by Nicola Marsh
It’s unhealthy, becoming dependent on this man for comfort. It won’t end well. It can’t.
But for now, I allow his shallow breathing to lull me toward sleep. It’s the only time I don’t have nightmares, a few snatched hours of slumber in his arms.
I better not get used to it.
Twenty-Three
Claire
The evening our second meeting with Jodi got canceled I serve my famous ten-minute pasta, fast-cooked spaghetti with a stir-in tomato sauce and sprinkled with Parmesan and parsley, and sit at the dining table opposite Dane.
With our manic work schedules we rarely get to sit down to dinner together, so while I hated not being on active duty the last few weeks I enjoyed a stint at playing domestic goddess. Not that I’m fooling anyone; we both know I’m an atrocious cook. But it’s the effort that counts.
I’m waiting for him to ask me how my first day back at work has been. He doesn’t. In fact, he’s almost salivating as he stares at the pasta, waiting for me to serve so we can eat.
Not that I feel like it. I’ve lost my appetite since we still haven’t had confirmation from Ris that Jodi is keen on us parenting her baby.
Ris reports that today’s cancellation means nothing and that Jodi is saying all the right things, but she hasn’t started the legal proceedings. It doesn’t inspire me with confidence that this girl holds our parenting future in her hands. I know if we don’t get Jodi’s baby we’ll get another but it could take years and now that I’ve got my hopes up I’m anxious to embrace parenthood sooner rather than later.
I’ve been foolish. Searching cribs online, checking out cute outfits in boutique windows, trolling the grocery aisles to investigate the various brands of formula. Crazy, when we have no guarantee we’ll get this baby but I can’t help myself. For the last year since I ditched my contraception and we started trying I’ve been obsessed with all things baby.
Not that anyone knows. I hadn’t told Ris and Elly we’d been trying because knowing Ris she’d buy me a bassinet before I could say ‘baby shower’ and Elly would’ve feigned polite interest. Even Dane has no idea how thoroughly baby-focused I’ve been.
When I hadn’t fallen pregnant after ten months of vigorous trying – a benefit my husband had enjoyed immensely but had almost turned into a chore for me after a while – we’d made the decision to check our fertility. I’ve been on an emotional rollercoaster ever since. For every one of those ten months when I’d pee on a stick and will those two blue lines to show, I’d make deals with a God I barely believed in.
‘If I’m pregnant, I’ll do whatever it takes to keep our baby safe and happy.’
‘If I’m pregnant, I’ll make our baby a priority and put my precious career on hold.’
‘If I’m pregnant, I’ll consider telling Dane the truth about my slip before our wedding.’
The last one terrified me and God probably knew it, which is why I didn’t fall pregnant no matter how hard we tried. Telling Dane about my infidelity before our wedding would crush him and I love him too much to risk losing him. We’ve been happy for a decade, why ruin it? Instead, I let guilt ruin my self-esteem, eroding it slowly but surely when I got my period every month like clockwork.
I’d done this to us.
Contracting that STD, I’d been warned by the doc at the time it could result in problems conceiving. But another doc had given me the all-clear so I hadn’t worried. Until I wondered if not being able to give Dane a child was my punishment for withholding the truth from him. I convinced myself it was. I’d been shattered when the fertility specialist had announced Dane couldn’t father a child, but I couldn’t deny I also felt a tremendous relief.
I wasn’t to blame.
But I continue to pay for my sins every single day because the last year has taken its toll. Once I resurrected the old guilt through constant self-flagellation, I can’t put it back in its box. It gnaws away at me, prickling and niggling at the oddest of times.
I’m hoping a baby will take all my focus and catapult me into a future of diapers and feeds without time to dwell on anything but playing happy families with Dane. So until I hear from Ris that Jodi has started signing adoption papers, we’re in limbo. I hate it.
