The Husband Game

by Wylder, Penny

  It makes me smile. At least it explains where he came from.

  After introductions, we’re treated to some before-dinner appetizers, and then, bewilderingly, everyone starts to put on their coats.

  “What’s happening now?” I ask, as I squint past them outside. It’s almost sunset—not early enough to really eat yet, though, since we’re up in the mountains and the sun sets pretty early this time of year.

  “Grab your coat,” Charlie demands, before holding up a pair of what look like… ice skates?

  “What are we doing?” I eye the skates with trepidation. But I shrug on my coat anyway, before his mother bombards me with hats and gloves to try on so I can find the right fit.

  “Tradition,” she explains, as if that one word could explain all of this. “Every year when we come up to the cabin, once all of us arrive, we play a game of hockey.”

  “Hockey… like on ice?” My eyes go wide, and my spine stiffens. I can’t play hockey. I barely just learned how to watch the game, let alone play it.

  “Don’t worry.” His mom pats my shoulder. “We don’t play like those ruffians Charlie goes to school with. It’s a civilized game. Very easy to pick up.”

  “But… on ice?” I study the skates Charlie is holding once more. They look about my size—they must be an old pair of his mother’s, because I notice her grabbing a similar pair in both size and style and looping them over one shoulder. But still.

  “You can skate, can’t you?” Charlie raises an eyebrow, like this is a completely normal and obvious thing to ask.

  Then again, we did grow up in Hartford. What with how winters here get, it would have been pretty weird if I’d done no skating at all during my formative years. “I mean… I’ve skated before, yeah.”

  “Then you’ll pick it up in no time!” Charlie’s brother exclaims, handing me a hockey stick.

  I take it and grimace at the thing. “But I haven’t gone since I was about twelve years old, so I’ve gotta say, the style is gonna be pretty rusty.”

  Charlie’s father catches my expression and chuckles. “Don’t worry. We’ll go easy on you until you get your sea legs. Or pond legs, as they are.”

  “We’re going to a pond?” Images of people falling through the ice to tragic deaths dance through my mind. But I force myself to clamp my mouth shut and follow the others anyway, as they lead us out of the cabin—many dogs in tow—and up a short trail through the woods out back.

  As we walk, Charlie jogs up to me and catches my hand, lacing his fingers through mine. “Don’t worry, we do this every year. And in the dead of winter, too. The ice is always nice and thick. No danger of breaking through it as far as we’re concerned.”

  “I’m still concerned, though,” I grumble, and he laughs.

  But when we reach the pond, I have to admit, it is pretty. There are a few other cabins up here, and apparently all of the owners pitch in to help light up the pond itself. There are fairy lights strung all around it in the trees and draped between boughs. Along the ground there are more than a few wintry decorations, lit up deer and snowmen, all standing and facing the pond too, like sentries. Or an audience for our hockey game.

  On the far side of the pond, a couple are teaching their kid to skate. I watch the little kid, who can’t be more than three or four, zooming around the ice as easily as if he were walking.

  Great, I can’t help thinking. I’m going to be tripping all over myself while someone a fraction of my age is here showing off.

  But Charlie pats my shoulder and leans in to kiss my cheek, lingering for a second, and who the hell could say no to him? So I lace on my skates anyway, and traipse after his family onto the ice. I start out pretty wobbly, but Charlie skates close by my side, holding my hands until I remember how to place my feet, how to glide with one foot and then switch to the next easily.

  After a few near-stumbles, where Charlie catches me, I feel steady enough to tell him to let me go.

  Then his father passes me a stick, and I guess we’re already off to the races.

  We start with some warm-up shots. Charlie’s father, brother and I against Charlie and his mom. After Charlie scores two goals in quick succession, though, I realize that it’s basically just all of us versus him. Or, his family versus him, since I pretty much haven’t moved since we started passing the puck around. I don’t trust myself to stay upright, let alone play well.

  “Come on, Lila. Counting for real now!” Mark shouts at me in encouragement. Then he passes the puck my way.

