I grab the glass of bourbon and step outside into the backyard. Shadow follows me and immediately goes to his bed, does a quick circle, and lies down. I pat his head and briefly scratch under his chin, and he looks up at me adoringly with his brown eyes, as though I’ve just bestowed upon him the greatest gift in the canine kingdom.
I drop my hand to my side, then reach into my pants pocket and absently trace the shape of Rachel’s pill bottle. Ruth had passed the pills to me, unceremoniously and without a word, before she left. Now, they sit heavily in my pocket. I move along the wall of the house to the stacked brick barbecue. I kneel down and open the metal door to the storage cupboard and feel my way past the sodas and waters and beer. My hand closes around the pack of cigarettes, and I pull it out. I take one of the cigarettes out, light it with the lighter hidden in the pack, then tuck it away, back behind all of the drinks. I move to the very corner of the property, where the trash and recycling bins sit, and smoke the cigarette in between sips of bourbon.
I quit smoking for Rachel. It was my one really bad habit, and she disapproved mightily, telling me flat out that she could never spend her life with a smoker. So I gave it up. For her. Because I wanted her that badly, loved her enough to commit my life and my lungs to her. But now she is unwilling to do anything for me, unwilling to be present, which in some ways I’m glad for, but in other ways not so much. So I stand here and smoke, enjoying every draw.
When I’m down to the filter, I stub it out on the corner of the concrete, then toss it in the trash bin. Rachel won’t find it. Rachel doesn’t take out the trash anymore or do anything anymore. And if Ruth finds it, well, fuck her.
I go back into the kitchen, Shadow at my heels. I look at the dog. He seems thin, and I wonder when he ate last.
“I’m sorry, boy,” I tell him, and his ears perk up and he pads over to my side and leans his full body weight against my leg. I pat him on his back three times—thump thump thump—then cross to his dish and fill it with food. He rushes to the bowl as if he hasn’t eaten for a decade and noisily inhales the kibble.
I polish off the bourbon, consider pouring myself another two fingers, then think better of it. I wash the glass and dry it with the dish towel and put it back in the cupboard, erasing the evidence of my sin even though I shouldn’t have to in my own house. I run my fingers past my nose, return to the sink and wash the cigarette stink off my hands, then wash my face for good measure, using the dish soap, which is probably terrible for facial skin, but who gives a fuck, really? Then I bury my head in the dish towel and try to keep myself from crying.
When the emotion, strong and pungent, passes, I leave Shadow to his emphatic feasting. I climb the stairs to the second floor and wander down the hall to Eden’s room, carefully averting my gaze from the door on the right, which is closed and has been for weeks.
I knock softly on the door, then push it open. Eden is seated at her desk, her back to me, hunched over a notebook.
“Do you need any help?” I ask and am relieved that my voice sounds normal and that I manage to get the entire sentence out without choking on a word. She snaps her head in my direction, and her look of surprise is like a slap to my face, as though she can’t believe I’m actually talking to her. I force myself to look at her, not turn away or drop my eyes, even though it takes all of my willpower to do so.
I watch as her lips turn up slightly at the edges.
“It’s just Language Arts,” she says. “I got it.”
I nod and try to smile at her, my lovely daughter who deserves a father who can speak to her more freely than I can.
“Good. Let me know if you need me.”
“Okay, Daddy. Thanks.”
My heart squeezes in my chest. Eden hasn’t called me Daddy for two, maybe three years. I can’t bear it. I pull the door closed and wander down the hall to my bedroom.
The curtains are closed, but I can make out the outline of my wife’s body in the bed. She lies on her side facing the window, away from me, and I’m not sure if she is sleeping or awake. I move around the bed and see that her mouth is open. I hear the familiar sound of her sleep breathing, which is like a snore, but not rough-edged or annoying like I know mine must be. I sit on the edge of the bed, perched and ready to escape should she start to stir.
In sleep, in the darkened room, Rachel looks like the woman I married, if a bit thinner. The curve and hollow of her cheekbones, the strong chin and perfectly arched brows, the slender neck, the sea of strawberry-blonde hair that my fingers used to grasp like a lifeline when we made love. When she is awake, she is a gross caricature of the woman she used to be, with the bruised circles under her eyes and the vacant stare and the slouched posture as though her grief is a constant pressure on her shoulders, pushing her down and down and down. But now, as she sleeps, I see the woman I fell in love with, and I have the urge to reach out and stroke the skin of her arm, to curl up beside her and spoon her and pull down her sweatpants and push myself inside her and lose myself to her sweetness.
“You smell like cigarettes.” I jerk with surprise at the sound of her voice.
I don’t know how to respond, so I say nothing. She rolls over onto her stomach, pulling the stuffed monkey with her, kicks out her leg, and falls asleep again. I consider taking the stuffed animal from her grasp—it’s time she let go of that goddamned thing—but I don’t want to wake her again. I watch her for another moment, then quietly leave the room.
SIXTEEN
RACHEL
I was having a dream. Jonah was there. I couldn’t see him, but I felt him, like he was hovering somewhere nearby. I was in a long tunnel, and I didn’t know which way to go. I was stuck, my feet in water that wasn’t really water—it was like soup, thick and heavy and pulling at my shoes. And then I saw the green glow of light from one end of the tunnel and the soup became water and I could move, and I did, toward the green light.
Green was Jonah’s favorite color.
I’m awake now. I wish I was still asleep. Not that it’s better there. Sometimes the nightmares come. The chasing-Jonah nightmares where he’s just out of my grasp and I’m running after him and I can almost feel the fabric of his shirt on my fingertips, but he always pulls away at the very last second, and the dream always ends with an echoing thump, and I wake myself out of it before I see what the thump means, even though I already know what it means. But at least in the nightmare, Jonah is alive, smiling and pumping his legs and giggling until the very last second.