The Whole Golden World

by Kristina Riggle

  Ethan’s expression grew hard. “That doesn’t sound good.”

  “I don’t need you to judge me.”

  “I’m just saying that any romance you have to hide and sneak around about . . .”

  Morgan jammed her phone and earbuds in her backpack, standing up abruptly and giving Ethan one last, eyebrow-raised look.

  Really. He should talk.

  She’d almost made it out of the cafeteria when she heard her name shrieked at the same time as Britney grabbed her hand. She yanked her over to the table where she sat with some girls from the band: flute players mostly, pretty girls whose giggles sounded airy and high, just like their instruments.

  “Hey! Let’s go to the movies Friday night. Then we can go get a coffee or something.”

  The girls looked at her expectantly. With Morgan standing and the rest sitting, faces raised, they reminded her of baby birds, twittering and all.

  “Can’t. I have plans.”

  She walked away quickly, knowing the bell was about to ring. She heard running feet behind her and cringed just as Britney caught up to her and snagged her elbow. Morgan fought her urge to yank away. Britney was such a touchy-feely kind of a girl, and that had really started to annoy the ever-loving hell out of her.

  “What’s up your ass? You too good for us or something?”

  What if I am? she was tempted to blurt. “No, I’m sorry. I’m just busy, like I said. I am way behind on practicing for solo and ensemble.”

  “But you can’t rehearse all night. Come out after!”

  “I can’t. I’m not feeling well lately. I think I’m getting my period or something. I’m just really tired.”

  Britney yanked Morgan to a full stop in the hall. Kids crashed into them from behind and cursed them out. Britney towed Morgan off to the side. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”

  Morgan started laughing, and she was so tired and loopy from the previous night’s suffocation dream that she thought she might keep laughing all through calculus, Spanish, and the drive home. Finally she stopped. “I’m tired. Just old-fashioned tired. Anyway, I’m not dating anyone, remember? You ought to know, right?”

  Britney and David supposedly weren’t boyfriend and girlfriend, but they seemed to be together an awful lot, even so.

  “Not dating anyone that we know of, anyway. Maybe you have a secret lover,” Britney said, but it was clear from the toss of her hair as she spoke that it was just something to say, a joke of a notion so ludicrous it wasn’t even worth sounding scandalized about. She gave Morgan a quick hug and made her promise to come to another movie sometime soon, and she nearly skipped away down the hall.

  Friday couldn’t come soon enough, Morgan decided, as with effort she peeled herself away from the wall and trudged off to class.

  Friday evening, leaning on the side of her Chevy in the mall parking lot, Morgan checked her phone. Right on time. But no sign yet of his car. She was just standing there in her ballet flats and miniskirt, goose bumps prickling her legs.

  It was freakishly warm for February, but not so warm it was miniskirt weather. She wasn’t supposed to be standing around, though. She was supposed to be picked up by now, in his warm car, on his way to his house. She had a change of clothes in her backpack, and Nicole was lined up to be her cover story, complete with fake Facebook update later. They’d even taken a cell-phone picture together that Nicole would later post. As far as Nicole knew, Morgan was dating a twenty-one-year-old college student in secret because her parents would have thought he was too old for her. Nicole thought that was terribly romantic and was all too happy to help. Not to mention, Morgan let Nicole copy her calc homework every morning as a show of gratitude.

  There. She recognized the car. Though she couldn’t yet see the driver and didn’t want to approach a stranger. She was already feeling naked and exposed, standing out in the open. . . . Finally she exhaled, not realizing she’d been holding her breath.

  He’d rolled down the passenger window. “Going my way?” he asked, and winked.

  “I am now,” she replied, and hopped into the warmth of his car as he pushed the button to roll the window up again.

  She reached over to peck his cheek, but he moved back.

  She sat back, feeling herself blush, and stared at her hands.

  “Sorry, it’s just . . .”

  “I know,” she said quickly.

