Lisa Unger - Darkness My Old Friend

She came to stand in the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room. She had a dishcloth in her hand. She folded it in half, then folded it again, kept her eyes on it.

“What are you trying to tell me, Jones?” she said.

The light from the halogen bulbs in the kitchen caught on her copper curls. She was wearing her hair shorter these days; it just danced about her shoulders. When he’d first met her, it spilled down almost to the middle of her back. He remembered the first time she’d unfurled it before him, took it down from the bun it had been in and let it cascade around her shoulders. He’d been breathless with desire.

He cleared his throat. “Just that things are maybe not working out with Dr. Dahl.”

She folded the towel again, still didn’t lift her eyes.

“I mean, you said yourself that if we’re not compatible, I should find someone else,” he said into the silence that hung between them.

“So that’s what you’re going to do?” she said. “Find someone else?”

He thought about going for the broom, to sweep up the floor. But Maggie had him locked in the look now.

“When?” she asked.

“I don’t know… in a couple of weeks? Honestly, I think I need a break from therapy. I certainly don’t need to be going twice a week anymore.”

His next scheduled appointment was in two days. Twice a week was supposed to be temporary, to help him through the initial crisis. But it was overkill, wasn’t it? How much talking can a person do?

Maggie sat down at the table. He stayed standing, holding the can of Pledge. The chemical lemon in the air was making his nose tingle.

“What?” he said.

She seemed to have to gather herself together, closing her eyes and issuing a light sigh. Maybe he’d better sit after all. He pulled up a chair, though he would have preferred to walk away and turn on the television, hope she’d disappear into her office. He’d prefer to leave the communicating for a day when he didn’t feel so drained. Though he couldn’t say when that might be.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I haven’t been sleeping in our bed.”

He hunched up his shoulders. “I noticed. The snoring, right? The waking up.”

“Yes, partly.”

There was a time long ago, when Ricky was a toddler, that she’d stopped sleeping in their bed. Jones would wake up in the night to find her downstairs on the couch or in the guest bedroom. And he’d watch her sleeping, then go back to bed himself. He’d never asked her why, but he remembered that the sight of her asleep alone had frightened him. It reminded him that she was someone separate from him, someone with an inner life to which he didn’t have access unless she invited him in. He had that feeling now, that creeping fear. Sitting across the table from him, she seemed suddenly very, very far away. He wanted to reach his hand across the table, take hers. He could say, Hey, what’s going on? I love you . He could use that soft tone that he knew would put her at ease. But he didn’t.

“This year has been hard,” she said. “For you. For me.”

He watched as she started to twirl her wedding band, the tiny muscles in her hand shifting, her nails pink and square, the milky quality of her skin. He tried to remember the last time they’d made love (a week, maybe two?), the last time they’d had any fun at all (longer than that). He couldn’t. In the reflection of the sliding door that led out to the pool deck, he saw himself thick and hunched across from her like some ogre. Beauty and the beast.

“I know it has been,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

She reached her hand across to him, and he took it.

“You don’t have to apologize,” she said. “I know you’re struggling. But I am, too… with the secrets you kept for so many years, with the things I’ve learned about my own past-with your… retirement.” She paused before the last word, as if she weren’t sure it was the right one. And it wasn’t, really. But he couldn’t think of a better one.

He found he couldn’t meet her eyes. They were the prettiest denim blue; he’d seen them shine with love and anger and fear. He didn’t want to see what played out there now.

“There’s a space growing between us, Jones. And if it gets much wider, we might not be able to bridge it again.”

He shook his head but couldn’t find any words. This was something that had never occurred to him, that something between them might break and not be mended. He didn’t even know who he was without Maggie.

“Look at me,” she said.

And he looked at his wife. She loved him, he could see that. But he could also see that she was sad, almost desperate. In the kitchen the dishwasher hissed. The refrigerator dumped ice cubes into the bin with a clunk-clunk .

“What are you saying?” he asked her.

“I’m saying listen to your doctor. He’s right. You’re stuck in the past, picking at scabs. You need to find a way to create your future. For yourself, for us.”

“I’m trying.”

“It’s easier to wallow, to place blame on the people who caused our pain, to reflect on all our mistakes. It’s easier than it is to leave it behind and find a different road ahead where we have to do better.”

“You think I’m wallowing.”

She closed her eyes a second. “What I’m saying is that who we were before , what we were, it doesn’t exist any longer. We need to move forward as who we are now, find a new us , a new life-without Ricky living in our house, without you as the town cop, without you carrying this secret burden. And if you can’t help me to do that…”

She let the sentence trail with a sad shake of her head. She looked back at that cloth in her hand, folded it again, smoothed it flat.

Estrangement didn’t always break and enter. It didn’t smash your windows, come in with a gun and steal your love. It slipped in through the open back door. Under cover of night, it took the little things that you might not miss at first, until one morning you woke up and everything you thought you had was gone.

“Maggie.”

She leaned back from the table and looked at him hard. “Do you hear me, Jones?”

“Yes.”

“Don’t stop seeing Dr. Dahl. Let him help you. Let him help us.”

“Okay.”

She got up and walked away from the table. She passed through the kitchen, and he heard her walk slowly up the stairs.

He knew he should go after her; he wanted to. He knew he could soothe her, make her feel better. But an odd inertia held him back, made his limbs and his heart feel so heavy. He managed to heft himself up from the table, move down the hallway, and stand at the stairs. From the bottom landing, he could see that the bedroom door was closed. He heard the shower running.

Words were so awkward in his mouth. He didn’t know how to use them to express his inner life. It was as if they didn’t fit, a language that seemed to work for everyone else but him. He couldn’t bring himself to climb the stairs, wasn’t sure what he would say if he did go up to her. He’d made so many apologies, so many promises. What was left to say?

He found himself thinking suddenly of the workbench. For Christmas a few years back, after they’d discovered that his cholesterol and blood pressure were through the roof, Maggie bought and had installed in the garage an elaborate workspace, with every possible tool he’d need for the woodworking he used to enjoy. He’d never once touched it; it just sat, collecting dust.

He wandered down the hallway now and went out into the garage. He pressed the button by the door to open up the space to the outside, and he flipped on the light. The garage door clattered open, letting in a rush of cool evening air. The wind outside was wild, sending leaves skittering across the drive.