  I drop my stick to the ice to catch it. Then I glance up, and find Charlie flying straight toward me.

  “Here!” Charlie’s dad calls over his shoulder. I wind up and slap the puck his way. Charlie tries to intercept, but it slips past him, and then his dad has it, and he easily flicks it into the goal past Charlie’s mom, who laughs and shakes her head good-naturedly.

  “They get so competitive over this,” she calls to me, while she fishes the puck out of the snowbank we’re using for her net.

  She passes it to Charlie, and I realize I’m close enough to stop him. I take off, hurrying toward him across the ice so fast that I don’t even look at my feet. Too fast.

  A moment later, I collide headfirst with Charlie, who catches me before I can go flying onto my ass, at the very least. He laughs as he steadies me, his hands strong and sure around my shoulders. As for me, all the breath flies out of me. Not just from our collision but because standing here, inches apart from him, with the ice beneath us and his warm eyes fixed on mine, I’m reminded all over again of his proposal. Of that moment in the middle of the arena with all of his friends watching, when he asked me to marry him.

  Of his grandmother’s ring, still glinting on my finger whenever I move my hand. I glance at it now, bright and shining in the corner of my vision. And once I start looking at it, I can’t stop. I just stare, worried, confused. But also… kind of loving this. Being with him, meeting his family, goofing off with them.

  “That would definitely get you a penalty anywhere else you know,” Charlie teases me, his eyes still heated, flashing where they catch mine.

  Then he, too, glances down at the ring on my finger, and I wonder if he’s thinking the same thing. If he’s enjoying this moment, and how natural it feels for us to be here together, as much as I am.

  Of course he isn’t, I scold myself. This is all just a game for him, just fake. I’d do best to remember that myself.

  Then his father claps his hands. “Face off at center,” he declares. “Since that would have probably been a foul. Sorry Lila.”

  “No, that’s fair,” I agree, and I skate to center. To face off against Charlie. Oh crap.

  I gaze into his eyes as his father drops the puck between us. I scramble for it with my stick, but Charlie has years of practice on me. He plucks it from my control easily, and flips around me, then dodges between his father’s defense and fires it at his brother Mark, who’s goaltending. It smacks the pile of snow behind Mark, within the goal boundaries we defined, with a satisfying thwacking sound.

  “Boo,” I chorus with his father and Mark, while Charlie and his mother high-five.

  “Come on, Lila.” Charlie’s eyes spark when they meet mine once more. “Bring your A game.”

  We play until someone in one of the houses near the lake cuts the power to about half of the lights out here. By the time we break, I’m sweaty, panting, my legs aching from the unfamiliar motions. Not to mention, my arms. These hockey sticks are heavy as hell. No wonder hockey players always look so ripped.

  Charlie being no exception.

  The other couple who had been teaching their kid to skate have long since gone home. Charlie’s parents decide it’s best we pack it in too, though I notice they’re careful to hurry off the ice, to leave Charlie and me a little time alone together, as he skates around picking up the remaining sticks.

  “You did really well for someone who hasn’t skated since childhood,” Charlie remarks, easily gliding up and past
me on the ice, before he spins around to skate backward in front of me.

  Show off.

  “Well, I tried. But I can’t really compete with your athleticism.”

  “I don’t know.” He grins. “You scored twice,” he points out.

  “Yeah, because the first time your dad pinned you so you couldn’t interfere, and the second time you were distracted by me winking at you.” I laugh.

  His smile widens. “Just means you’re smart enough to use your assets to your advantage.” He reaches out to catch me around the waist as we near the edge of the pond. Then he pauses to check over his shoulder. But his parents are already halfway up the trail to the house, and his brother follows closely behind them. “Speaking of your assets…” he whispers, his breath a tickle, a caress against the nape of my neck.

  I turn, and his lips find mine. The kiss is soft, slow. Searing, yet not just heat. There’s real passion there too, real feeling. When we break apart, I can tell both of our breaths come short, based on the amount of fog that steams the air between us, quick and heaving.

