not anyone else) I would never intentionally do again.
I'm under no illusion that things are going to be smooth sailing from here on out. I'm too arrogant and full of it and she's too persistent and feisty to let me get away with it. We're both too stubborn and set in our ways not to have the seldom war…We are after all war buddies!
But the way I know it will be okay is this little idiotic smirk/grin I have had on my face since she said "Take me home" on a bridge in Paris. I swear to God I haven't stopped feeling giddy since.
Good God, I am losing it….Because, evidently while I was lost in my haze of memories, I hadn't noticed my guests for the evening arriving. But they had noticed me and they are definitely looking at me like I have lost my mind. Well…you know what….maybe I have.
At last I seem able to shake out of my trance to open the door and allow them to precede me into this damn coffee shop once again…This place is starting to give me nightmares.
We take a seat at the same table I sat at and almost begged for their approval to go after Carrie. If what I was feeling that night was nervousness, now I am downright terrified…
This all started earlier in the week when I was thinking about how/when/where to ask MY kid to marry me. I suddenly had this feeling that just proposing wasn't enough. After the past six years of pushing and pulling, taking and not quite giving, I needed to make absolute certain that noting or no one (or in this case no ones) would hold us back.
And so that's when I put my plan into action. I called 'the girls,' Carrie's girls, and asked them for another meeting.
I can honestly say that I wasn't worried when I first made the calls; after all they had allowed me to go to Paris to get her. But then…something strange happened…I started to wonder if their sending me was for me to get Carrie back in my life or for them to get Carrie back in their life.
That's when I made the final decision. I first called Charlotte, and explained my proposition. And then I berated myself for using the word 'proposition' with these girls…I should know better. Finally, after having been chewed out over a misunderstanding, I was able to explain what it was I had in mind.
She offered to call Miranda and Samantha and explain the situation, but I told her it was something I needed to do. So now…here we are, and I am preparing myself for the worse interrogation of a lifetime.
My plan was simple – I want to propose to Carrie and I want their blessings before I do so. What can I say, some men ask the girl's father…that would have been easy compared to this. Fathers don't know every single intimate detail of their daughter's past.
But the women sitting in front of me not only knew the girl's past, but they in all likelihood knew most of mine as well. It's a very unsettling thought to willingly put yourself in front of a firing squad, but it's what I had to do.
The rules are…There are no rules. Any question can be asked, but every question has to be answered. And should I, by some gigantic miracle survive, then maybe, just maybe, I will get that blessing I am so desperately looking for.
Taking a deep breath, I look at each lady and say…Fire away.
