by Jen Conley
I looked up at the lights recessed into a textured white ceiling. "I'm sorry."
The ambient of hum of a dishwasher stopped and the room became silent.
"Natalie and I haven't had sex in a month. Not that we did it every night, but—"
"It's none of my business," I said.
"After Michael died, it took us a long time to sleep together. We were still in the same bed, but we weren't intimate."
"You don't need to tell me."
"I do. You need to understand I'm not crazy. Please, just listen, okay?"
I nodded.
A clock hung on a wall, the arms reading nine a.m. and the red line jerking in five-second fits.
"We've been having sex once every week or two this spring. Then something happened."
"What?"
He shrugged. "She didn't stop, not at first, at least. She wouldn't fight me, but she would just lay there and let it happen."
"Okay."
"But now, if I try to do something, she takes a pillow and sleeps here." He patted the loveseat.
I nodded. "Have you asked her if she's having an affair?"
"Why? What's the point? What's Natalie going to do, admit it?"
We both paused, looking at a tangle of vines and pink blossoms embroidered in a dark blue rug under our feet.
Jason said, "We have nothing to keep us together. Michael is gone."
"Why don't you have the marriage dissolved?"
He shook his head. "Then I'm the bad guy. And it's not my fault."
"Divorce can be no-fault."
"I want her to take ownership, to be responsible for the damage she's done to our marriage."
I stood, moving a pillow decorated in needlepoint back to the corner of the loveseat. "I'll be in touch."
"Thanks for meeting me at the library, Cassie." I sat down and unfolded my laptop beside her.
Squeaking on its wheels, a cart stacked with books rolled by. Rows of shelves stood on our left and right.
I added, "I need an extra pair of eyes on short notice, and I didn't know who I could trust."
Sitting with her computer on the table, she wore a pink cardigan and jeans. Her curly hair was cut short and freckles splashed the bridge of her nose.
She nodded. "Extra eyes and the willingness to sign nondisclosure agreements."
A screen came up with a list of websites. I pointed and ran my finger down the first three: weather.com, the Star Tribune website, and YouTube.
"These I checked. Nothing. But next there's an e-mail account."
She nodded again.
We faced our computers and logged into the account.
Natalie's inbox was a solid column of e-mails from a St. Cloud State address. The window showed no folders except Drafts, Sent, and Trash.
"No sent messages?" she said.
I clicked on the Sent folder. Empty.
"Covering her tracks?" she added.
There was an unread message in her inbox. I clicked on it, then clicked "Mark as New." The message was one line: I'm free but not until seven. If that doesn't work, call me.
It was a reply with Natalie's original message appended below: I need to see you. Sorry to be brief, but we should talk. Tonight?
"Is this it?" she asked.
"Probably." I said, then clicked on the oldest message and worked my way forward. "I'll start reading these and you check out other sites."
A librarian returning books made soft thuds as hardcovers clinked against metal shelves and air hummed through a vent.
A few minutes later, Cassie said, "Getting anything?"
"Yeah. I can trace the conversation, since every message is a reply to something else. She's talking to a guy named Chris. Since all of his messages include her original ones, I can follow it like a dialogue." I skimmed over the messages:
Chris: Thank you for giving me your e-mail address! It's nice meeting you at the Bible study.
Natalie: It was nice meeting you, too! I've been looking for a church to join and I like this one. I hope to see you next Sunday!
Chris: I'll be there! If you want to hang out some time and or see a movie or something, gimme a call.
"So, is it an affair?" she asked.
"No doubt," I said.
I scrolled to the middle of the messages.
Natalie: You make me so happy. When I look in the mirror, I see myself again. Before, it was just pieces of a body—hair to be brushed, eyelashes that needed mascara, skin for makeup. I'm happy to recognize me.
Chris: You're beautiful. I want you so much, I can barely control of myself.
Natalie: Being with Jason is such a struggle but being with you is the opposite. I can't say no. How did this happen in just five weeks? Am I crazy?
Chris: I'm the crazy one. I can't stop thinking about you.
"Love, isn't it wonderful?" she said.
I nodded, then logged out of her e-mail. "I'll tail her tonight, see what happens. I went to the cemetery before I got here," I said.
"The cemetery?" she asked.
"To see the son."
At the top of a pole marking a corner of the lot, a sign read, "BABYLAND". The lot was bordered by lines of hedge bushes, trees, and a chain link fence coated with leafy vines.
"He's buried in a section for children and infants in Lakewood Cemetery," I said.
Beside the asphalt path into a rose quartz block was etched:
SUFFER the little children and forbid them not to come unto me: for to such belongeth the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 19:14
The cube was surrounded by a thick circle of pink and yellow flowers.
"Why did you go?" she asked.
"I don't know. I wanted to see."
"See what?"
A white statue of Jesus sat on the stone block, and he held an infant in his lap with one hand. The other hand stroked the scalp of a kneeling figure.
"I don't know," I said.
