The kitchen contains a cold spread: cheese and hummus, fresh vegetables so crisp I find myself looking around for Penny, who couldn’t have left more than moments ago. There’s no one, of course. It wasn’t that long ago that I found this sort of convenient arrangement of our lives to be charming, like a party card trick. A sleight of hand here, a simple misdirection there, and Voilà, here’s your dinner. Now, it crawls under my skin and festers there, like a chigger, and the whole thing makes me itch.
Henry makes me tea, chamomile, lightly sweetened with honey that he insists on serving me in bed, against my protest. It’s barely eight o’clock for God’s sake. My head feels so heavy and I want to do nothing but sleep.
“You must be exhausted. Please, let me take care of you.” He pulls the covers up to my lap, fluffs my pillows. His hair is flopping down on his forehead and he’s changed into a dark oxford shirt and khaki shorts. He looks relaxed, nurturing, his eyebrows pulled together in concern. He keeps kissing me, my forehead, my hands, my cheeks. As you are woman, so be lovely.
He brings me a hot washcloth for my headache. He brushes my hair, kneads my back, his thumbs working the tender muscles between my shoulder blades. I let him. His hands guide me back down to the bed, lying on my back, and his fingers work the buttons on my blouse. I close my eyes and let him remove my clothes until the breeze blows in, chilling my skin where he’s kissed it. His fingers trace circles around my belly, my thighs, my breasts, and I let him. They find me open and wet between my legs and I let him.
I feel loosely disconnected, lubricated at the joints, floating above the bed, watching now-naked Henry make love to me, slow, insistent, loving. His face flickers in the light of a candle I don’t remember lighting, and it embodies one word: rapture.
I don’t come. I feel numb and weightless, like I’ve had too much to drink. Or like I’ve taken something. A thought pops in my head but flitters out before I can catch it. Henry shudders and bucks, his soft yelps in my ear remind me of a caged puppy, and he whispers things I can’t quite hear.
Except one. My most precious thing. He says it again and again until I fall asleep, hard, like falling off a cliff.
? ? ?
I dream of Evelyn, her teeth bared, red and bloody. She screeches, What have you done? She comes at me, hands clawed out to attack my neck, my throat. I can feel her nails on my neck, my collarbone, scratching, and she shrieks like a banshee, her hair wild. Her hatred is so real, so palpable, that I wake up wrapped in sheets soaked with sweat. Henry isn’t in bed.
It’s two a.m. I roam the house and find him sitting in the kitchen, sipping bourbon. He leads me back upstairs, changes the sheets, and tucks me in. I sink into the freshly made bed. I’m quite sure I can’t handle even one more little thing. Henry’s quiet care is such a relief. He brings me orange juice, For strength, he whispers, and I drink it gratefully, chugging it in large, heaving gulps.
“Have you heard from Yates?” I ask. “Did they find him? Can we go home?”
He shakes his head and I flop back against the pillows, exhausted. I’m asleep in no time, a thick, wool sleep, heavy and dense. The kind where when you wake up, you don’t know if it’s morning or night and the numbers on the clock swim around, bumping into each other.
I don’t have any dreams.
? ? ?
I wake sometime later, could have been hours, could have been days. I’m feverish and chattering. Henry, bedside, tucks thick, patterned quilts around me, murmuring about germs and summer colds. Fluffing pillows, clucking and puttering around the room, like a nursemaid. Picking random objects up and moving them for no other reason than to have something to do.
I push myself up on my elbows, watching him. “Have they found him?”
Henry shakes his head. “Just worry about getting better.” He kisses my forehead, his hand cupping the back of my neck. He brings me more tea, toast, and Penny’s buttery, flaky scones. I wonder when she made them and feel a sharp beat of unexplained hatred. I leave them all on the tray untouched. On the nightstand, he sets down a tall tumbler of orange juice. “You have to stay hydrated or you’ll only get more sick.”
I chug it down and fall back to sleep, the kind of thick sleep you fall in and out of quickly, dreamless. He wakes me every few hours to drink, until I shove the glass away. I can’t remember Henry ever taking care of me sick. Prior to today, I wouldn’t have imagined it.
“I can’t drink any more orange juice. Henry, I think we need to go back to the city.”
“We will. We will. As soon as I know it’s safe.” He pushes my hair off my forehead, which is slick with sweat.
“Yates should have called by now. Did she call?” I try to get out of bed, but my vision swims. I have a fever and I thunk back onto the bed.