All Your Perfects

That’s one of my favorite things about him working later than me. I get to watch him take his tie off every day.

“Special occasion?” He grins as he takes me in with one fell swoop. He’s walking toward me and I give him my best seductive smile. The one that says I want to put all the pretending behind us for the night. Pretending we’re okay, pretending we’re happy, pretending this is exactly the life we’d choose if the choice were ours.

By the time he reaches me, his jacket is off and the first few buttons of his shirt are undone. He slips off his shoes at the same time his hands slide up my thighs. I wrap my arms around his neck and he presses against me, ready and eager. His lips meet my neck and then my jaw and then he presses them gently against my mouth. “Where would you like me to take you?” He picks me up and secures me against him as I lock my legs around his waist.

I whisper in his ear. “Our bedroom sounds nice.”

Even though I’ve all but given up on the chances of becoming pregnant, I’m obviously still clinging to that small sliver of hope on at least a monthly basis. I don’t know if that makes me strong or pathetic. Sometimes I feel I’m both.

Graham drops me on the bed, our clothes covering the distance from the kitchen to our room like scattered breadcrumbs. He settles himself between my legs and then pushes inside me with a groan. I take him in with silence.

Graham is consistent in every possible way outside of the bedroom. But inside the bedroom, I never know what I’m going to get. Sometimes he makes love to me with patience and selflessness, but sometimes he’s needy and quick and selfish. Sometimes he’s talkative while he’s inside me, whispering words that make me fall even more in love with him. But sometimes he’s angry and loud and says things that make me blush.

I never know what I’m going to get with him. That used to excite me.

But now I tend to want only one of the many sides of him in the bedroom. The needy, quick, and selfish side of him. I feel less guilt when I get this side of him because lately, the only thing I really want out of sex is the end result.

Sadly, tonight is not the selfish version of Graham in the bedroom. Tonight he’s the exact opposite of what I need from him right now. He’s savoring every second of it. Pushing into me with controlled thrusts while he tastes all the parts of my neck and upper body. I try to be as involved as he is, occasionally pressing my lips to his shoulders or pulling at his hair. But it’s hard to pretend I don’t want him to get it over with. I turn my head to the side so he can leave his mark on my neck while I wait.

He eventually begins to pick up the pace and I tense a little, anticipating the end, but he pulls out of me unexpectedly. He’s lowering himself down my body, drawing my left nipple into his mouth when I recognize this pattern. He’s going to make his way down, slowly tasting every part of me until he eventually slides his tongue between my legs, where he’ll waste a precious ten minutes and I’ll have to think too much about what day it is, what time it is, what fourteen days from now will be, what I would do or say if the test is finally positive, how long I’ll cry in the shower if it’s negative again.

I don’t want to think tonight. I just want him to hurry.

I pull his shoulders until his mouth is back near mine and I whisper in his ear, “It’s okay. You can finish.” I try to guide him back inside of me but he pulls back. I make eye contact with him for the first time since we were in the kitchen.

He brushes my hair back gently. “Are you not in the mood anymore?”

I don’t know how to tell him I was never in the mood to begin with without hurting his feelings. “It’s fine. I’m ovulating.”

I try to kiss him, but before my lips meet his, he rolls off me.

I stare at the ceiling, wondering how he can possibly be upset with me for that comment. We’ve been trying to get pregnant for so long now. This routine is nothing new.

I feel him leave the bed. When I look at him, his back is to me and he’s pulling on his pants.

“Are you seriously mad because I’m not in the mood?” I ask, sitting up. “If you don’t recall, we were just having sex less than a minute ago, regardless of my mood.”

He spins around and faces me, taking a pause to gather his thoughts. He pulls a frustrated hand through his hair and then steps closer to the bed. The clench of his jaw reveals his irritation, but his voice is quiet and calm when he speaks. “I’m tired of fucking for the sake of science, Quinn. It would be nice if just one time I could be inside you because you want me there. Not because it’s a requirement to getting pregnant.”

His words sting. Part of me wants to lash out and say something hurtful in return, but most of me knows he’s only saying it because it’s true. Sometimes I miss the spontaneous lovemaking, too. But it got to a point where all our failed attempts at getting pregnant began to hurt too much. So much that I realized the less sex we had, the less disappointment I would feel. If we only had sex during the days I was ovulating, I would be disappointed a fewer number of times.

I wish he could understand that. I wish he knew that sometimes the trying is harder for me than the failing. I try to empathize with his feelings, but it’s hard because I don’t know that he truly empathizes with mine. How could he? He’s not the one failing every time.

I can be disappointed in myself later. Right now, I just need him back on this bed. Back inside me. Because he’s right. Sex with my husband is definitely a requirement to getting pregnant. And today is our best chance this month.

I kick the covers off me so that I’m sprawled out on the bed. I press one of my hands against my stomach and pull his attention there. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, trailing my fingers upward. “Come back to bed, Graham.”

His jaw is still clenched, but his eyes are following my hand. I watch his struggle as part of him wants to storm out of the room and part of him wants to storm me. I don’t like that he’s not convinced I want him yet, so I roll over onto my stomach. If there’s one thing about me physically that Graham loves the most, it’s the view of me from behind. “I want you inside me, Graham. That’s all I want. I promise.” I lie.

I’m relieved when he groans.

“Dammit, Quinn.” And then he’s on the bed again, his hands on my thighs, his lips against my ass. He slips one hand beneath me and presses it flat against my stomach, lifting me enough so that he can easily slide into me from behind. I moan and grasp the sheets convincingly.

Graham grips my hips and lifts himself up onto his knees, pulling me back until he’s all the way inside me.

I no longer have the patient Graham. He’s a mixture of emotions right now, thrusting into me with impatience and anger. He’s focused on finishing and not at all focused on me and that’s exactly how I want it.

I moan and meet his thrusts, hoping he doesn’t recognize that the rest of me is disconnected to this moment. After a while, we somehow move from both being on our knees, to me being pressed stomach first into the mattress as all his weight bears down on me. He grips my hands that are gripping the sheets and I relax as he releases a groan. I wait for him to fill me with hope.

But he doesn’t.

Instead, he pulls out of me, pressing himself against the small of my back. Then he groans one final time against my neck. I feel it meet my skin, warm and wet as it slides down my hip and seeps into the mattress.

Did he just . . .

He did.

Tears sting at my eyes when I realize he didn’t finish inside me. I want to climb out from under him, but he’s too heavy and he’s still tense and I can’t move.