  “Do you still think we did the right thing, coming up here?” I whisper, unable to resist. “Because… I can’t help thinking that we’re doing something wrong.” Leading his family on, making them think there’s more between us than there really is? It doesn’t sit right with me.

  Just like we’re lying to all of our readers—or, well, my readers, I guess. Anyone following the article closely.

  I push that thought to the back of my mind, as Charlie reaches up to brush his thumb along my mouth, tracing my lower lip. Then he leans in to kiss me again, right there, softly. “No,” he whispers, the word a new cloud between us, steaming in the chilling night air. “No. I don’t think we’re doing the wrong thing at all.”

  13

  We take our time weaving our way back to the cabin. With Charlie’s hands wrapped around mine, hot as ever, and the heat from all the action of the game still pumping through my system, I don’t feel cold, despite the deep snow and the evening air. My breath fogs as we walk, but there’s something peaceful about it. The complete silence up here, the full darkness. I can see more stars than I ever remember seeing before, glimpsed between branches of the pine trees that arch over us like the canopy of a cathedral.

  Our feet crunch through layers of snow with a satisfying sound, every step we take.

  “So, now you’ve seen all my crazy,” Charlie jokes, with a gesture toward the cabin in the distance with its little curl of smoke drifting out the chimney, visible even from here thanks to the lights on in every window. “When do we meet yours?”

  He says it in a lighthearted, joking voice. But it only makes my steps falter, worry flooding back in. Because my family isn’t like his. We’re not whole and happy; I don’t have two happily married parents joking with one another, playing hockey together, parenting their boys together.

  “I…” The words stick in my throat.

  Charlie frowns, suddenly catching on to my discomfort. “If you don’t want to talk about it…”

  “It’s not that,” I say, quick to explain. “It’s just…” I blink hard and turn to look through the forest toward his cabin. When I speak again, my voice comes out softer. Stuck in the back of my throat. “My family isn’t really… like yours.”

  The snow crunching softly is my only hint that Charlie’s stepping up beside me. But when he speaks again, his low, now-familiar voice is a rumble just beside my ear. I can tell that he’s standing barely a foot away, behind me. Close enough to touch, but he doesn’t. Not yet. “Every family is different, Lila.”

  “I mean, we’re not happy.” My throat feels so tight, it nearly shuts.

  Slowly, so slowly that I can tell he’s waiting for me to shrug him off, maybe even expecting me to, his hand comes to rest on my shoulder. Warm and reassuring.

  I let it stay. “My parents married pretty young. My mom got pregnant with my older brother in grad school, and she made a deal with my dad. He’d work and support the family while she raised the kids. But once we were old enough to go to school on our own, then Dad would slow down, take care of us, while she went back to school.”

  “Sounds sensible enough,” Charlie says softly. “I’m guessing it didn’t go exactly that way?”

  I squeeze my eyes shut, and in response, his grip on my shoulder tightens. “Ten years later, when my brother was in fifth grade and I’d only just started first—right around when Mom was supposed to be able to go back to school… Dad left.” My breath hitches.

  Charlie’s arm slides down mine, and his other comes up to my waist, until he encircles me with both strong, taut arms, drawing me back against him. I let him pull me into the hug, and after a moment of hesitation, I tilt my head back to rest against his strong chest.

  I can feel every breath he takes. In and out. It steadies me enough to continue.

  “It took us ages to even figure out where my father went. Turns out he’d been having an affair for a while. When Mom demanded he live up to his end of their bargain, he decided he’d rather take off with his new girlfriend. Have no more responsibilities or ties. He never reached out to us again, not even me, and I—” My voice cracks now. Tears leak from the corners of my eyes. “He and I were close… I thought he cared about me, thought he loved me. But who could do that to someone they loved?”