Dane, on the other hand, tucks into his pasta like he hasn’t eaten in a week, oblivious to the worry churning my gut and making eating impossible. I’m puzzled by his apparent indifference, like he doesn’t care either way if we get to start our family sooner than later.
He’s been so supportive of this idea from the start, but ever since we got the call from Ris that the meeting with Jodi was canceled, he hasn’t seemed fazed. I’ve been a mess but pretending to hide it considering it had been my first day back on the job today and I can’t afford to screw up. No more time off. No losing it at a crime scene. I love being a cop. It’s part of my identity. And I’ve lost my way recently, like a tiny part of me broke when I acknowledged I’ll never be pregnant.
Ron nursed me through today, even though I didn’t need it. We had an easy eight-hour shift. Two call-outs: one to a domestic involving a jealous boyfriend having the house locks changed on him, the other to a DUI, a soccer mom who enjoyed one too many wines at a long lunch. Thankfully I didn’t run into Griffin, who was consulting in the city. I wish he’d stay there. But I know I’ll face an inevitable confrontation at some stage; I’m just glad it wasn’t on my first day back.
After the call-outs I spent the rest of my day tied to my desk doing endless paperwork, drinking coffee and glancing at my cell, hoping Ris would call with good news. She didn’t. Being back at work is good for me now I have something to look forward to and I’m not wallowing in my misery anymore. I’ve been grieving for something I never had and it has taken its toll, the ever-present, bone-deep sorrow that I won’t be pregnant and won’t have a chance to raise my biological child.
Working through that grief has taken time, several weeks, which my husband seems to have coped with admirably. While Dane has seen the fallout from my grieving, he doesn’t seem to realize how much of a big deal it is that I’m back at work. All he’s asked since I walked in the door half an hour ago is ‘How was work?’ A generic greeting that has me stewing since. We rarely fight but his blasé attitude makes me want to get some kind of reaction out of him.
I push my spaghetti around on the plate with a fork while he shovels pasta into his mouth as fast as humanly possible. When he’s done, he dabs his mouth with a napkin and pats his belly.
“That was good, babe, thanks.” He glances at my untouched plate and frowns. “Not hungry?”
“No.” I nudge the plate away and lay down my fork. “Aren’t you the slightest bit bothered that Jodi canceled the meeting today and hasn’t given us the go-ahead yet?”
A flicker of unease darkens his eyes to indigo. “Ris warned us about this. It might not be smooth sailing so no point getting worked up because Jodi’s taking extra time making up her mind.”
I huff out a breath, his eternal optimism one of the things I love about him but tonight I want a wallowing buddy, someone to offload my fears to, namely what if Jodi changes her mind?
“I adore you but your ability to constantly see the positive side of every situation is infuriating.”
He chuckles but I don’t join in, poking my tongue out at him. “What’s really bugging you?”
I can’t tell him the truth so I settle for a lame half-truth. “Being back at work today was a big deal for me and you barely asked me anything about it.”
He fixes me with a baleful stare. “I asked you how was work, you said fine. I didn’t want to push. From past experience if you’ve got something to say you’ll usually say it.” He reaches out to touch me. “I’m not a mind reader and I know there’s something more going on up here,” he taps his temple, “that you’re not telling me.”
I want to tell him. I’ve wanted to tell him for years but can never summon the courage for fear of losing him. We’ve never kept secrets from one another.
Secrets are poison. I know it. I’ve coped all these years and if I don’t get a grip now, my entire world could implode.
Thinking about secrets reminds me about the phone message weeks ago from Beau, along with another two terse ‘Call me’ messages since that have all been deleted. I’d intended on asking him about why he’s avoiding Beau’s calls but with all the baby business it has slipped my mind until now.
“Maybe I’m not the only one with something on my mind?” I point to the phone. “Why did you lie to me that night at the supper party?”
Shock widens his eyes for a second before he quickly masks it with indifference. “What are you talking about?”
“I heard the phone message, the one from your brother, who’s freaking out over that conversation you had at the supper party. And he’s called a few times since.” I rest my forearms on the table and lean forward, my classic cop interrogation posture.
