The Wives

by Tarryn Fisher

  “Yes, I suppose I am.” She looks at me with new appreciation. “I like how direct you are.” I bite the inside of my cheeks to keep from smiling.

  “So what’s the deal? You have to talk to someone about it, right?” I’m trying to play it cool, but my toes are curled up in my shoes and my leg is bouncing sporadically underneath the table. I feel like a druggie. I need more, I need to hear it all, to understand.

  She looks at me through spiky black lashes and presses her lips together.

  “He hides my birth control pills.”

  I press the back of my hand to my mouth as I choke on the sip of coffee I’ve just taken. She has to be joking. Seth, hiding birth control pills? Seth is the type of guy who gets what he wants without tricks. Or maybe that’s just with me.

  “How do you know he hides them?” I ask, setting my coffee cup down. Hannah shifts in her seat, her eyes darting around like she’s waiting for Seth to appear out of the walls.

  “He’s joked about it and of course my pills go missing.”

  “It’s like when women poke holes in condoms to trap men with pregnancies,” I say, shaking my head. “But why would he want to trap you with a pregnancy?”

  Hannah’s mouth pulls into a tight line and she looks away. My breath catches in my throat as my eyes travel to the bruises on her arm.

  “You wanted to leave...”

  She looks at me but doesn’t say anything. I can almost see the truth in her eyes, pressed behind her rapid blinking. My mind is spinning out of control. It’s inconceivable to me, Seth hurting a woman, Seth hiding birth control pills. I want to ask if she loves him but my tongue is glued to the roof of my mouth.

  “Hannah, you can tell me...”

  A woman with dreadlocks and a baby strapped to her chest in one of those hippie sling things walks past our table. Hannah watches her with rapt interest, and I wonder if she’s imagining herself with a baby. I’d done it a thousand times before, imagining the weight of a tiny human in my arms—wondering what it would feel like to know you made something so small and perfect. I stare at her beautiful face. Hannah is not who she seems: the perfect house, the perfect face, the perfect outfit...and then those bruises. I wanted to know her, understand her, but every second spent with her makes me more confused. A few hours ago I was furious at Seth, and now, as I sit across from my husband’s other wife, my anger transfers to her. I feel absolutely bipolar in my emotions—one minute distrusting one, the next the other. Why would she have agreed to all of this if not to have a child with him? That’s why...that’s why he added a wife. Because I couldn’t give him a child.

  “Did he make that bruise on your arm?” I lean in, studying her face for signs of a lie before she’s even answered me.

  “It’s complicated,” she says. “He didn’t mean it. We were fighting and I walked away. He grabbed my arm. I bruise easily...” she offers weakly.

  “That’s not okay.”

  Hannah looks put off, like she’d rather be anywhere else but here. She glances longingly toward the door; I lay a hand on her arm and stare her right in the eye.

  “Has he hit you before?” My question is loaded. I’m not just asking Hannah Ovark if her husband hits her, I’m asking if my husband hits her.

  “No! I mean, he doesn’t hit me. Look, you have it all wrong.”

  I’m about to ask her exactly how I have it all wrong when someone bumps into our table. I lean out of the way, but it’s too late, a cup tilts toward me, emptying its contents over my clothes. The girl who’d been holding the cup widens her eyes, her mouth dropping open.

  “Shit,” she says, jumping back. “I’m so sorry. It’s iced, thank God it’s iced.”

  I grab my purse, moving it out of the way as a puddle of brown crawls across the table. Hannah is shoving napkins at me, pulling them one by one from the holder. I look at her helplessly as I dab at my pants. “I have to go,” I say.

  “I know.” She nods like she understands. “Thanks for the breakfast,” she says. “It was nice to talk to someone. I don’t get to do that very often.”

  I smile weakly at her and think of the woman with the dreadlocks and the baby. She’s lying. There’s something off about Hannah Ovark and I’m going to find out what it is.

  SEVEN

  When Seth calls a few days later I am home, snuggled up under a blanket on the couch. I’ve been screening his calls for days, sending him to voice mail on the first ring. I’m mellow after two glasses of wine and so I answer. I’ve been going over what Hannah said, replaying her words over and over until I want to cry from frustration. He says hello first; his voice sounds tired but hopeful.

