In Her Shadow

by Kristin Miller

  As I turn over, dragging the covers over my chin, I feel the weight of her body turn on the bed, away from me. This was how I remembered the long winter nights with Joanna. Guilt-filled silence. A bare shoulder trembling in the moonlight. I don’t want to upset Colleen, but why can’t she understand? I don’t want to talk about Joanna. To relive those memories. I want to move on. And before tonight, I thought we had an unspoken pact: no discussion of former loved ones. With Colleen, I’d found a unique sense of freedom I hadn’t felt with anyone else. Because she didn’t ask pestering questions about Joanna and our marriage, I could be a new man—one deserving of her love, living with a clean slate.

  I won’t let Joanna’s memory ruin what I have with Colleen.

  When she sighs heavily, I reach over and switch off the light.

  “I didn’t mean to upset you,” she says in the dark. “I only want to make sure I’m doing everything right, the way it’s supposed to be. I’m trying to be the perfect girlfriend.”

  “Try harder.”

  Damn it.

  I should’ve kept that last part to myself.

  I don’t know how we’ve come to this place, a stalemate. We used to be unable to keep our hands off each other. Now, although there are only a few inches between us, the distance is a canyon, and I can’t cross it without knowing if she wants me to.

  “Colleen,” I say after a few quiet minutes. “Are you still awake?”

  She never answers.

  I close my eyes and pray for sleep to hit fast, but the recurring nightmare is already taking form, blurring the line between memory and dream. I can hear the jingle of Joanna’s keys as she walks up the drive. And in that split second before sleep sucks me back in time, I can almost feel the anger lashing through my body as I slam Joanna against the wall.

  MICHAEL

  When the clock over the bar strikes ten, I finish off the last of my Jack and Coke and order another. Normally at this hour I’d be on my way home to Joanna. But tonight, as usual for the second Friday of every month, she’s out with Rachael.

  On a typical night, they walk to the distillery for dinner and the first round of drinks. Now that Joanna’s pregnant, Rachael drinks her share. Afterward, they catch an Uber into the city, and then Christ knows what. They used to like to use their girls’ night to paint hideous cityscapes on canvases while drinking obscene amounts of wine. Really just an excuse to get plastered, which was fine by me. How they entertain themselves is none of my business. Since Joanna hasn’t been able to drink for the last six months, I’m sure she simply enjoys the time apart—I know I do.

  Her nights with Rachael give me alone time to do whatever the hell I want.

  And tonight, I want to drink without feeling like I’m doing something wrong. If my gaze lingers on a beautiful woman, I won’t have to explain myself. I want to be able to order a third, or a fourth, drink if the urge strikes me, without feeling as if I’m being monitored.

  It’s not like I drove. I stopped off at home to change clothes, walked the two blocks over, and plan to stagger home.

  Every table at the Point Reina Distillery is packed, especially the ones near the windows overlooking the sand and surf. A full moon looms over the black sea, illuminating the waves with a rippling white ribbon.

  With a view like that, it was a miracle my seat at the end of the bar was open.

  “Bad day?” Don remarks as he slides my glass of Jack and Coke across the bar. It stops right in front of me. “That should help.”

  I’ve always liked Don. He’s a hipster in his late thirties with a thin mustache, sharp eyes, and a dirty sense of humor. He’ll go shot for shot with anyone who challenges him, and never falters on an order.

  “Bless you,” I say, burying my nose in the drink. “It’s been the day from hell.”

  I was late to work that morning, thanks to an accident on the bridge. The meeting I’d scheduled first thing had to be pushed back, which in turn ruined the scheduling for the rest of the day. I slammed down a sandwich for lunch and haven’t eaten since. It shows in the shake of my hands.

  “Tonight it’s me and you, and that bottle of Jack.” I drink up. “Joanna’s out with Rachael.”

