John Lutz - The Ex

When she was sixteen, her father had left her mother and her for another woman. Her mother died two years later, and Molly had never quite escaped the notion that the terrible stress of the desertion had triggered the cancer. Her father had left his new lover, and a few years ago had remarried, to a woman named Verna who owned an art gallery in Detroit. Molly wasn’t sure if she’d ever forgiven him, or if she fully understood what forces had moved him. Had there been something lacking in her mother? In herself?

She tried to shake such thoughts from her mind and returned to David’s shadowed and patiently waiting form on the bed.

David moved close to her. “What’s wrong, Mol? Still thinking about Deirdre?” He kissed her neck. “Well, I’m not. Like she said, the past is buried and dead.”

Molly lay very still. “My past with you has been my happiest time.”

“Mine, too,” David whispered.

“Men leave women,” she said softly. “I know it’s unreasonable of me to think that way, and it’s because of my childhood, but it’s the kind of thing that inundates the mind and changes things forever. That’s how I feel and I can’t help it. Men leave women.”

She felt the backs of his knuckles lightly caress her cheek. “Not this man, Mol. Not ever.”

She turned to him and they kissed, and his hand found the small of her back and pressed her to him. She could feel his erection hard against her thigh.

“Try not to wake Michael,” she heard herself say.

But it was she who moaned and cried out, clinging possessively to him as they made love.

In the morning, while David showered, she made coffee and stuck two slices of whole-kernel wheat bread in the toaster.

He came into the kitchen and kissed her, dripping water from his hair still damp from the shower. Neither of them spoke about last night or about Deirdre. Everything seemed reassuringly normal to Molly.

He cooked eggs and bacon while she quietly finished getting dressed, careful not to wake Michael. After breakfast, she and David would deliberately rouse the child and play with him for a few minutes, then David would leave for work and Molly would dress and feed Michael and walk him to the Small Business Preschool, six blocks away.

“You working on something today?” David asked when they were seated opposite each other at the kitchen table.

“Book on architecture from Link Publishing,” she said, salting her scrambled eggs. “I’ve got the rest of the week to finish it.”

He took a sip of coffee and smiled. “What do you know about architecture?”

“What’s an architect know about dangling participles?”

“Good point. You gonna finish on time?”

“Easily. It’s going to be mostly photographs of European cathedrals. The text is all about flying buttresses, opposing stresses, Gothic spires, that sort of thing.”

“Saaay, you do know about architecture.” His sarcasm was good-natured, and not the sort of remark he’d have made if he felt any tension between them. Grinning, he forked in a final bite of egg, then washed it down with a swallow of coffee and stood up. He was the usual David, all right. She smiled, feeling pleased and secure. “Gonna wake up Michael now?” he asked.

“We can.”

She stood up from the table and David followed her into Michael’s bedroom. It was a small room, painted pale blue with decals of fish and sea horses on the walls. Toys were piled in a blue rubber laundry basket in a corner. More toys were lined on shelves alongside a narrow dresser. On the top shelf was a penny-stuffed piggy bank Michael’s grandfather-Molly’s father-had sent him from Detroit last winter when Michael had had the flu. A delicate butterfly mobile dangled from the center of the ceiling, swaying gently in the stirring of air caused by the opening door.

Muffin, the brown and orange cat that was a gift from the previous tenant, uncoiled from where he’d been curled near the foot of the bed, stretched, then left by way of the window that was propped open six inches by a stack of weathered paperback books to allow him access to the fire escape.

Molly and David watched their son sleep for a few seconds. He was fair and blond, as David appeared in his childhood photographs. His round face was set in the blank-slate serenity seen only on children in slumber. He was lying on his side, his knees drawn up, his tiny ribs starkly prominent with each deep and even breath. Mortality was so apparent in the very young. He was perspiring slightly and his down-like hair was plastered to his forehead.

Each morning was like the beginning of a new and fascinating chapter for Molly when she stood alongside her sleeping son. She knew she would nudge him awake, kiss him, and another day would unfold in their journey to his adulthood while they learned from each other. He was her reminder that life was an exploration.

She touched his soft, bare shoulder and he stirred and opened his eyes. Smiled.

“Big Mike,” David said, and bent low and kissed him gently on the forehead.

Michael stretched out his arms and David lifted him effortlessly, holding him well away until he was sure he hadn’t wet the bed. Then he hugged him, kissed him again, and while Michael was still chortling he handed him carefully to Molly and turned to leave for work.

This must be a ritual as old as the family, she thought. Fathers readying to leave for the hunt on primal, misty mornings lost forever in the past. She smiled. Not a politically correct thought? She wasn’t sure. But it was a lovely thought, even if she was soon to begin work herself.

David turned back as if on a whim and kissed her forehead, then ruffled Michael’s hair. Michael reached up and rufffled his father’s hair right back.

“Have a good day, you two,” David said, and left the bedroom.

She heard the floor creak as he walked into the bathroom, probably to recomb his hair, as she sorted through the dresser drawers for something Michael hadn’t outgrown.

David laid his folded suit coat on the toilet lid and ran water in the washbasin. He wet his hands and slicked back his hair, then raked a comb through it and checked his image in the mirror. He’d splashed a little water on his shirt but the spots would dry soon.

As he scooped up his coat to put it on, something fluttered from one of its pockets and landed on the hexagonal white tiles alongside the vanity.

A small piece of paper, folded once so sharply that it would be permanently creased. He picked it up and stared at it, trying to remember if it was a note he’d written to remind himself of something. He couldn’t recall putting it in the pocket.

He unfolded the paper and saw a phone number scrawled in black ink. Below the number was a message: Don’t be silty. We should be friends. Call me, please. Deirdre. P.S. Say hello to Molly and Michael.

David crumpled the paper and lifted the toilet lid.

But he paused and stood with his hand above the water. He was slightly surprised that he couldn’t release the note. Couldn’t press the lever that would remove it from his life.

He glanced at himself in the mirror, then looked away as he stuffed the note into his hip pocket, shrugged into his coat, and left the bathroom.

He could dispose of the note on the way to work, in the subway station, or at the office. There was no rush. This wasn’t some kind of goddamned test. Despite a persistent discontent some mornings in the dawn of waking, or at bad times during the day when he would contemplate the futility of his job, he was a settled and happy husband and father, probably less worried about the future than most men his age. Certainly he was more blessed than many he knew. He had unexpectedly run into his former wife yesterday and had an uncomfortable moment, that was all. They were grown-up folks living out their lives as best they could while trying not to experience or cause pain; there was no need for adolescent conflict here.