“Co?” he asks in confusion. “When did you get home?”
“A few hours ago.” I run my fingers through my damp hair, and Jude notices my sweat.
“What’s wrong?” I can see his concern, even in the shadows.
“A nightmare.”
“Oh, babe.” He sighs, reaching to rub my back. “It’s okay. I’m here. Nothing bad is going to happen. I won’t let anything hurt you.”
My husband’s fingers feel good on my skin, familiar and soothing, and I’ll never want anyone else to touch me but him. I allow myself to relax, to close out the images from my head.
“I’ll never forget it,” I tell him softly.
He nods. “I know. No one would. But you can move on from it, Co. It doesn’t have to hold this power over you.”
I squeeze my eyes closed, because my brain knows that. It really does. But my heart... My heart isn’t so logical.
“I just wish I could unsee what I saw,” I offer limply.
Jude pulls me into his arms, and his warm breath moves my hair.
“You can’t,” he replies simply. “But we can deal with them, babe. I promise you.”
“It’s been years,” I tell him, and I feel so dejected.
“I know. But the mind works in powerful ways,” he tells me. “You know that. Be patient. I really think you should see someone, babe. You need help working through this. You should’ve gotten help long ago.”
“I don’t know,” I answer doubtfully. “I don’t want to see a psychiatrist.” I stare at the ceiling and remember my panic attack. “Or maybe I do. I don’t know.”
I don’t say what I’m thinking...that I’m afraid of what I’ll find if I poke around my head too much. Something feels like it’s there...lurking just behind a wall...waiting for me to find it.
Jude squeezes my hand. “Just hang in there. We’ll figure this out. What time do you work today?”
“Second shift.”
I know he hates second shift, and so do I. It means I can sleep in, but it also means that I won’t see Jude until almost midnight. He sighs, hard, just like I knew he would. When you’ve been married so long, you can anticipate your spouse’s reactions.
“I swear. It won’t be for much longer,” I tell him, and I mean it. “As soon as they get another doctor in, I’ll transition to Family Practice.”
“I’ve heard that before.” Jude is wry.
“I know. But I mean it.”
He turns to me, his eyes almost green in the early morning light. There’s something there in those mossy depths, something I haven’t seen in a while.
“Are you sure? Because that would mean that you’d actually have to spend time with me.”
His words are pointed, barbed, at the same time as they are insecure.
His implication takes my breath away.
“What are you talking about?” I ask hesitantly, because that’s crazy. “You’re the most important person in my whole world.”
“You have a weird way of showing it sometimes.” Jude’s eyes are hard, and he’s staring at me, and I see the truth in his gaze. He feels neglected.
I taste guilt in my mouth.
“Oh my God,” I breathe. “Jude, I’m sorry. I never want you to feel that way. I love you.”
Something passes over his face, and he shakes his head, and his attitude is different.
“I know,” he tells me, and he sounds so tired. “I’m sorry. I’m just being passive-aggressive because I never see you. This will pass. These hours...everything.”
“Do you really believe that?” I ask, and he nods again.
“Yeah. I do.”
I grab his hand and squeeze it, his fingers entwining with mine.
“You know, let’s make a deal,” I suggest. “All honesty, all the time. If something bothers you, just tell me. And I’ll do the same. That way, we don’t get worked up about things that aren’t even true.”
He smiles. “I like that. It’s a good idea.”
“I have them sometimes.” I grin back and he chuckles. “In fact, I can go first right now...because I have a concern.”
Jude waits, and I continue. “It bothers me that we don’t have much of a sex life anymore,” I tell him honestly.
He stares at me, and I can practically see him biting back a sharp retort. His tongue must hurt from the effort.
“Okay. Point taken. And it bothers me that you’re not home more. It bothers me that we haven’t started a family yet, Corinne. We’re not spring chickens.”
A heavy feeling of dread drops onto my chest like it always does when he talks about having a baby. I swallow hard, then again, then again.
“I promise to come home by dinnertime at least twice a week.” I make a spur-of-the-moment resolution, addressing one thing at a time. “Can you promise that we’ll have sex once a week? I miss our sex life, Ju. It makes us feel closer, and without it...well...”
Without it, I feel so distant.
He grips my fingers.
“Yes. That’s a deal.”
We’re quiet then, and I almost think I’ve escaped an uncomfortable subject, but then Jude brings it up.
“What about our family?” he asks after a few minutes.
I swallow again. Hard.
“I...I don’t know.”
Jude’s hazel eyes look more green in the light, as they do whenever he’s upset. I try to meet his gaze, to meet the disappointed look there, but it’s hard. I look out the window instead.
“You don’t know what it’s like,” I tell him quietly. “Living under the shadow of what my father did. I can hardly stomach the idea of bringing a child into that.”
“Into what?” Jude is frustrated now, as he always is when I speak of this. “You didn’t commit your father’s crime, Corinne. No one knows us here. Our child would never have to deal with it.”
He’s right. Of course he’s right.
But I’m not telling him the entire truth. I’m not telling him that I’m afraid of genetics. I’m afraid that our child might inherit my father’s mental illness... In fact, I’m afraid that I even have or my sister. My father didn’t snap until he was an adult.
Jude watches me, watches the wheels turn in my head. “It’ll be okay,” he tells me, and his voice is understanding. “Our baby would be okay.”
I nod. “I know. Maybe soon.”
Jude blinks away his disappointment at my non-commitment.
“Want to go get breakfast?” I ask him. “It’s almost morning. We can go to your little place—so I can make it up to you for coming home late all week.”
He pauses and almost seems reluctant.
“We can,” he tells me. “Or we can stay here and spend some quality time together.”
He stresses the word quality, and I know what that means. I’m so tired, but I don’t want to tell him that. I was the one who just asked for a better sex life, for God’s sake.
“What do you have in mind?” I flirt, ignoring my exhaustion, and I rub my hand on his leg. Once upon a time, that would’ve made him instantly hard, but we’re not twenty-five anymore, so it doesn’t.
“Let me show you.” His voice is a growl and he flips me over.
I suck in my breath because this is new—his roughness, his coming at me from the back. His fingers bite into my shoulders, and he pushes me into the bed. His passion is palpable, and it’s been so long since I’ve seen him this way.
Excitement laps into me, and I exhale in a rush.
My fingers curl into the sheets, and I hold on as he slides his fingers into me, rough rough rougher. One finger, two, then three.
I moan, and he moans into my neck, his chest rubbing my back, his heat leaching into my own. The friction is delicious, and the aggression is pleasingly different.
It’s so unlike him, so unlike us, and for a minute, I revel in that. He’s taking a renewed interest in our sex life, taking my words to heart.
But then...then...
He grasps my neck from behind. His fingers curl around the sides of my flesh, not truly hard, but hard enough.
I suck in my breath, and for a minute, a strange minute, I feel panicked.
I don’t know why. It comes out of nowhere.
I feel subdued, compressed, constrained. It’s suddenly terrifying, and I can’t breathe.
I can’t breathe.
My lungs are hot and I scramble around, pulling away from Jude, turning onto my back and pushing him away. It takes him a minute to realize what’s happening. His eyes are glazed over with sex.