I knew it was wrong: I knew it was right.
I’d have to leave. I’d have to persuade David to take an assignment somewhere else. But what excuse could I give? That I missed my friends on the east coast? No, that wouldn’t even give him pause for thought during the length of a coffee break. That I wanted to be nearer to my mother? No, he’d never believe that. My brain was empty of further excuses.
Maybe I could leave? Leave David, start again somewhere else: no job, no home, no money? It was a terrifying prospect. I’d never been alone my whole life; I didn’t know how to do it.
Miserable, pathetic, whore!
And then a new fear threatened to derail me: I hadn’t used any contraception.
“NO!”
I wailed out loud, then threw a hand over my mouth. “Shit! SHIT! FUCK!” David grunted but carried on snoring.
I wasn’t on the pill, I had no need; David was as infertile as the Gobi desert. But Sebastian… oh God!
I tried to organize a list of urgent jobs for the morning but all I could think was, what if I’m pregnant? For the briefest of moments I imagined an alternate universe where I was the mother of a blond-haired child with eyes the color of the ocean, and a husband who loved me. But that’s all it was: a moment.
Plan B Emergency Contraceptive – that was my priority. At least I could buy it over the counter. I’d have to drive into the city or somewhere I wasn’t known.
How could I be so stupid?
Everything I’d done in the last 12 hours had been lunacy. What was wrong with me?
I realized belatedly that I’d ironed David’s pants to within an inch of their shiny-ass life. I let the iron cool and tiptoed into the bedroom to lay out the rest of the uniform. David was K-O-ed. I stared down at the man who was my husband, for better or worse. I gazed for so long, my eyes were dry. How curious. I couldn’t put a name to what I felt when I looked at him. Maybe something, maybe nothing. My emotional gauge was running on empty; I think it had been that way for a long time. Until Sebastian… No: must not think. Must not think like that.
Back in the kitchen I fixed myself a coffee which I didn’t drink, and waited solemnly for dawn.
As the sun’s first light filtered weakly through the windows, I had resolved nothing. Go or stay? Stay or go? The devil I knew or the deep blue sea? Go or stay? Stay or go? Endlessly repeated through the torpor of my mind.
The doleful ring of the bedside alarm made me jump. David snorted awake and I hurried to make breakfast. He liked it hot and greasy after a bender. Luckily yesterday’s sprint to the store had furnished the refrigerator with bacon and maple syrup. I whipped up some pancake mix and put a dab of oil in the pan.
He arrived at the breakfast table with military precision and in a full-on sulk.
“Nice to see some food for a change,” he muttered.
“How many pancakes do you want?”
“Two.”
Silently I served him the guilty-wife special: three pieces of bacon, two eggs sunny-side up, two pancakes, syrup on the side and coffee.
“This plate’s cold.”
“You want me to heat it up?”
“I haven’t got time for that. Christ, Caroline! Can’t you do anything right?”
No. Probably not.
He left the house without a word. I wondered how long his sulk would last: nine days was the record.
Belatedly, it occurred to me that Sebastian would probably come looking for me once he was sure David had gone to work. I knew it was cowardly and unfair, and I was supposed to be the adult – but I just couldn’t face him.
I showered at the double and ran out of the house without bothering to dry my hair, scooping up my notebook from the hall table as I passed. I couldn’t say why: perhaps some atavistic memory of needing to write, from a time when life was simple.