  “Sounds like she’s feeling better.” He shakes a martini, pours, then hands it to the waitress waiting at the end of the bar. “That’s good to hear.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Joanna’s not sick. I was just home, and she wasn’t there. Her car was parked in its usual stall next to mine. And I talked to her on my way home from work. She was fine. Going out with Rachael, she’d said, as usual.

  “Rachael was in earlier. Sat right over there.” Don points to a table tucked in the corner with an ocean view on two sides. “When she showed up alone, I asked where Joanna was. Said she was sick as a dog. Holed up at home in bed.”

  “Joanna wasn’t here? Are you sure?”

  “Positive. Rachael came in alone,” he says, drying a tall glass with a dish towel. “She stayed for a while, ate clam chowder and fish and chips, and drank two glasses of wine. I picked up the table since Monica wasn’t on the clock yet. It was before the dinner rush.”

  “Odd,” I say.

  Because when I’d called, Joanna told me she left home hours ago.

  Don takes another drink order from the waitress leaning over the bar and goes to work mixing. “Maybe she caught up with Rachael later, once she was feeling better.”

  “I doubt it,” I mutter, because Don just shined a spotlight on one of my worst fears.

  She’s sneaking around behind my back.

  I toss cash onto the bar and push out the distillery door, charge down the steps, and round the corner of the block before my thoughts come together. If Joanna’s not home sick in bed, I’m going to lose my mind.

  The lights in Ravenwood are on, but it’s empty and cold inside. She’s not in our room or the second master. She moved out of our bedroom in May—nearly two months ago—because she claimed she needed space. She’d secluded herself in that new room of hers for at least a week when she first moved in, and I’d thought for sure it was over. Since then, she’s remained aloof about resolving the issues in our relationship.

  Hey, honey, I text. Just got home. Still out with Rachael?

  I keep my phone in my hand as I pace through the house like a caged lion. I shouldn’t get worked up, not until I hear what she has to say, but I can’t keep the bitterness at bay. I call Joanna, leave an urgent voicemail, and then search through my phone contacts, stopping at M for Martin. I punch the call button for Rachael’s cell.

  No answer.

  I call Travis and also get voicemail.

  Furious, I pitch my phone across the kitchen. It hits the wall and drops to the floor with the expensive sound of glass meeting tile. I feel like tearing the house apart. I want to track Joanna down and demand to know where she’s been. I want to hear the truth from her lips.

  When the lights of a car sweep through the living room at two o’clock in the morning, I tip back my glass and down the remains of my Jack. At this point it tastes like water. That’s what usually happens after the fifth—or was it sixth?—drink. I’m no longer on the verge of bursting through my skin. I’ve moved beyond the wild, irrational state of anger. The fury inside me has boiled down to contempt.

  Joanna strides through the front garden as the purr of a motor pulls away from the house and rumbles down Cypress Street. I hear keys jingling in the lock, and the handle turns. She appears in the foyer, smiling to herself, her eyes downcast as if she’s lost in thought. She glances into the kitchen and spots me sitting at the island in the dark. Her smile drops.

  Sick, my ass.

  Ditching Rachael freed up Joanna’s night to see whomever she wanted.

  “Michael?” Clicking on the light, she closes the door b
ehind her. “You scared me. What are you still doing up?”

  Even in my drunken haze, I can see she looks stunning tonight. She’s dressed in a low-cut pink top, dark blue jeans, and spiky heels. Her stomach appears flat. Her black hair is pinned on top of her head except for a few tendrils tickling her neck. Silver earrings dangle from each ear. She’s made up her face with smoky eyes and red cheeks, but her lips are bare. Not a hint of lipstick. She’s probably kissed it off.

  “How was paint night?” My words drag, slowed by the liquor chugging through my system and the numbness tingling my mouth. I’m probably slurring, but I can’t tell.

  “What do you care?” she says. “You’ve never asked before.”

  “I’m asking now.”

  “I’m nearly a Monet. A few more classes and I think I’ll best him. Is that what you want to hear? That my time away from you isn’t wasted on something frivolous?” Scoffing, she shakes her head. “I made it home safely. You can go to bed now.”