  “And, um, there’s something else I have to ask. I need you to, like, slouch down or something. The seat reclines with a button on the side.”

  “Oh,” was all she could think to say. The mechanical whirr of the seat reclining reminded her of the dentist’s office. Finally she was low enough to be underneath the window view. She rested there on her back, staring up at the car’s beige interior, not wanting to look at him from this humiliating position.

  He didn’t speak, either. They rode in silence with something unspoken growing between them like a balloon filling to the point of breaking.

  Morgan was arguing with herself.

  How dare he! You aren’t some whore.

  But be realistic: This could ruin him. That’s why it’s so powerful, isn’t it? The fact that he’s risking everything to be with you?

  He could make it right. If he wanted to be together, he could leave his wife and in a few months see you properly. There would be no need for hiding like a criminal.

  Morgan turned toward the passenger door, feeling the blood drain from her face. Her stomach turned over, and a wash of dizziness crashed over her.

  “I’m carsick,” she finally said. “I’m afraid I’m going to be sick.”

  “Just a couple blocks,” he said, his voice gritty with strain. She heard a noise as he cracked the window. Cold outdoor air swirled into the car, of little help to her. “Breathe deeply,” he said sharply. Like a command.

  He doesn’t want the mess, Morgan realized. How would he explain that? And obviously he had no notion of pulling over, or allowing her to sit up.

  Morgan tried to breathe as he ordered, not wanting to throw up either.

  Finally, the car stopped. “Hang on,” he told her, and he hopped out, leaving her flat in the passenger seat. She heard keys rattling nearby, and then he popped the car door open and held out his hand. “Coast is clear. Quickly, get inside.”

  She felt shaky as she stumbled out of the car and up some cement porch steps. He almost threw her across the threshold and she stumbled, grabbing a kitchen chair for support as he slammed the door behind them.

  “Aaah. Now we’re alone,” he said, his voice blooming with relief.

  Morgan sank into the chair, wanting to feel relief herself, still feeling sick, still reeling in fact, as if she’d been on an ocean voyage.

  He was locking the door behind her and busying himself with something by the kitchen counter. She swept her eyes across his home—their home. There were afghans and framed photos of nature scenes, and seashells on shelves. The room had a disarray about it that was homey and familiar. Not unlike her own home, Morgan realized. She looked down at the faux-wood dining table.

  “Here,” he said, handing her a jelly glass filled with ice water. “Take little sips. I’m really sorry about that.”

  “I hated that,” Morgan blurted, taking a sip and then pressing the cool glass to her cheek. “Like I was something disgusting to hide away.”

  She finally raised her eyes to his. She almost gasped. His eyebrows were lowered, his stare hard. “We cannot be seen together. Do you know what that would do to me? What that would cost me? Do you know what risk I’m taking having you here at all? In my house?”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you mad . . .”

  “I mean, if my wife found out, the school . . . my whole world would be over.”

  The queasy overheated feeling was leaving her, and Morgan felt then as if she were growing colder by the moment, freezing slowly from the toes up.

  “But . . . you said . . .” Morgan tried to remember his exact words from the n
ight at his brother’s house. Something about being patient. But didn’t that mean waiting for something good in the future? “I thought . . . after graduation . . . I know this is . . . unusual, but you feel it too, don’t you? That it’s special? Meant to be? Won’t they all find out sometime that . . .”

  He raked his hands through his dark hair roughly, staring down at the table.

  Morgan’s heart thudded, and the chilled feeling spread to her limbs and fingers, and she began to tremble. “You . . . love me. Right? Don’t you?”

  He jumped up roughly from his chair and grabbed her close, covering her mouth and neck with urgent kisses. He began to caress her with one hand in her hair, the other roaming all over her back, and inside her skirt. She was wearing a thong and when he discovered it, he groaned into her mouth as they kissed. He picked her up, doll-like, and much as he’d done before, he carried her up the stairs.

  “No,” she said, panting. “Not in the bed . . .” Not your wife’s bed.

