The Darkest Lullaby

by Jonathan Janz

  “No,” Ellie said. “Did he?”

  “Who the hell knows.”

  She sat thunderstruck. She couldn’t imagine her sister letting anything she was a part of fail. It was one of the fundamental laws of Ellie’s reality: Kat succeeded; Ellie was the one who screwed up.

  “I’ll tell you about it on one condition,” Kat said. “You have to tell me exactly what’s going on with Chris.”

  Ellie wanted to look away, but Kat’s stare transfixed her. There was something almost fierce about her sister’s expression, but beneath that she sensed a hurt she’d never imagined possible.

  “Okay,” Ellie agreed.

  Kat began to talk then, and soon the twilight deepened. Ellie lay on her back staring up at the porch ceiling planks, her hands folded behind her head for a pillow.

  Roland, Kat told her, had begun to behave distantly around the time Ellie had gotten married to Chris, and one of the many shocking facts Kat revealed was that Roland had accused her of being attracted to Chris at the reception.

  “You’re kidding,” Ellie said. “Roland thought you wanted my groom?”

  “Sexually.”

  “Why would he think that?”

  “I made the mistake of mentioning that I thought Chris looked handsome in his tux.”

  “And because of that he thought you were after him?”

  “That’s Roland,” Kat said. “Painfully insecure. He thinks I want every man my gaze happens to linger on, like I’m constantly on the prowl for new lovers.”

  “My first husband cheated on me,” Ellie said.

  “No kidding?”

  Ellie was surprised at herself for mentioning it. In fact, the whole ordeal had been so painful, she rarely allowed herself to think of it.

  Not unlike being raped under the bridge.

  Ellie shut her eyes to blot out the memory.

  “Well,” Kat went on, “Roland didn’t cheat on me, but in a way that might have been better.”

  “Believe me, it wouldn’t have been better.”

  “Yeah?” Kat said. “I’m not so sure.”

  Ellie shifted on the unforgiving concrete, striving for a more comfortable position.

  “Hold on a sec,” Kat said and got up. Ellie heard her open the screen door. A moment later, she returned. “Sit on this,” she said, placing a couch cushion beside them.

  Ellie did as she was told, and felt an almost immediate lessening of the pain in her left side.

  Kat went on. “He didn’t cheat on me because that would have required him to perform sexually.”

  Ellie raised her eyebrows.

  “After we had our second child, he was barely able to get an erection.”

  “How’d you get pregnant the third time?

  “Luck, I suppose.”

  Ellie let it digest. She couldn’t picture Roland becoming impotent; then again, she couldn’t picture him having sex either. There’d always been something strangely robotic about him. She thought of him as a Stepford husband, but instead of being glamorous, he was like a million other American husbands: clean-cut, pale, not unattractive, but not remarkable either. He was just…there.

  They sat in silence awhile, the sky darkening to navy blue. There were stars out tonight. Not many, but enough to make it nice on the porch.

  All at once, a weird whirring sound erupted from the woods, making Ellie start and grab her sister’s arm. “What the hell is that?” she asked.

  “Cicadas,” Kat said. “We didn’t have them in California, but around here they’re all over the place.”

  “What an awful noise.”

  “You get used to it. I’m just surprised they’re out this early. In Ann Arbor they usually don’t start until July.”

  Ellie sat back on her cushion. “So…when’s the last time you two had sex?”

  “Probably the night we conceived Jacob.”

  “You’ve gotta be kidding.”

  “I wish I was.”

  “And Jake’s how old now? Three?”

  “Four in October.”

  “Jesus, Katherine.”

  Kat smiled, but there was pain in it.

  “Why do you think Roland…”

  “Couldn’t get it up?”

  Ellie waited.

  “Who knows?” Kat said wearily. “I guess he stopped finding me attractive.”

  “But you’re gorgeous.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far. Having babies does a lot to your body, El. My stomach looks like a dried prune.”

  “That’s not so bad.”

  “Sometimes I pee when I laugh.”