  She avoids my eyes as she takes down her hair and disappears into the living room. I hear her footsteps on the stairs and then, moments later, a faucet. She’s showering to wash away the scent of another man, I know it.

  I charge upstairs and into her master. Her room smells so different from mine—floral and sweet mixed with something else I can’t place. A new perfume, maybe? Or the scent of him.

  “Where’s your painting?” I holler.

  “Can’t hear you,” she calls from the bathroom.

  “Where is your painting? The one you made tonight. I want to see it.”

  “Oh,” she calls out. “Gave it to Rachael. She liked mine better than hers, so I told her she could keep it.”

  Liar.

  I’m stumbling into her bathroom, clutching the doorjamb to steady me. “Where’d you go for dinner?”

  She’s nude, staring into the mirror with her back to me. Five months pregnant, her figure is gorgeous, her skin smooth as porcelain, which makes me wonder when she’ll really start showing. I haven’t seen her naked since she moved into this damn second master. And we haven’t had sex since then, either. Hell, we’ve barely been looking at each other.

  But now that Joanna is carrying my child, she’s more beautiful to me than she has ever been. The possibility that someone else has been thinking the same thing, and touching her body with the same kind of reverence, kills me.

  “We ate at the distillery,” she says flatly, testing the water, “and then we went for dessert after painting. We worked up an appetite.”

  “I bet,” I spit.

  At that, she turns, frowning, and she doesn’t bother to cover up. She stands like a soldier, hands at her sides, holding strong to the lies she’s just told. Her body seems strange and foreign. A piece of art I can admire, but can’t touch.

  “What’s the matter with you?” she says.

  I swallow down a vile taste that’s lodged in the back of my mouth. “I went to the distillery tonight.”

  “That’s not a surprise.” Stepping into the shower, she drops her head back to allow hot streams of water to sluice down the curves of her body. “From the glazed look in your eyes, I can tell you drank yourself stupid again.”

  “I texted you when I got home.”

  “You did?” She turns beneath the spray. “I must not have heard it. It was loud. You can’t expect me to check my phone every ten seconds.”

  “How about every six hours?”

  Swiping her hands over her eyes, she levels a stare at me through the dimpled glass. “You’re turning into a control freak, you know that? I moved into this room to get away from you. I can finally breathe in here. It’s refreshing.”

  I open the shower door and grab her by the arm. Water sprays everywhere, drenching me. “We need to talk.”

  “Can I finish?” Her eyes flick over my fingers biting into her forearm. “Is that okay with you?”

  Her face blurs, and for a split second I see two Joannas, and then three, before they merge together once more.

  “Don from the distillery said you never came in tonight,” I manage, pinching my eyes closed as a wave of nausea rolls through me. “He said Rachael came alone and told him you were too sick to go out.”

  “Really? That’s bizarre.” She nudges my arm off as the color drains from her face. Then, as if to cover her shaking hands, she reaches for the soap. “He must’ve mistaken another woman at the bar for Rachael. It was packed. You should’ve seen that place during the dinner rush. It’s no wonder he was confused.”

  “Seriously? You’re going to tell me Don can’t recognize Rachael?” I can’t do this anymore. “Where the hell were you?”

  Water spills onto the floor as steam fills the bathroom and fogs the mirrors, but I don’t care if the whole damn house floods. We’re not brushing this off. Not tonight. Gripping her elbow tight, I wrench her out of the shower.

  “Where were you?” I demand once more.

  She shivers and covers her breasts with her hands. “Michael…I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “Then tell me the truth. Where’d you go tonight?” I glare down at her as my head pounds. And then, because I can’t bear to see her play the victim, I yank the towel off the rack and toss it at her. “Who were you with?”

  “Jesus, Michael, I’m so tired of answering to your demands every time I go out.” She dries off angrily and then shoves her arms into the white cashmere robe I bought her last Christmas. “When I married you, I didn’t sign up to have a watchdog hounding my every move. You’re the most suspicious man I’ve ever known.”

