The Twilight Wife

by A. J. Banner

  No, not alone.

  Someone was watching us. Nancy had come down the steps from the garden that afternoon. We didn’t notice. She approached in stealth. Maybe she saw Jacob’s shirt draped over the side of the fort, like a flag. I looked up and caught her watching us, a stunned look on her face.

  Nancy! I scrambled out from under Jacob, grabbed for my clothes. Jacob laughed and said, Oh, shit. He was not embarrassed. He seemed to take her voyeurism in stride. We were covered in sand, our faces flushed.

  Orcas, a whole pod breaching, she said, looking at Jacob. Dozens of them. They’re in the cove in Mystic Bay. Someone said there’s a new baby . . . See you there.

  She turned and walked away, as if she had not seen anything.

  “Kyra!” someone calls from the top of the steps. I look up at the figure of a burly man. He’s waving at me.

  “I’m down here!” I yell, waving back. From this distance, the man looks a lot like Van Phelps. I race back along the beach, away from the fort, and up the steps to greet him.

  “I was about to give up,” he says when I reach the garden. He hands me a carton of eggs. He’s in cargo pants, rain boots, and a hooded windbreaker. The familiarity returns—we’ve conversed before, and I remembered what I thought of him, a solid, earthy fix-it man, a fearless diver. He seems uncomplicated. But then, looks can be deceiving.

  “Thank you,” I say. “Jacob’s not around?” How long was I walking on the beach? I’ve lost track of time. I can still see Nancy’s face, the surprise in her eyes, and a touch of jealousy.

  “He’s not here, and he’s not in the cottage.”

  “I don’t know where he went, but I’m sorry to keep you waiting. Would you like to come in?”

  “I could use a cup of coffee.” He follows me inside, into the warmth. Jacob has made coffee, as usual. The pot is full, the fire crackling pleasantly in the woodstove. Maybe he drove back into town, or he went for a jog on the beach, heading north.

  “How’s Nancy?” I say brightly.

  “Same as ever.”

  “Meaning she’s well?” I say.

  “Meaning she’s Nancy.”

  I reach up into the cabinet to bring down two coffee mugs, and when I turn around, Van looms over me.

  He steps back. “I was going to reach those for you.” Let me reach that for you, he says in my mind.

  “Thanks, I can reach on tiptoe.”

  “I see that.” He pours us both coffee, hands me my mug. His gaze shifts to Jacob’s latest to-do list on the counter.

  SWEEP DECK, CHECK GUTTERS, WEEDING.

  BUY SALT, OLIVE OIL.

  “Milk?” I say, opening the fridge. He’s still too close.

  “I take my coffee black.” He makes no move to go and sit down.

  I put the carton of eggs in the fridge.

  He leans back against the countertop, points with the mug to the scar on my forehead. “Does it still hurt? Looks like a pretty bad scar.”

  “I don’t feel it anymore. Only its aftereffects.”

  “Aftereffects.” He turns the word over on his tongue, as if he’s tasting a bouquet of wine. “What does that mean? You feel phantom pain or something?”

  “My vision blurs now and then, dizziness. Gaps in my memory. It’s annoying.”

  “It would annoy the hell out of me, not remembering.”

  “Funny, though, certain things are coming back to me. Something about you.”

  His brows rise. “What about me? You remember coming to the boat?”

  I nearly drop my mug. My knees go weak. “We’ve been on your boat?”

  “You weren’t with Jacob.” His eyes darken, creases forming on his forehead.

  “I went alone. Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

  “Jacob told me not to tell.”

  “He knows. Why would he want you to keep information from me?”

  “He said not to bring up the past with you, to let you figure it out on your own.”

  “What if I never figure it out? Without help? He’s the one who said I would never remember.”

  “Maybe that’s what he wants.” He looks closely at me, taking in all my features, my skin flushed by the cold, my hair mussed from the wind and sand. It’s as though he can see my memory of Nancy catching Jacob and me in flagrante delicto in the driftwood fort. If Van had seen the jealousy in Nancy’s eyes, the complicated regret, what would he have done?