  Ellie laughed, her enlarged breasts jiggling painfully. Still, it felt good. She hadn’t laughed in weeks.

  “It’s true,” Kat said, laughing now too.

  Ellie lay back on the cushion, struggling to catch her breath. Kat lay back beside her, laughing as well, and as she did she gasped and squeezed her legs together.

  “No way,” Ellie said.

  “I can’t help it,” Kat said, wiping her eyes. “I can’t control it anymore.”

  Just then, Chris opened the screen door and stared down at them. “What’s so funny?”

  But try as Ellie might, she couldn’t catch her breath to explain.

  The burned hand made typing a bitch.

  Chris pushed away from the desk with a frustrated sigh. He examined the medical tape with which Katherine had wrapped his hand, the bulging gauze beneath. He’d need to change the wrapping tonight before bed. Once, when his mom had used gauze to cover a nasty scrape he’d gotten while sliding into second base—a strawberry was what his coach had called it—he’d nearly screamed himself hoarse when his mom peeled the white bandage off several days later, the scab having attached itself to the gauze. It resulted in a wound that was worse than the original.

  His bladder throbbed, but below, he could hear the shower going. He checked the small clock on the corner of the desk: 10:17 p.m.

  He stood and stretched, his lower back a tangle of knots. He went down to the second floor and passed the guest room, which was closed, and the room in which he kept his weights, which was open. He made a face at the realization that his burn would likely prohibit working out for at least a week.

  Stupid thing to do, he thought as he reached the bathroom door. He frowned. Ellie seldom closed the door. In fact, she never did unless she was taking a dump. But he could hear the shower spraying within. Maybe it was because her sister was here.

  He opened the door and blinked at the amount of moisture in the air. The mirror was completely steamed up, the room like a sauna.

  He glanced at the shower curtain.

  It was Ellie in there, wasn’t it?

  Kat’s door had been shut, and he was pretty sure she’d turned in for the night. He didn’t know his sister-in-law all that well, but she seemed like an early sleeper. Most people with kids were.

  Chris stepped over to the toilet and raised the lid.

  He grinned. It would be funny though, wouldn’t it? Him walking in on Katherine taking a shower? How would she react? Even better, how would Ellie react? Would she take it all in good fun, recognize how innocently it had happened, or would she be pissed off, assuming Chris had done it intentionally? Like he was some kind of adolescent, desperate enough for a look at some tits to walk in on his sister-in-law. Well, it would be embarrassing for him too, right? Him standing here with his dick in his hand taking a leak?

  He was thinking this when the water shut off and the curtain slid open.

  Katherine had her eyes on the bathmat, one leg extended out of the tub, when she looked up and uttered a gasp of surprise.

  “Hey, I didn’t mean—” he began, but she was already jerking the curtain over her. Before she did, though, he got a good look at her naked body. Nice-sized tits, small pink nipples. Tummy a trifle loose, but below that…

  And what was more, her eyes had flickered, just for a moment, to his penis.

  Through his surprise at having encountered her this w
ay, he felt a powerful surge of arousal. It was difficult to zip up.

  “Could you…” she began. He met her gaze and followed it to the towel bar.

  “Oh, sure.”

  When he handed her the towel he noticed she was blushing. Embarrassed, yeah, but not angry. That told him a lot. When she had the towel in hand, she receded into the shower. A moment later, she drew the curtain aside again and stepped out, the towel low enough to show a little cleavage, but not quite long enough to cover much of her legs. In fact, if he had a better angle…

  She glanced at him, and he realized he’d been staring too long.

  “I’m sorry,” he said and forced a smile. “I’m just—”

  They heard footsteps below. Ellie.

  Without a word, Chris slipped out the door and into the bedroom. He crossed to the closet, occupied himself by studying neckties.

  He listened as Ellie climbed the stairs. Then she was in the room beside him.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “Hey, honey,” he said as casually as he could.

  “I feel bad for Kat.”

  “Yeah, why’s that?”

