Love Expectations (Season 1 of Nata and Phillip's Romance) ✔️

14. 'Where do I sign?'

Phillip

Nata turns away from me, straightens her legs, and flexes her toes a couple of times. I let her stall because the pause gives me a chance to breathe and think. What the hell am I playing at here? Because this conversation is nothing but play. Cannot be serious. I cannot actually be thinking of having a kid with this woman because I'm thirty-seven and I'm tired of the games that come with dating. If this were not a hypothetical? If this were an actual real possibility, however unconventional, would I do it? Would she? The prickly feeling in my chest is both fear and hope. What if it were possible?

The couch moves as Nata rises and leaves me sitting alone.

"The conception would work the usual way." She lifts the lid of the drip coffee machine on the counter and opens the cabinets above. "Sex is sex. It doesn't have to have the deeper transcendental meaning."

"You have lots of experience with casual sex?" I place my arms on the back of the couch and recline, opening my chest to take deeper breaths. This discussion feels both like an exam and an exercise in patience. If I pass, I might just get admitted into Nata's inner circle, I definitely want to be in.

"No." Nata pulls out brown paper coffee filters and places one into the machine. "That's not the point." She rounds the island and ruffles through the minefield of bags, suitcases, and boxes in the living room. "There's always IVF if someone is against the sex part. Although, I'd rather do the sex, than be pumped full of hormones." She picks up a box with a symbol of a food service company on it I've seen lots of ads for, and a smaller grocery bag. Her slow movements are the opposite of the speeding up beats of my heart. She sets the box on the counter-top in the kitchen. "If IVF is the only way—I'd do it. I'm very determined. But—"

"You'd rather have sex with a guy than go through IVF?" So much for patience. I wince at my loss of self-control. I've wooed so many clients and listened to their endless tales to placate them and I can't hold my mouth shut during a chat that has a lot more important things at stake than money.

Nata bites her lip and sets her hands on her hips. "It's consensual," she says with irritation seeping through her gritted teeth. "Both parties agree. No emotional attachments." She lifts her chin and meets my gaze. "And it's free."

"I don't care about the money part." I don't blink. Her words talk to me about the money, but I sense the unsaid conversation between us. The sussing out of the viability of this idea.

"I do." Nata drops her gaze and pulls an already opened container of ground coffee out of the bag. "My insurance doesn't cover IVF." She measures four tablespoonfuls into the filter lined opening on top of the coffee machine and pours water into the other portion. "I don't have the money for the first and last month to rent an apartment. That's why I'm in this situation." She gestures around the piles of her stuff in the living room that's getting dark. "Otherwise, I would've done it already. I'm ready to do whatever it takes. Sex with a stranger included."

Is she still joking? Or are we talking about something specific here?

I locate the switch and turn on the light on the lamp at the side table next to me. She squints from the sudden intrusion of brightness. "Could've warned me."

"Sorry. I wanted to see you clearly before I ask this next question." I wipe my sweaty palms on the couch and focus on the texture under my fingertips to pull my attention away from the rush of blood that heats my neck and wooshes in my ears. She's going to freak out. I'm freaking out too but I still want to do this. I clench my fists and look at Nata.

"What question?" She furrows her brow and gives me her tutor-Nata look of don't you-mess-with-me. I shouldn't ask her. What a ridiculous notion. She's just talking theoretically. I shouldn't have even thought of asking.