  “You’re suggesting he doesn’t want me to remember,” I say. A cactus of prickles covers my skin. “That’s . . . silly.”

  “He said you would get all riled up. But to tell you the truth, I was hoping to find you here alone.”

  “Why?” Maybe I should not have invited him in. I’m aware now of his size, his imposing presence, the way he disturbs the air like an unstable weather system.

  His voice tightens. “It’s been bugging me. I thought you should know. You came to me for help.”

  For help? “What kind of help? To fix something?”

  He laughs softly. “Hell no. This was not a solar panel situation.”

  “Then what was it? When was this?”

  He rubs his upper lip, then runs his fingers through his hair. “Last September. You came to the boat to ask for my help.”

  “What was going on?”

  He gulps his coffee, taps the mug. “I promised Jacob I wouldn’t mess things up for you two.”

  “Wouldn’t mess what up?”

  He makes a motion with his hand. “You two are trying to patch things up. I can’t stand in the way.”

  “Are you saying you and I were involved? You were in the way?”

  “Not in so many words.”

  “Then in how many words?”

  “We weren’t involved, okay?” He goes to the window, looks out to sea. “Promise me you won’t tell Jacob I’m telling you this, since you two are back together.”

  “We weren’t together last September?” I press my hand on the countertop, bracing myself. I might faint.

  “You were, but you wanted to leave without him. Ferry broke down. You asked me to take you to the mainland, only I couldn’t. Nancy was having a meltdown.”

  “Why would I ask you to take me away from the island?”

  He gulps the rest of his coffee, comes back to the kitchen, and plunks the mug in the sink. “You didn’t tell me why, but you were upset. I hated that I couldn’t leave. Nancy was angry with me at the time. She says I go away too much. I’m only trying to give her what she wants. The life she wants.”

  He’s heading off on a tangent, but I can’t follow right now. “Jacob knew about my plan to leave?”

  “He knew you came to the boat, not because I told him. He followed you down there and picked you up.”

  “So I came back here with him.”

  “Yep, you did. The next day, the ferry was running again, and you left.”

  “On my own, with luggage,” I say. I strolled past the library, rolling my suitcase . . .

  “Obviously, you two worked out your differences. You’re here with him again.”

  “Obviously,” I say, the room closing in on me.

  “I hope you know what you’re doing. You were so ready to get the hell out of here.”

  “Well,” I say, “I’m not now.”

  “I can see that.” He taps his fingers on the counter.

  “I have to tell him, you know. About this conversation.”

  “Yeah, I figured,” he says. “I’ll take the heat.”

  “You can’t take heat for something that’s not your fault. Jacob should have told me we fought. I didn’t say why I wanted to leave. Are you sure?”

  “You were pretty cagey, about a lot of things. When you and Jacob met us the first time, I thought you were a woman with secrets. You brought them with you from the city.”

  “What secrets? What would make you say that?”

  “Whenever Jacob would start talking about you, how you first met or your wedding, you would get quiet. Somet
imes you’d tell him not to bother us with the details. Or you’d get up and walk away. It seemed like it embarrassed you.” He looks out the kitchen window and frowns. “Speak of the devil. There he is. Look, forget I said anything. You guys seem to be fine now. Thanks for coffee.” He leaves the house, taking the porch steps down two at a time.

  “Wait!” I call after him, but he’s already getting into his truck as Jacob pulls into the driveway.

  I’m in Sylvia’s office, ripping a tissue into threads in my lap. I’ve just told her about Van’s visit to the house.

  “What happened when Jacob came home and saw Van leaving?” she says. She’s in jeans, a long, loosely knit pullover, and black shoes.

  “He asked what Van was doing there.”

  “And what did you tell him?”

  “The truth. Van’s story.”

  “How did he react?”

  “He was angry. He agreed that we fought last summer. But he said we were okay after that.”

  “Did he say what you fought about?”

  “He couldn’t remember. I don’t know whom to trust, Jacob or Van. Or myself. Except I can’t contribute anything to their stories.”