  She steps past me out of the bathroom, shoving me in the shoulder as she goes, and I follow.

  “Then leave,” I taunt. She’s so close. With one move, I could grip her hair in my fist and yank her to the floor. “But we both know you’re not going anywhere, don’t we? Because you love the life I’ve given you. You get off on the clothes, and the cars, and the staff waiting on you hand and foot. You love Ravenwood, and you especially love the way that people look at you when they realize you live here.”

  She rounds on me then, eyes narrowing, lips pinching in disgust. “Oh, yeah, you nailed it. I love that my home is practically a prison, and that I can’t go anywhere or do anything without hearing an earful from you when I come home.” Whirling around at her bedroom door, she swings her arm toward the hall. “Get out of my room.”

  A laugh erupts from my chest as I charge at her, eliminating the space between us. “You’ve lost your mind. Who do you think you’re talking to? This is my house, and I’m not going anywhere until you tell me who you were with tonight.”

  “Get out!” she shrills, lurching forward so that our noses nearly brush. “Goddamn it, Michael, leave me the hell alone!”

  “Tell me who you’re fucking, honey, and I will.”

  She clenches her jaw tight.

  “Is it Dean Lewis? Distillery Don? All of the above?”

  She swipes wet strands of hair out of her face. “Yes, Michael, I’m fucking everyone. Our chef, the bartender, and the skinny guy who delivers the mail, too. Would you really like a list of all the men I’ve slept with? Because boy, it’s a long one!”

  “Maybe.” There’s a sharp pain in my forehead, making me dizzy again. “If that’s the truth.”

  She meets my gaze now, and there’s no anger in her eyes. Just gut-wrenching indifference. “Just get out. Seriously, just go.”

  “How long has it been going on?”

  “A few months. But stop being ridiculous. It’s just sex. It means nothing.”

  I’m furious that she thinks she can write this off so nonchalantly.

  “At least I don’t have to hide it anymore,” she adds with a shrug. “No more sneaking around, no more lies. If you could accept this, it could work. We could all b
e happy.”

  “We could all be happy? You’re going to keep seeing this bastard?”

  Frowning, she crosses her arms over her chest. “Well, that would be ideal. We’re in a traditional marriage in a modern world, Michael. Let’s catch up to the times. You could have someone on the side too. It could be fun. Think about it.”

  “Absolutely not.” I can’t believe she’s being serious. “I didn’t get married to have my wife spread her legs for anyone who asks.”

  She smirks. “Don’t be so closed-minded. There are couples in open relationships everywhere. Why can’t we be that way?”

  “Name one couple we know in an open relationship.” I square up to her, though I get the feeling I’m swaying. I’m having trouble focusing. “One couple who’s happy to see their spouse screw other people.”

  “Rachael and Travis,” she says triumphantly. “And Rachael says they’re doing well.”

  “Fuck.” I scrub my hands through my hair and steady myself on the doorjamb. “That’s your example of a happy couple? They’re delusional. You’re delusional.”

  “Why should we have to choose between a boring monogamous marriage and living the exciting single life? Why can’t we have both?”

  I step forward and peer down over her. The natural scent of her skin, sweet and fresh, wafts over me. “Because that’d make you a whore.”

  “A whore?” she seethes. “Is that what you think I am?”

  My head pounds. “Don’t ask questions you’re not prepared to hear the answers to.”

  “You’re impossible to talk to when you’re drunk. And I’m done being insulted by a man who can barely get it up. If you don’t think I’ll leave you, you can stand there like an idiot and watch me go.”

  “Get your ass back here.” I clutch her shoulders as she strides away, and pin her against the wall. “Does he know you’re married?”

  Her eyes flare with anger. “This conversation is over.”

  “This conversation is over when I say it is. I’m going to ask you again, and this time you’re going to answer me.” I speak as coldly as possible. I won’t let her off the hook. “Does he know you’re married?”