  “We only have one shower. I hate that she has to share it with us.”

  “We’ll make it work,” he said.

  And turned away so Ellie wouldn’t see his smile.

  Katherine had a hard time making eye contact when Chris came down for breakfast. It wasn’t only that he’d seen her naked, which was bad enough—hell, she hated to see herself naked—it was the way they’d both reacted to the incident. No nervous laughter, no talking over each other to ease the tension of the moment.

  Chris said good morning and went to the fridge to pour himself some orange juice. Katherine noted that Ellie hadn’t even looked up when her husband came in, had only continued pushing her scrambled eggs around her plate.

  The tension…that was the real problem. It had been the wrong kind of tension percolating in that small, humid bathroom last night. It hadn’t been the tension of two embarrassed people who wished the moment had never happened. It had been the tension she sometimes felt when her husband’s—soon-to-be ex-husband’s, she reminded herself—best friend came over for dinner and drinks. Ross wasn’t remotely her type, but there was a knowingness about him that she reacted to, couldn’t help reacting to. Her only defense with Ross was to avoid making eye contact, which worked during dinner. It was always later on, after they’d started on their second round of drinks, that she allowed herself an occasional glance at Ross as they all talked. She told herself she was simply being polite—after all, in a party of six, how could she not look at him at some point in their conversation? But whenever he’d look back at her she’d have to squeeze her legs together to stifle the heat he kindled there.

  After Roland ceased initiating sex between them, and later, after they stopped having sex completely, there’d been a yearlong period in which Kat had not experienced an orgasm or even indulged in a sexual fantasy. Then again she’d been pregnant for nine of those months, and after her last child was born she was too busy or too tired to think of anything other than survival.

  But slowly, as her nursing decreased and her libido returned, she indulged in fantasies of Ross, of her college boyfriend Francesco, of George Clooney.

  And eventually, of her sister’s husband.

  The ironic thing about her blow-up with Roland upon leaving Chris and Ellie’s wedding reception had been that a cruel part of her had wanted to confess to her husband that yes, she did in fact want to sleep with Chris Crane, did want him to ravage her the way Roland would not.

  Katherine forked in a bite of hash browns and stifled a laugh. Who was she kidding? Roland had never ravished her in his life, and definitely not in the manner Chris did in her fantasies.

  The first time she met him, he and Ellie were just dating, and Katherine assumed he was only another in a long line of her kid sister’s flings. Some of them had been handsome in a vapid, puerile way, but none of them had been memorable.

  But Chris…

  The first time he entered the Italian restaurant at which they were to meet for dinner, Katherine knew she had a problem. As he smiled and shook her hand, his sincerity incongruous with his gorgeous looks—the sandy hair, the broad shoulders, the knockout smile, even the dimples in his cheeks and chin—she secretly hoped it wouldn’t work out between him and Ellie. There was a part of Katherine that wanted the relationship to fail out of a primitive, nasty jealousy. Chris was everything Roland was not. He was bigger, sunnier, more charismatic, and Katherine was sure he could get erections just fine. Ellie’d certainly never stay with a man who couldn’t.

  Katherine realized Ellie had been speaking to her.

  Ellie chuckled. “Jeez, Kat. Talk about zoning out.”

  Katherine steadied her breathing. If you only knew.

  She said, “I was just thinking about Gigi.” She glanced at Chris. “She’s my oldest. I was just thinking Mom and Dad better make sure she gets plenty of sunscreen or she’s liable to fry.”

  “Always a mother, huh?” Ellie said and went back to playing with her eggs.

  Katherine swallowed, her throat thick with guilt.

  Chris set his glass on the table, a few inches from Katherine’s fingers. He tented his hands, looked at his wife and said, “I don’t suppose Kat told you what happened last night?”

  Katherine felt her heart lurch. She shot a warning look at Chris: What are you doing?