  “Sounds like you’re still feeling confused.”

  “I can’t trust my own brain.” I clasp my hands together in my lap. My knuckles are white. “If I went to Van for help, I must’ve trusted him, or I was desperate. But why would I have been desperate to leave Jacob?”

  “You don’t have any idea?”

  “Not really,” I say.

  “Were you desperate to leave, or desperate to go somewhere?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, maybe it wasn’t leaving Jacob that concerned you, but going toward something or someone else.”

  “You mean there was something important back on the mainland.”

  “Perhaps,” she says.

  “I remember the intensity of us . . . of Jacob and me together, but I know I was being pulled away from him, too. In the Whale Tale, I was certain I was about to leave him for good. I felt the sadness, like something was ending. But then it wasn’t. Van told me I went to him for help. Did I? Jacob and I might’ve been in trouble, but he tells me our marriage was perfect. I don’t know what’s real.”

  “It’s not going to make sense all at once.”

  But even the immutable aspects of reality—the rise and fall of the sun, the phases of the moon—seem suspect to me now. “Did you ever see the movie The Truman Show? A guy discovers his entire life is a TV show. Nothing is real. His wife is an actor, his town is a movie set. Everyone’s in on the joke, but he’s not. He believes everything is real.”

  “Do you feel that way now?”

  “What if I never escape from the show? What if I never remember everything? What if I never get to the truth?”

  “You will. We’re making progress.”

  “What if my marriage was truly over?” I say, rubbing my upper arms. “What if Jacob’s only telling me it wasn’t?”

  “What would his motivation be for lying?”

  “He didn’t want our marriage to end?”

  She nods thoughtfully. “Sounds like you think that might be the case.”

  “I thought that if I started remembering things again, I would remember falling in love with him. Instead, I’m getting a confusing jumble. I’m kissing Aiden. I’m in the shower with Jacob. Then I’m falling into Aiden’s arms on a hiking trail—something isn’t coming to me yet. Something important.”

  “Maybe you’re not quite ready to remember the missing pieces.”

  “Not ready? If my marriage was ending, should I leave Jacob now?”

  “Do you want to leave him?”

  “Apparently we patched things up. It seems somehow we did.”

  “I wouldn’t make any hasty decisions,” she says. “You need time to sort through your memories and emotions.”

  My days in rehab, a blur, darken the edge of my memory. “I do get impatient sometimes.”

  “This doesn’t have to be all or nothing, black or white. You could’ve had problems, true. But you’ll know when and if you’re ready to leave, or whether you want to stay.”

  “Thank you, I know you’re right.” As I leave her office, I should feel calmer, less confused, and better equipped to face the mystery of my past. I do, in a way. But I also feel as though my memories stop short, before the storm, at the edge of a precipice leading down into an abyss.

  I’m standing in a square of warm sunlight, in my dream house. It’s exactly the way it was before. Only now I realize the house is modest, giving the illusion of space in its open rooms and large windows. I love the saffron-colored walls, the skylights. Sunlight shines through the rustling fir trees. A beautiful summer ocean winks at me from a distance.

  This time, I leave the room, the nursery, and I go down the hall to the open kitchen. The living room is all windows facing the sea. My heart fills with warmth. Jacob stands in the kitchen, talking to a young woman in a blue pantsuit and matching pumps. Other offers? . . . Love the place, he’s saying. I walk up to him, but I’m confused. We’re supposed to be in the house on Mystic Island. This is all wrong. He looks up and smiles, and Aiden Finlay comes in through the sliding doors, into the living room, the sun at his back. The wind rustles his dark hair. He gazes at me. A dark cloud passes over Jacob’s face. Aiden doesn’t seem to notice. Hey, you two, he says, you should see the Jacuzzi tub.

  In a slow transformation, possible only in dreams, Aiden becomes Douglas Ingram. You look like someone I used to know . . . The sunlight fades into the gray, oppressive clouds over Mystic Island. I’m under the comforter next to Jacob. He’s snoring softly. The dream is gone.