It doesn’t sit well with me, that I have to ask my husband questions about something he’s hidden, when we usually share everything. Then again, I realize how hypocritical that is when I haven’t shared the worst with him.
“That night, you said it was someone from work. Why did you lie?”
His glance shifts away, so unlike Dane I’m taken aback. “Beau’s going through some really personal stuff and he doesn’t want anyone to know about it but me.”
My stomach sinks. He still can’t look me in the eye, which means he’s lying again.
I call him on it. “That’s crap and you know it.”
Foreboding churns my gut as I wonder what is so terrible that Dane can’t tell me the truth let alone look at me. “If you told me you were talking to Beau on the phone that night and that it was personal I wouldn’t have asked anything beyond how he is.”
“Just leave it alone, okay?” He leaps from his chair so fast it slams against the wall behind him.
This time I’m the one in shock as he makes a grab for his plate and knocks over the Parmesan grater, scattering cheese all over the floor.
“Fuck,” he mutters, grabbing a dishcloth and getting down on his hands and knees to clean it up.
I have no idea what’s going on but I realize something. Secrets breed discontent and if I can’t tell him about my slip up all those years ago, maybe I should come clean about Griffin. I’ve pushed it to the back of my mind once this adoption business started. Ris has been so kind and caring I’ve focused on that, not that meaningless kiss from a misguided colleague I had valued as a friend.
But I wonder. I’ve been discombobulated lately, attributing it to guilt from the past, when in reality it could be my latest slip up that’s bothering me the most. Even with the potential good news regarding the baby, me being back at work and our lives as parents about to start if all goes well, I can’t get past what I did.
Maybe that’s why I’m picking a fight. My latent antagonism probably has nothing to do with him and that phone call, the hold up with the baby or me being back at work.
I’m angry at myself.
The guilt is consuming me. It’s an ever-present burr digging me when I least expect it since that incident in the cellar with Griffin. I want to forget. I want to pretend it never happened. But I can’t ignore this any longer. The repercussions of that one, stupid, impulsive act threaten to overwhelm me when I least expect it.
How can I be outraged with Dane for not telling the truth when I’m guilty of the same? And who knows, depending how he reacts to this, I may pluck up the courage one day to tell him the rest?
I have to tell him.
I wait until he’s finished cleaning then I stand and approach him near the sink. “I have to tell you something and I don’t want you to freak out, because it lasted less than two seconds and meant nothing.”
He’s rinsing the dishcloth and his hands still. He turns off the taps, hangs the cloth up and swivels to face me. I’ve never seen him look so somber. Tiny worry lines appear at the corners of his eyes and his lips are compressed.
“What meant nothing?” His voice is cold, chilling, and he sounds nothing like the man I know and love.
I clamp down on my irrational fear, take a deep breath, and release it. “That night at the supper party, when you stormed out? I was coming after you when Ris asked me to get some wine for her. She was flustered so I agreed. I thought it’d only take a second then I could follow you home. But in the wine cellar Griffin came up behind me.”
Regret sits heavy in my chest. “You were right about him.”
He inhales so sharply his nostrils pinch, making an odd whistling sound. “What did he do?”
Hell, this is harder than I thought. I don’t want to cause Dane pain when the incident with Griffin is now a blip of disgust in the recent past. That’s the thing about honesty. I have good intentions but now I’m partially through the execution I know this is a really bad idea.
“He… he kissed me. It didn’t last long. And I stopped it when I realized what I was doing—”
“What you were doing…” He grips the bench behind him so tightly his knuckles stand out. “Are you trying to tell me you responded? That you kissed him back?”
I swallow down the bile burning a path up my throat. “No, but I hesitated—”
“No fucking way!” He pushes off the bench so fast I startle and almost trip in my haste to get out of his way. “You kissed that asshole?”