  “I can’t imagine anyone wanting to leave you, Lila Baker,” Charlie whispers, and he sounds so damn sincere that I can’t help myself. I turn in his arms and press my lips to his, hard. He cups the back of my head, kisses me soft and slow and sweet, like I’m the only taste in the world he wants to savor right now. When we break apart, our lips hover inches apart, and our gazes lock. He wipes a thumb across my cheekbone, ever so gently, and it’s only then that I realize I’m still crying.

  “So this is why, is it?” Charlie frowns at me. “Why you wanted to do this whole stunt, to prove that traditional marriage never works, that relationships like that are always doomed to failure.”

  I hiccup, then let out a weak laugh at myself. “I never thought about it like that…” But he’s got a point. My parents’ failed marriage does make me angry about the whole institution. And it does make me want to prove how badly marriages can go; to try to save other girls from my mother’s fate if I can. “Maybe you’re right,” I admit, my voice so low that even I can barely hear it.

  Charlie watches me carefully, nodding. Then he leans in to kiss my forehead again, more gently this time. “Then, for your sake, Lila, I hope you can stop reliving that pattern. Just because you learned one way a marriage could go wrong, doesn’t mean you can’t ever find love yourself, or even a happy marriage of your own.”

  My throat practically closes in on itself. You’re wrong, my instincts scream. I am doomed. Didn’t you hear a word I just said?

  But deep down, there’s a tiny little voice in the back of my head that murmurs, Or does he have a point?

  With one last smile, Charlie touches my cheek, and then he breaks away from me toward the house, as if sensing that I’ll need a minute to compose myself. I’m both grateful for his instincts—the man really does always know what I need, sometimes even before I know it myself—and wishing that he’d come back and hug me again. Kiss me until I don’t feel anything, until I can’t think about any of this.

  In the end, he doesn’t. I watch him enter the cabin, watch the lights flare. I lean against a tree and consider it. A family. A husband. A home that I wouldn’t have to worry about losing, because I’d know my partner would never abandon me the way my father did.

  It’s certainly worth thinking about. Even if it’s hard to believe a life like that could ever be mine.

  * * *

  Dinner that night feels just as warm and reassuring as our hockey game. I sit at the table between Charlie’s parents and listen to their good-natured banter; to his brother’s exploits. To all of them teasing Charlie about embarrassing stories from when he was growing up. Then we watch a movie on TV toget
her, before everyone retires.

  I notice his parents don’t put me in the same room as him. But I’m in the one next door, which is almost as good. I lie awake, staring at the ceiling until well past midnight, when all the noises from the rest of the house have finally died down. Only then do I rise from the bed and toss my nightgown on, tiptoeing next door, to the closed door beside mine.

  I tap lightly on the frame. I’m about to tap a second time, worried I’d done it too quietly the first, when the door creaks inward, and Charlie’s face appears in the gap. He holds up a finger to his mouth in the universal gesture for quiet. Then, wordlessly, he inches the door wider and lets me step inside.

  I don’t even make it one step. I move on instinct, stepping toward him and wrapping my arms around his neck at the same time. My lips sink into his. He pulls me against him, and gently, I hear the sound of him easing the door closed after us. We pull apart just long enough for him to whisper, “We’ll have to be quiet,” his voice barely a breath against my neck. Then he’s kissing me again, his lips at my neck, my jawline, his hands clawing up my thighs to push my nightgown out of the way.

  He spins me around, drops onto the mattress with me pinned beneath him. I arch up against him, raise my arms as he draws my nightgown over my head and tosses it to one side.

  I’m not wearing anything underneath.

  And I’m pressed close enough to feel exactly how hard that makes him, as his cock starts to rise against my inner thigh, stiffening with each press of my thighs against his. I reach for his shirt and pull it off, tossing it after my gown. Then only his boxers separate us, and no matter how distracting it is when his tongue trails down my chest to circle my nipples, licking and sucking, his hands palming my stomach, my sides… I still manage to keep my hands working long enough to shove his boxers down to his ankles.

  His cock springs free, swollen with desire, hard and thick and velvety soft. I wrap my hands around the base, stroking the length of him from base to tip, savoring the glide of him through my fingers.