  In the bedroom, he set her down on her feet then lifted her again, facing him. In moments he’d hoisted her up, pressing her back against the wall, and pushing her skirt up and out of the way.

  “I love you,” he breathed into her ear as he crushed her hard against the wall. “I do love you.”

  She tried to say she loved him too, but she could barely catch her breath.

  They ended up on the floor again, next to the bed. He’d fetched a spare blanket, and she was resting her head on his muscular arm, her leg thrown over his. The warm, languid feeling was back, all the earlier carsickness and nausea nearly forgotten.

  And he’d said he loved her.

  She sighed deeply, feeling emptied out of all her stress, care, and worries, which now seemed minute and petty indeed.

  He kissed her temple and whispered, “I have to get up for a minute. Sorry.” She reluctantly moved her head and allowed him to rise. She followed the progress of his naked, strong body across the room to the bathroom and smiled. Then she rolled to her side.

  Her eyes landed on a pair of women’s slippers, under the bed.

  They were moccasins, lined with puffy fleece, the kind that you would wear after a long day, on a cold night, watching TV, snuggled up next to your husband. Morgan turned to her other side and saw, sticking out of a dresser drawer that was not all the way closed, a piece of silky ivory cloth trimmed with lace.

  She sat up, aware suddenly of how naked she was, and she snatched up the blanket around her chest. On the wall across from her, the wall where just moments before they’d been having sex, was a wedding photo. She hadn’t noticed it, though it must have been just a few inches from her head.

  The bride was wearing a simple white gown fitting close to the body until the hips, where it swept away, ending in a small train. It was an off-shoulder gown, exposing her delicate collarbone. The bride’s bouquet of white tulips drooped down, loose in her hand as she gazed up at her new husband.

  And he, the groom, the man who’d just nailed Morgan against the wall, was staring with fierce, wild love at his bride, a half smile on his face like he could hardly believe his luck, one arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her close.

  The bathroom door opened, and he came back into the room, following Morgan’s gaze.

  “Don’t look at that,” he barked.

  She dropped her eyes to the blanket, wondering suddenly if he and the wife bought it as a couple, strolling through Bed Bath and Beyond with their fingers laced together.

  He said, “Maybe it was a mistake to be here.” He pulled on his underwear and jeans roughly, as if he had somewhere urgent to go.

  “Don’t say that,” she replied. “It wasn’t. I . . . I’m happy to be here with you.”

  He stopped dressing, slumped a bit. “I know. It’s just . . . too hard. Worlds colliding. It was just convenient was all. She’ll be back early though, so . . .”

  “Early? Early when?”

  “Early in the morning. She’s coming back first thing.”

  “I thought . . .” Morgan realized she’d assumed another overnight visit, when he’d only been referring to the evening.

  “I’ll take you back to your car in a little while. Want a snack? I’ve got some wine,” he said, dressing again, pulling on his socks, a shirt, an old baseball cap. He started handing her clothes back to her.

  “Um. Sure, I guess.”

  She dressed and started running through her choices. She’d told her mom she’d be gone all night. She could claim to have come home sick, but this also meant getting Nicole to adjust their story, and what if she couldn’t reach her? What then?

  “Shit,” he muttered, as his phone vibrated on the nightstand. He snatched it up, and Morgan watched him pale as he read the screen.

  “She’s coming home tonight. Like, now.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “Hurry up! She said she’s not feeling good, and she’s coming home right now. I have to get you out of here and straighten this place up.”

  Morgan was throwing on her clothes now, taking three tries to get her arm into her sleeve. “Where is she driving from?”

  “Lansing, so it won’t take her that long. She was at some book signing for some yoga dude, and I thought she was going to stay the night in town with Beverly . . . shit.”

  He started jamming the blanket into folds. Morgan tried to help him, but he yanked it away from her. “Go find your shoes and meet me by the back door.”