  “Hi,” I breathe into the phone. I hold the device to my ear with one hand, and with the other I trace the patterns of a throw pillow on my lap.

  “I’m sorry,” he says right away. “I’m so sorry.” He sounds it.

  “I know...” My anger dissolving, I reach over for the remote and mute the mindless fodder I was watching. Reality TV is the ultimate distraction from a broken heart.

  “I spoke to Hannah,” he says. “That’s Monday’s name.”

  I hold my breath, pushing myself into a sitting position and tossing the pillow onto the floor. Did he really just tell me her name? It feels like a triumph, Seth trusting me with something he’s never shared. I am fairly certain neither of the other wives knows my name. And then it hits me: Hannah holds all the power. She is the pregnant wife. I suddenly feel claustrophobic, my prior softness replaced with nerves. If Hannah decided that it was important for Seth to stay with her instead of going on vacation with me, that’s exactly what he would do. I may be Seth’s legal wife, but this baby shifted me to the position of middle child, and everyone knows that the middle child is the forgotten one. I clear my throat, determined to act normal, despite what I am feeling.

  “What did she say?” My heart is pounding and my nails find their way to my mouth where my teeth begin their ripping assault.

  There’s a pause on his end. “I told her that it was important for me to take the trip,” he says. “You’re right. I can’t take time away from you. It isn’t fair.”

  I should be nice, play the role of the good wife, but the words bubble from my lips before I can pull them back.

  “I don’t want your charity. I want you to want to take a trip with me.”

  “I do. I’m doing my best here, baby.”

  “Don’t call me that, Seth.”

  There’s a long pause on his end, followed by a sigh. “All right. What do you want me to say?”

  Annoyance blooms in my chest.

  What do I want him to say? That he chooses me? That he only wants me? That’s never going to happen. It’s not what I signed up for.

  “I don’t want to fight,” he says. “I just called to tell you that I’m figuring it out. And I love you.”

  I wonder if he made me the bad guy, told her I was kicking up a fuss. Why would I even care what Hannah thinks of me? But I do care what Hannah thinks, even if she doesn’t know who I am. Well, she does know, doesn’t she? I think. She just doesn’t know she knows, you fuck.

  “I told her that it was important I go,” he tells me.

  That sounds like Seth actually. Never wanting to be the bad guy. He needs to please and be pleased. He makes love to me in the same way, alternating between a tender reverence and wild grip of fingers and thrusts until I sound off like a porn star.

  Suddenly, his voice changes and I press the phone closer to my ear. “I didn’t know if you still wanted me there...on Thursday...”

  I swipe away the guilt I’m feeling for being so harsh and consider my feelings. Do I want him here? Am I ready to see him? I could just outright tell him what I did and ask for an explanation. But he could deny the whole thing, and then I’d never get to talk to Hannah again. He’d tell her who I was and she’d feel betrayed by what I�
�d done. There’s a huge chance that I am blowing all of this out of proportion, and then I’d look like a pathetic idiot to the only person in the world I am close to.

  “You can come,” I say softly. Because if he doesn’t, he’ll go to one of them. I may be angry with him, but I am still a competitive woman.

  “Okay,” is all he says in return.

  We hang up with barely more than an I love you from Seth. Who I know genuinely does love me. But I don’t say it back. I want to make him suffer. He needs to know that there are no lies in a marriage—no matter how many women you’re married to—which makes the truth even more complicated. But still...

  * * *

  I don’t know what to do. I grow sour with each day, like curdled milk left in the heat. When Thursday arrives, in an act of defiance I decide not to make dinner. I’m not going to cook for him, put on a show like everything is all right. It isn’t. I don’t do my hair or put one of my usually sexy dresses on, either. At the last minute I spray some perfume on my wrists and at the neckline of my shirt. That was for me, I tell myself. Not him. When Seth walks through the door, I am sitting on the couch in sweatpants, my hair rolled into a bun, eating ramen noodles and watching Bravo. He pauses in the doorway to the living room, surveying my state with a look of amusement. I have a noodle hanging out of my mouth, my lips cupped around it.

