Lucy and Owen took turns staying up with him, sometimes alternating nights, sometimes splitting them in half. They felt like they’d aged fifteen years in just under three. They both nearly lost their minds.
Just when they thought things were starting to get better, when Wyatt had finally found some sort of rhythm, he woke up in the middle of the night and, for the first time in his life, he did not cry or bang his head or scream bloody murder. Instead, he figured out how to climb out of his crib. He made his way down the stairs, unlocked the front door, and walked down the long stone driveway to the mailbox. He was obsessed with the mailbox at the time, something to do with Blue’s Clues, and he enjoyed putting the red flag up and then down and then up and then down, flapping his hands each time he put it up again like a penguin trying to fly.
Around two a.m., a middle-aged man coming home from a bar drove by and saw this: a little boy, barefoot, in Spider-Man pajamas, standing on a large flat rock next to a black mailbox. The man was drunk, and he had done a fair amount of cocaine. He was afraid to call the police. He was afraid to be seen drunk and high with a little boy in Spider-Man pajamas on a dark road in the middle of the night. He kept driving. When he finally called the police, he couldn’t remember the name of the street or the number of the house, just that it was a black mailbox and the house was set far back from the road.
What do you do? Years without sleep? Years of waking up in a blind panic with each creak of the house? Four years of crying every day? And watching yourself and your spouse slowly fall apart before your eyes. And that’s after the regular-new-parent no sleep, regular-new-parent nights with midnight feedings and diaper changes and fevers and coughs and croup. Maybe they were better now, but still, sometimes Lucy worried.
A volunteer firefighter had driven by and found Wyatt, shivering, still playing with the mailbox. He’d brought him home. It was a close call.
They installed sliding locks up high on the insides of the doors the next day, and Wyatt went back to not sleeping.
“I’ve changed my mind,” said Lucy.
It was dark, and Owen and Lucy were in bed. Lucy was wide awake and staring up at the ceiling.
“About what?”
“The list. The open-marriage thing. I think I want to do it.”
“What? Are you being serious?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s crazy, Lucy.”
“I’m not so sure it is.”
“You said it was crazy, remember?” said Owen. “That was your word.”
“Well, I think I’ve changed my mind.”
“You think you’ve changed your mind, or you’ve changed your mind?”
“I’ve changed it. I want to do it.”
“No, Lucy,” said Owen.
“Is that a real no?”
“Yes,” said Owen.
“Your voice went up at the end of that yes,” Lucy pointed out. “That means you’re not sure it’s a real no.”
“Well, it’s a real no until we discuss it,” said Owen. “And I mean, really discuss it. Like, a paid professional should probably be involved in the discussion. A marriage counselor or something.”
“No.” Lucy sat up. She pulled her knees into her chest and wrapped her arms around her legs. “That’s just it. I don’t want to discuss it. I don’t want to spend two years talking about whether or not this is a good idea. I think that would be profoundly destabilizing, actually.”
“And you don’t think both of us fucking strangers for six months would be a bit destabilizing?”
“It might be,” said Lucy. “But honestly, Owen? I don’t think it will be. And I don’t think you think it will be either.”
“I don’t know what I think.”
“We made the list of rules. That was the discussion. It’s either a yes or a no. It’s like we’re on a nuclear submarine, and it only happens if we both turn our keys.”
“And you’re turning your key.”
“But only if you will. This is not me announcing that I’m going to go run around and cheat on you. I’m saying let’s both do it, and let’s swear to keep our mouths shut about it for the rest of our lives. Let’s decide right now, and then not another single word about it, ever,” said Lucy.
“How much wine did you have tonight?”
“One glass. Maybe two, but that was hours ago. In no way am I drunk.”
Owen sat up and leaned against the headboard and looked at his wife. “I’m just trying to process this.”
“We stick to rules,” said Lucy. “Especially the end date. Six months from tomorrow.”
“I need to know you’re one hundred percent serious, Lucy.”
“I am,” said Lucy.
Owen would never know why he said yes, beyond the stupid reasons, beyond the “my wife is going to let me sleep with other women” reasons—but he did. She leaned over and kissed him, a kiss filled with meaning and love and a little bit of danger, but still it was the kiss of the person he’d been kissing now for years and years and years. Maybe that’s why I said yes, he’d think to himself later. Maybe it’s as simple as that.
“I know this is weird, but I think we should shake on it,” he said.
“This is it,” Lucy said while they were shaking hands and looking into each other’s eyes. “This is done. We’ve made the deal. Now, not another word about it.”
Three
Schopenhauer rather famously said, we forfeit three-fourths of ourselves in order to be like other people.
—Constance Waverly
Esalen Institute, spring 2015
The Titanic was unsinkable!” said Wyatt.
“Yes, that’s what they called it,” Owen said.
It was the next morning. Owen was shaving, and Wyatt had followed him into the bathroom so he could flick his fingers under the faucet while the water was running.
“The Titanic was unsinkable! It was the unsinkable ship!” Wyatt said again.
“But what happened to it?”
“It sank! The Titanic sank in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean!”
“Yes, it did.”
“Over two hundred thousand people died in the freezing water.”
“I think that’s not the right number, Wyatt.”
“Over two hundred thousand people died in the freezing, freezing water,” said Wyatt. He had both of his hands under the running water now, flicking them with excitement. Owen filled the toothbrush holder with water so he could clean his blade.
“We might have to ask Siri about that number, Wyatt.”
“The Titanic was unsinkable!”
“We’re unsinkable,” said Owen, wiping his face dry with a towel.
“If our house got a hole in the side, and water poured in, our habitat would be destroyed!”
“But that’s not going to happen, Wyatt.”
“Our habitat would be completely, completely destroyed!”
Did last night really happen? Owen thought as he was driving to work. Was that whole thing my imagination, or did that really just happen?
1. They were both sober.
2. Everything was written down, first in orange Sharpie and then with an ordinary black pen.