  Chris caught it, a hurt expression rippling through his features. He went on in a less jocular tone, “I feel sort of bad about it, it was really an—”

  “It was nothing,” Katherine interrupted. She risked a glance at Ellie in the hope that she was still staring down at her uneaten food, but her sister had picked up the nervous energy hovering over the table.

  “What happened?” Ellie asked.

  Chris shifted in his seat, but Katherine cut him off. “He almost walked in on me in the shower,” Katherine said. “Apparently he thought I was you.”

  “Did he…” Ellie began.

  “No, thank God.” She grimaced. “Probably would’ve given him nightmares.”

  “Oh,” Ellie said, but she didn’t seem to relax any. If anything, her expression grew more troubled.

  Katherine forged on, “He asked if I’d leave the water running for him. I told him sure, but could he give me time to put on a robe first?”

  Ellie was watching Chris now, her face difficult to read. She said, “Guess you’ll knock from now on, huh?”

  Chris nodded, gave Katherine a sheepish grin. “You bet.”

  Soon after, Ellie excused herself and went upstairs.

  When she was gone, Chris seemed to deflate. “Shit, I’m sorry, Katherine. I didn’t mean to—”

  She stilled him with a hand on his forearm. “It’s okay,” she said. “Really.”

  He suddenly seemed very vulnerable, almost like a little boy. Though they were roughly the same age, she felt like a rapacious older woman.

  She took her hand off his arm.

  He said, “Sorry about last night.”

  “You really got an eyeful, didn’t you?”

  His cheeks reddened. “I’m not the only one who got an eyeful.”

  It was Katherine’s turn to blush.

  “You have a great body,” he said quietly.

  She shrugged. “After three kids…”

  “You’d never guess it,” he said. “Seriously.”

  She stared up at him. “Yeah?”

  He nodded. “I know I shouldn’t have, but…”

  “What?”

  He favored her with a sidelong glance. “Tell you the truth, I sort of enjoyed it.”

  Katherine fell silent. She had no idea what to say to that.

  “There’s something I was wondering about,” Ellie asked as they made dinner that evening.

  Kat said, “Shoot,” and went on chopping celery.

  Ellie opened the oven a crack to make sure the garlic bread was
n’t burning. “I wondered why Chris walked in on you.”

  In her periphery she saw the knife pause, then slowly begin chopping again. “I told you why,” Kat said. “He thought I was you.”

  “You said that earlier.”

  “Well,” Kat said and uttered an impatient grunt, “that’s because it’s the truth.”

  “What I don’t get,” Ellie went on, “is why Chris didn’t take a shower last night.”

  Kat stopped chopping and set the knife on the cutting board. Palms on the counter, she said, “Why don’t you come out and say it?”

  Ellie returned her glare. No, she thought. I’m not buying it, not this time. You’ve been caught, and you’re doing a poor job concealing it. But what exactly are you concealing? What happened between you two?

  Ellie kept her tone level: “You said he came in and asked you to keep the shower running after you were done. You said, ‘Sure,’ but would he give you time to put on a robe first.”

  “Good memory,” Kat said. “You should’ve been a court recorder.”

  “He asked you to leave the shower on so he could take a shower.” She leaned forward to drive home her point. “But he didn’t take a shower last night.”

  “So?”

  “So what happened between the bathroom and the bedroom? Did Chris suddenly decide he wanted to go to bed dirty?”

  Kat faced her. “I don’t know, El, why don’t you ask him?”

  “I’m asking you.”

  “What, you think I drove all the way out here so I could screw your husband?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Kat’s eyebrows went up. “Then what did you say? It sure sounded like an accusation to me.”

  “Asking you to clarify is not the same—”

  “The hell it isn’t.”

  And dammit, they were right back to arguing the way they had in their teens and twenties and would have in their thirties, had they stayed in touch. Ellie shook her head and took the cover off the soup. She put the bowl of washed lettuce and cucumbers next to the cutting board, nodded at the celery. “You can put that in with the rest.”

  Katherine’s tongue made her cheek bulge. “I’m not hungry anymore.”

  Ellie sighed. “I’m sorry, okay?”