Turnstiles creaked as people entered, dropping off books at the returns desk.
"Did you find the son's plot?" she asked.
Grave markers lay flat against the ground, names and dates and statements engraved with figures—cherubs, lambs, crosses, flowers, and a Star of David.
"Yes" I said.
His bronze marker was decorated with a sleeping angel holding a doll. The ornamentation and letters were raised on the metal plate.
"It's there," I said.
It readMichael Johnson, 2003-2011. The same school photo from their mantel was embedded in it. I brushed away lawnmower clippings.
"Makes me glad I've never had children," I added.
"Look at this," she said, turning her computer toward me.
As I typed the login information myself, I asked, "A second account?"
The inbox was an e-mail salad: random chain letters and mass mailings, photos of naked Hollywood starlets, forwarded jokes and cartoons, fantasy football updates, and spam political diatribes.
"It's his e-mail account. It's Jason's," she said.
I clicked in and out of assorted folders. One titled Personals had a smattering of messages from online dating sites.
Another folder was called Amanda. I searched by keyword "Amanda" and the messages from the Amanda folder plus outgoing messages sorted together in chronological order.
"He's having an affair with a woman named Amanda," I said.
"I'm looking at the Kendra folder. I think that's an affair, too," she said.
I scrolled through the folder named Kendra like I had Amanda's.
"I think you're right." I turned off my computer and sighed.
As the sun dissolved in burning red clouds, my car sat several blocks down the road from their house. Kids glided by on bikes. Lights flicked on in windows. Jason Johnson passed in his black Accord and drove into the garage while the door was still lifting into place. The garage door opened again half an hour later. Tail lights of a copper Civic that was stabled beside the Accord light up.
Natalie pul
led out of the driveway and drove by me, out of the neighborhood.
I pulled a U-turn and tailed her onto the highway where she veered to the mall exit, looped along the service road, and parked in a YMCA.
"Shit," I said.
I drove into the lot and rolled by the glass entrance long enough to see her show a membership ID. After finding a parking stall, I drummed my fingers on the steering wheel.
An emergency exit door was propped open with a cluster of people smoking cigarettes. I left the car and walked up, nodding and smiling, then walked through the threshold—
—and bumped into Natalie.
"Excuse me," I said, but she walked past, through the door, and into the night air.
I swore again and paced a few minutes in the hallway, then I returned through the doorway.
When I reached my car, her Civic was still in the lot. She disappeared into a church across the street.
Stepping carefully, I entered the nave. The sanctuary's doors were open. Water trickled in a baptismal font and candles glowed in dim light.
Walls of stained glass windows separated the nave from the sanctuary. I crept up to the glass and pushed my face against an amber pane. Through it, I saw rows of benches leading to a raised chancel. Two figures sat in the front pew.
"You'll be going back to college in a few weeks," she said.
"I'll be back on weekends." His hair was long and he wore a T-shirt under an unbuttoned dress shirt.
"Is that enough? For either of us?" she said.
Her hair was banded into a ponytail. Lace decorated the V-neck of her shirt.
"You can come visit me," he said.
She shook her head. "You'll be surrounded by thousands of college girls, women your own age."
"I don't want anyone else." He leaned forward and put a hand on her shoulder. "I want you."
She lifted his hand off her shoulder. "Chris."
"Please," he said.
"Chris."
Fumbling with my phone, I tapped video then record, then held it up to the window.
"I want to kiss you, to take off all your clothes and make love to you. I—"
"You can't talk like that anymore."
He raised his voice, "So you decide it's over, just like that? It doesn't matter what I think or feel?"
"Things have changed, Chris. I can't explain, but things are different. Way different."
"What did I do?" he asked.
"Nothing. I feel like I'm cheating on you if my own husband wants to sleep with me."
"Do you? Sleep with him?"
She sighed. "I don't want to talk about him. What matters is what's going on between me and you. I'm not saying any of this your fault, it's mine. I have to take responsibility. And I have to stop what I'm doing." She stood up.
He said, "Don't go."
She started to sniffle. "I didn't know that Thursday would be our last time together."
He stood too, and tried to kiss her, but she pushed him away.
"Please. Don't make this harder," she said.
He dropped into the pew and crossed his arms. "Then don't do it."
"Would it make it easier if I told you I was sleeping with Jason? Would it make you stop wanting me?"
He was silent.
"Would it make you hate me? If that's what you need to be free, then go ahead and hate me."
"I don't hate you—"
"I deserve it. I shouldn't have started in the first place. You're a nineteen-year old guy and I'm a crazy old woman who needed someone to talk to."
"Thirty-one isn't old."
"The point is I never should have started sleeping with someone barely out of high school."
"I'm not good enough for you?" he asked.
"I mean I took advantage of a situation and I should never have gotten you involved with me."
A row of artificial trees stood in pots between the altar and the pulpit.
"If we're not in a relationship, then at least we could get together. Hang out. We don't have to sneak around and hide anymore."