  In a matter of minutes they were driving off into the evening. She’d started to lower the seat, but he told her not to bother, it was dark out anyway. He drove fast and hard, taking sharp corners that almost threw Morgan into the door. He pulled up next to Sears in the mall parking lot, away from any parking lot lights, and looked at her pointedly, hitting the “unlock” button.

  Morgan looked back at him and opened her mouth to say something, but he cut her off. “I have to get going. Quick, before anyone sees us.”

  She hopped out and slammed the door just in time to watch his car pull away with the flow of traffic, leaving her standing alone, exactly as she’d been just two hours before.

  29

  Rain wasn’t sick. She was feeling fine. She was feeling, in fact, far too fine. She had been praying for morning sickness, for fatigue like other expectant mothers talked about. Her breasts were even less sore than before. She had snuck into the bookstore’s bathroom to squeeze them. They felt completely normal.

  She then suffered something in the bathroom stall at the book signing that she could only describe as a panic attack: She’d slammed her fist into the wall behind the toilet hard enough to bruise her hand and screamed silently in such a way that turned her throat raw.

  Rain left the bathroom stall trembling and convinced the baby within her had disappeared. She texted TJ that she was coming home and made her apologies to Beverly. Fortunately they had driven separately.

  By the time Rain had gotten onto the highway, reason had started to edge its way back in, and she understood, in her higher brain functions, anyway, that she had not lost the baby just because she wasn’t vomiting.

  She might have to quarantine herself from pregnant women, Rain thought, as a light mist started to fall—in February?—and she flipped on her windshield wipers. There had been a pregnant woman next to her at the book signing, opining about how miserable she was with heartburn, how pregnancy was such a trial and she wished she could hire out someone to do this part of the job. How she’d thrown up so much in the first trimester she’d subsisted on ginger ale and saltines. That’s what started it all.

  As the woman carried on this way, Rain’s hand drifted to her flat stomach, and that’s when she was overcome with the urge to squeeze her breasts and check for soreness. And she went to the bathroom and did just that, and she found none.

  Rain tried again, in the darkness of the car. Still fine.

  As she drove, she tried to recover the joy she felt when the nurse gave her the news. Rain had known the moment she’d sai
d, “We have the results of your pregnancy test!,” because the nurse’s voice had an unmistakable brightness reserved only for good news. It had come like a burst of sun, the kind that hits you in the face when you drive out of a tunnel.

  The joy had quieted some as she tried to find the perfect time to tell TJ, and then it receded like a tide going out in the face of his muted reaction.

  Since then she’d begun to feel numb. Not depressed, nor joyous.

  “Why can’t this just be normal?” she shouted into the car’s interior.

  The only answer was the slapping of the wipers and the spitting of rain on the windshield.

  When she walked back inside the house, she found TJ looking flushed and frantic, coming down from upstairs.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “Nothing. I’m fine. Just worried about you.”

  He came forward to hug her, but his embrace was quick and stiff and he released her quickly. His hair was damp and he smelled like soap. He said, “Can I get you something, honey? Some tea? You said you’re sick?”

  “More like tired,” she said. “Did you take a shower?”

  “I was bored so I worked out on the elliptical and got all sweaty.”

  “Oh. Okay. I feel a little sleepy, I might turn in early.”

  Rain walked upstairs, conscious of TJ following her. She was impatient then with his hovering, making her wish she’d stayed at the hotel in Lansing with Beverly rather than come all the way home.

  At the doorway to the bedroom she paused, and he bumped into her from behind. “What gives? Can I have some space?”

  “Forgive me for being concerned about my pregnant wife who came home sick from a trip,” he barked. “What if you passed out on the stairs or something and broke your neck?”

  Rain pinched the bridge of her nose. “Your kindness is so overwhelming.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Rain’s armor was already worn thin and brittle. Her emotional fortitude to carry the burden for the both of them as a couple had eroded as well, and she almost relished this rare moment when she couldn’t help herself: “Yell at me a little more so I’ll feel even better.”