  “Hi,” he says. He’s wearing a cardigan pushed up to his elbows and a light blue V-neck T-shirt. His hands are stuffed into his jean pockets like he doesn’t know what to do with them. Sheepish. How charming.

  Normally, I’d be on my feet by now, rushing toward him so that I could be wrapped in his arms, so relieved that I could finally touch him. This time I stay seated, and the only acknowledgment I give him in greeting is a slight raise of my eyebrows as I suck the lone noodle into my mouth. It slaps my cheek on the way in and I feel a spray of the salty chicken water hit my eyeball.

  I watch as he ambles into the living room and sits across from me on one of the floral chairs we chose together: deep emerald green with creamy gardenias floating across the fabric. “Almost like they’re caught on the wind,” he’d said when he first saw it in the store. I’d bought it just because of his description.

  “There’s ramen in the pantry,” I say cheerfully. “Chicken and beef.” I wait for a startled reaction, but he doesn’t have one. This is the first Thursday in our marriage that I have not cooked an elaborate meal.

  He nods, hands clasped between his knees now. I marvel at the change. All of a sudden, it’s like he doesn’t belong here and I do. He’s lost his power and I sort of like it. I lift the bowl of broth to my lips and drink it down, smacking my lips when I’m done. Delicious. I forgot how good a brick of noodles could be. Oh my God, I’m so lonely.

  “So,” I say. I’m hoping to prompt Seth into saying whatever he’s holding behind his teeth. By the strained look on his face, he appears to be choking on all of his unsaid bits. I can’t believe I even entertained the thought that this man could rough up a woman. I study his face, his weak chin and too-pretty nose. It’s strange how perception is altered by bitterness. I’ve never thought his chin weak before, never considered his nose too pretty. The man whose face I’ve always loved and cradled between my palms suddenly looks weak and pathetic, transformed by my flip-flopping opinion of him.

  I flip through the channels, not really seeing what’s on the screen. I don’t want to look at him for fear he will be able to see in my eyes the ugly things I’m feeling.

  “I thought I’d be good at this,” he says. I spare him a glance before I keep flicking.

  “Good at what?”

  “Loving more than one woman.”

  The laugh that bursts from between my lips is sharp and ugly.

  Seth looks at me, chagrined, and I feel a stab of guilt.

  “Who can be good at something like that?” I ask, shaking my head. “God, Seth. Marriage to one person is hard enough. You’re right about one thing,” I say, setting the remote down and turning my full attention on him. “I’m disappointed. I feel betrayed. I’m...jealous. Someone else is having your baby and it’s not me.”

  The most I’ve said about our situation. I immediately want to reel the words back in, swallow them down. I sound so jaded. It’s not a side of myself I’ve ever let Seth see. Men prefer the purrings of a confident, secure woman—that’s what the books say. That’s what Seth said about me in the first months of our dating: “I like that you’re not threatened by anything. You’re you no matter who else is in the room...” It isn’t that way now, is it? Two other women are in the room, and I notice them every minute of every day. I look around my small living room, my eyes touching the knickknacks and art that Seth and I chose together: a painting of an English seaside, a driftwood bowl that we found in Port Townsend in our first year of marriage, a pile of coffee table books that I swore I needed but have never paged through. All the things that comprise our lives, and yet none are filled with memories, or represent a joining of lives, like a baby would. He shares that bond with someone else. I suddenly feel depressed. Our existence together is a shallow one. If not for children, what is there? Sex? Companionship? Is anything more important than bringing life into the world? I reach up absently to lay a hand on my womb. Forever empty.

  EIGHT

  It has been a miraculous three sunny days in Washington and the night sky is rejoicing with a spray of stars. I opened the blinds right before bed so we could feel like we were lying underneath them, but now they almost seem too bright as I lie awake next to my snoring husband. I glance at the clock and see it’s just past midnight when suddenly the screen on Seth’s phone lights up. His phone is on his nightstand and I lift myself slightly so I can see who is texting my husband. Regina. I blink at the name. Was that...Tuesday? A client wouldn’t text this late at night, and I know the names of everyone in his office. It had to be. I lie back down and stare at the ceiling saying the name over and over in my head: Regina... Regina... Regina...