"What would be the point?" she asked.
"I would rather see you and talk to you," he said, his voice starting to whine, "than to not have you in my life at all."
"You think you can talk to me in public? If you can't control yourself now, how can I trust that you will around other people?"
"Natalie—"
"Besides, what happens in September when you go back to school and you won't see me at all?"
"I won't see you again?"
"You won't. You can't."
"What about Bible studies? Services?"
"I can't come anymore, not with you here. Some of my neighbors are members here."
"I'd rather die than not see you again."
She sighed. "If you can handle being friends, we can still be friends. You can still talk to me and e-mail me from time to time. But we can't meet again in private."
His voice dropped into a whimper, "For how long?"
"Ever."
"So, you choose him over me. You tell me that he doesn't care about you, and you obviously don't love him. He doesn't treat you well."
"We had a son together."
"I know. But why does that matter now?"
"You're too young to understand."
"Explain it to me."
"I love Michael. I'm still his mother, even if he's gone. I'm not willing to leave Jason right now and say that I'm ready to move on. I'm not ready. I don't want to move on."
"Leaving Jason doesn't mean you leave your child, too," he said.
"What if I want another child?"
He was silent.
"Are you ready to be a father? Could I have a child with you?" she asked.
"Do you want to have a child with Jason?" he asked.
"I want a child. I want that part of life again. I have a husband and I'm ready to have another baby."
Slowly backing away from the stained glass mosaic, I slipped away quietly.
When I opened the screen door to knock, the inner door was opened a crack. A cat raced out the door, eyes wide and ears flattened down.
"You WHORE!" Jason shouted from inside.
I rushed in and ran toward the sound.
Jason stood over Natalie who knelt on the carpet, her thick hair bound into his fist.
Two dressers faced each other from opposite ends of the room while a bed protruded in the middle. Against the fourth wall, a television's blank face watched the empty bed.
"Let her go."
He looked at me but held tight.
I pointed a Taser at him.
Natalie tried standing but Jason kept his grip firm. A cry squeaked out of her.
"Let her go or I call the cops."
She said, "Who's there?"
Once he jerked her head toward the floor and opened his fist, Natalie's head whiplashed free. She sat on the carpet and massaged her scalp.
"Stand on the other side of the bed, so I can put this down." I motioned with the Taser.
He walked to the other side of the bed.
I said, "You're not innocent."
"What are you talking about?"
"Amanda and Kendra. You've been sleeping around, too."
He struggled to inhale. After a pause, he said, "That has nothing to do with this."
"I saw the e-mails. And the pictures, too."
Raising a hand, he said, "That's not what I paid you to do."
I shook my head. "I was watching what was going on your computer. Remember, we talked about it?"
He dropped his hand and shrugged his shoulders. "But I didn't check my e-mail today."
"No," I said. "But she did."
She glanced between both of us.
"You think you've been seeing people on the sly, but she hacked your account, so you're not hiding anything."
Natalie stood and straightened her clothes.
The full-length mirror hung on the wall reflected Natalie's image, and she looked into it to watch Jason watching m
e.
"I don't like being here," I said. "But if I leave, I'm calling 911 on my way out."
"And if you stay?" Natalie said.
"You're both gonna sit down and talk to me."
They looked at each other.
"We'll sit," Jason said.
Natalie took a rocking chair in the corner and Jason sat on the bed.
"What makes you think she's having an affair?"
Jason gritted his teeth.
I waited.
He turned his face to the window.
"This is your warning, and I'm not giving you anymore. You don't answer my questions, you're going to talk to the cops and I'm sticking around to give an incident report."
After blinking at me, he looked at his wife. "I saw a home pregnancy thing in the trash in the bathroom."
Her face turned hot pink.
Jason looked at me, his jaw clenching again.
I looked at him. "I don't get it."
His breath snorted through his nostrils. "I can't have another child."
"What do you mean, 'can't'?" she asked.
"When she visited her parents over last Labor Day weekend, I had a vasectomy. I didn't tell her."
Natalie leaned forward in the rocking chair, nearly falling to her knees with a groaning cry.
Through the gauzy drape, a window sucked in a summer breeze with the smell of rain.
His voice was relaxed. "The stitching was so small and fell off after a few days."
She pushed her face against her fingers and cried softly.
"I still used a condom because I didn't want you to know."
She huddled down against the carpet.
Jason looked at me as he continued. "I never want to have another child."
I said, "What happens next? How do I leave and make sure you don't start beating on her again?"
Pointing a finger at me, Natalie asked, "Who are you?"
"Drew Kohl, licensed private investigator. I saw you at the church then I went home, but your husband left a message to meet him back at your house."
As I talked, she stood up and walked over to her dresser, so they stood across the bed from each other.
"As I was saying, how do I make sure you'll be all right when I leave?"
"It doesn't matter," she said.
"It doesn't matter?" I asked.
"My son is dead, and I've had an affair. Things won't be all right."