  I slip outside into the cool, crisp air. The dawn feels scrubbed clean. I imagine this kind of autumn day is why I wanted to move here. The tide peels back from the beach to reveal a whole new world of stranded shells and crabs. As I head south toward Doug Ingram’s dock, my legs grow tired. But this time, I make it all the way to the secluded cove, only to find his boat gone.

  Overcome with a deep sense of disappointment, I sit on a rock to catch my breath. The tide pools are teeming with a rich array of marine life, including a lined chiton, an otherworldly little marine mollusk clinging to a rock, feeding on algae.

  What is that little alien? Aiden says, crouching beside me. I see him as if he’s here with me now, examining the chiton, which resembles an armor-plated, oversized caterpillar. I hear his breathing, smell his scents of soap and pine. He’s looking at the chiton with a focused sense of wonder.

  Tonicella lineata, I say. A subtidal mollusk.

  Could you say that in English?

  It has eight overlapping plates or dorsals, you see? They’re bilaterally symmetrical.

  Like humans.

  Only the chiton sticks to rocks with a suction cup foot. And they’re herbivores. Animalia: Mollusca: Polyplacophora.

  Poly what?

  Sorry, I say.

  Don’t be sorry. You’re amazing. He’s looking at me with admiration.

  You’re not bored out of your mind?

  Are you kidding? I’m fascinated. We should go diving. I bet you would see a whole lot more. He takes my hand and we clamber across the rocks into another cove, where we find more tide pools. We’re not on Mystic Island. But we’re close, maybe on a nearby island. We’re careful not to step on the numerous fragile anemones. I recite the scientific names for the species we see. He tries to pronounce the words. We come upon a jellyfish in the sand, a flat puddle of amber.

  Strange to see jellyfish motionless, I say. They move twenty-four hours a day in the sea.

  He kneels next to me, looking at me, not the jellyfish. You’re sad, he says.

  No I’m not, I say, but I am. Washing ashore is a natural part of the jellyfish life cycle.

  Can we put it back in the water?

  I smile at him. You’re so sweet, but the tide will only bring it right back again.

  Then wha
t can we do? His dark eyes register concern—for me, for the jellyfish, for everything I have ever worried about. He wants to protect me from pain, from grief, but it is too late for that. There are some things in this world from which we can’t be protected.

  Nothing, I say. There’s nothing we can do.

  Hell, if we can’t save the damned jellyfish, let’s have a funeral.

  A funeral? I say, in disbelief.

  Memorial service, whatever. To honor the life of the jellyfish.

  I laugh as we arrange seashells around the jellyfish. I used to do stuff like this when I was a kid. But it’s been a long time.

  Never give up being a kid, he says. I’ll give the eulogy. ‘All good jellyfish go to the great Sea in the Sky.’

  Even bad ones get to go there, I say. I feel as though I’m a child again, doing childish things, but happiness is suffusing me like filtered sunlight.

  “Kyra!” Jacob calls to me from far away. I’m no longer in my memory of Aiden. The jellyfish is gone. I’m crouching in the cold water, my pants wet to the knees; my feet soaked in my running shoes. Jacob’s rounding the bend in his Spandex jogging pants, windbreaker, and fluorescent green running shoes.

  “I’m here!” I wade out of the icy water onto dry sand.

  “What are you doing way the hell down here?”

  “I found a lined chiton. They’re abundant up the coast, or at least they were four years ago. But this is the first time I’ve seen one here. They—”

  “You’re shivering. Come on, let’s get you home.”

  “I’m fine.” But my teeth are chattering now, and my toes are going numb.

  “The telephone woke me up, and I saw you weren’t there.” He takes my arm and steers me back toward the house.

  “Who called?” I say. Aiden’s smile stays in my mind. His dark eyes, so sincere, so interested.

  “It was Nancy, reminding us about dinner Saturday night. We should make something to bring with us.”

  “Okay, you’re the cook,” I say. I want to go back to that protected cove. How many more moments did Aiden and I share, peering into tide pools on that rocky shore, holding solemn funerals for the dead creatures coughed up by the sea?