  Seth’s first wife is Tuesday. I don’t know if it was me or if it was Seth who gave her that nickname, but before Hannah, it was just Seth and the two of us. Three days went to Tuesday, three days to me, and one day was reserved for his travel. Things felt safer back then; I had more control over my own heart and his. I was the new wife, shiny and well-loved—my pussy a novelty rather than a familiar friend. Of course, there was the promise of babies and family, and I would be the one to provide them—not her. That boosted my position, gave me a power.

  Tuesday and Seth met sophomore year in college at a Christmas mixer thrown by one of his prelaw professors. Before Seth was business, he was law. When Seth walked in, Tuesday, a second-year law student, was standing by the window sipping her Diet Coke alone and illuminated by Christmas lights. He spotted her right away, though he didn’t get to speak to her until the very end of the night. According to Seth’s account, she was wearing a red skirt and four-inch black heels. A departure from the dowdy attire of the rest of the law students. He doesn’t remember anything about her top, though I doubt it was anything scandalous. Tuesday’s parents were faculty members of the college, observing Mormons. She dressed modestly except for her shoes. Seth said she wore fuck-me shoes right from the get-go, and that over the years, her taste in footwear has intensified. I try to picture her: mousy brown hair, a blouse buttoned to her collarbone and hooker shoes. I asked once what brand she prefers, but Seth didn’t know. She has a whole closet filled with them. “But check if their soles are red,” I wanted to say.

  Toward the end of the night, as people were starting to leave to head back to the dorms, Seth made his way over.

  “Those are the sexiest shoes I’ve ever seen.”

  That was his pickup line. Then he said, “I’d ask them on a date, but I think they’ll just reject me.”

  To which Tuesday had replied, “You should ask me on a date instead, then.”

 
They were married two months after they graduated. Seth claimed that they never fought once during the two and a half years they dated. He said it with pride, though I felt my eyebrows lift at the ridiculousness. Fighting was the sandpaper that smoothed out the first years of a relationship. Sure, there was still plenty of lifelong grit after that, but the fighting stripped everything down, let the other person know what was important to you. They made the move to Seattle when a friend’s father offered Seth a job, but Tuesday hadn’t acclimated well to the constant shade and rainy mist of Seattle. First, she became miserable, then outright hostile as she accused him of dragging her away from her family and friends to mold away in wet, dreary Seattle. Then, a year into their marriage, he caught her with birth control pills, and she confessed that she didn’t want to have children. Seth was distraught. He spent the next year trying to convince her otherwise, but Tuesday was a career woman and my dear Seth was a family man.

  She was accepted to a law school in Oregon, her dream. Their compromise was a relationship commute for the two years it would take her to finish. Then they would reevaluate and Seth would look for a new job somewhere closer to her. But the business Seth ran was doing well, and his investment in its success grew. When the owner had a stroke, he agreed to sell the company to Seth, whom he had trusted to run it for two years. Seth’s move to Oregon was thwarted. He would never leave Tuesday, he loved her too deeply, and so they worked around their respective states, driving, driving, driving. Sometimes Tuesday would drive to Seattle, but mostly it was Seth who made the sacrifices. I resented Tuesday for that, the first, selfish wife. Seth opened an office in Portland partially to be closer to Tuesday, and partially because it was a good business opportunity. When we first met, I asked him why he didn’t divorce her and move on. He’d looked at me almost pityingly, and asked if I’d been left before. I had, of course—what woman hasn’t experienced being left? A parent, a lover, a friend. Perhaps he was trying to distract me from the question, and it had worked. Tears sprang up, resentful memories came, and I believed Seth my savior. He wouldn’t leave me, no matter what. That’s where jealousy came in, when someone or something threatened my happiness. I’d understood Seth in that moment, admired him, even. He didn’t leave, but the downside of that was he didn’t leave anyone. He merely adapted. Rather than divorce, he took a new wife—one who could give him children. I was the second wife. Tuesday, in a compromise to remain without children, agreed to legally divorce Seth while I married him. I was to be the mother of his children. Until...Hannah.