He stalks the kitchen, kicking out at random cupboards, muttering expletives I’ve never heard spill from his mouth before. My calm husband who never loses control has morphed into a monster.
What the hell have I done?
“How could you fucking do that to me?” He pauses at the dining table we’ve just vacated long enough to sweep his arm across it, sending plates and pasta and cutlery flying across the kitchen.
I gape, stunned by the ferocity of his rage; I expected anger, not this… this… torrent of fury that blinds him to everything but how much I’ve hurt him.
In that moment I know I can never tell him the rest.
It would ruin us.
I have to try to calm him. “I know this is a betrayal, Dane, and I’m not proud of what I did, but I’d been going crazy over our infertility, grieving really—”
“Don’t you mean my infertility?” he spat, hatred making his eyes glow like a feral cat. “That’s what this is all about. You don’t think I’m man enough because I can’t give you a kid so you turn to the first prick who puts the moves on you…”
He punches the wall so hard his fist goes through the plaster, leaving a hole. He barely notices. “Fuck! Why him? That asshole has lorded his damn superiority over me ever since we met and now, when we’re at our most vulnerable…”
He shakes his head and stares at the gaping hole in the wall, then the mess all over the floor, like he’s seeing it for the first time.
I’ve done this. Not with telling the truth but by not avoiding that kiss in the first place. The kicker is, Dane’s right. I’d been suppressing so much resentment toward him that I’d let that kiss happen.
I could’ve pushed Griffin away faster. I could’ve cut him down with my usual sarcastic jibes. Instead, I’d stood there, knowing what could happen but not stopping him quick enough. It doesn’t matter that my brain eventually kicked in and I stopped it a second later. It doesn’t matter that the guilt has been eating me alive. I did wrong and I need my husband to understand I get that.
“It lasted less than two seconds and I was so repulsed I could’ve killed him. But I hesitated, trying to stare him down and act all tough, rather than moving away and I’ll have to live with that for the rest of my life.”
I take a step toward him but he holds up his hands, as if warning me off. “I love you, Dane. Nothing or no one can ever come between us—”
“Wanna make a bet?”
He punches the wall again, leaving a matching hole beside the first, before he grabs his ke
ys and cell, and storms out.
I can’t summon the energy to go after him. I’m in shock. The potency of his wrath… I didn’t know he was capable of it.
So I slide to the floor, hug my knees to my chest, and cry.
Twenty-Four
Jodi
I’ve made a decision.
I glance down at my small bump. “Thanks to you, our lives are about to get easier.”
Until I saw that picture in the paper I’d been adrift, swept up in a force bigger than me. I don’t like it.
I hate feeling out of control. I’d suffered enough helplessness as a kid: Dad dying young, Mom drifting from one loser to another, and me fading into the background trying to draw as little attention to myself as possible.
Then I hit my teens and it became harder to hide. Mom’s boyfriends would leer behind her back no matter how hard I tried to avoid them. I didn’t want to hurt her and I didn’t want to get hurt, so I left. Became the clichéd teenage runaway. I headed to the busiest city in the world, New York, intent on losing myself for real. Mom couldn’t find me there and I regained control of my life. I survived, too. Waitressing initially, working in admin later. I thought I’d been doing okay.
Until this.
I rub my belly, liking the smoothness of it. It has become a comforting gesture, something I do regularly to reassure myself I’m not alone.
If my plan succeeds, I’ll never be alone again.
Thanks to Ris, I have resigned from my PA job and now have a one-room studio on a hill outside town called The Rise. It overlooks the ocean and I hear the waves crashing on the shore, I’m that close. I leave the windows open, something I never did in the city, allowing the refreshing tang of brine to waft in.
This is my first night here and I love it. I love the pristine white walls, the honey-colored floorboards, the tidy kitchenette. I’ve never lived in a new place before and I like that fresh paint smell. It sure beats the pungent aroma of stale curry that permeates the studio I rent in the city, considering I live over an Indian diner.