“I don’t know.”
He looks so incredibly sad. Overwhelmed by my need to comfort him, I ignore the warning bells clanging in my head that this is a very bad idea, and I reach out and put my arms around Daniel and lay my head on his chest. He doesn’t do anything at first. His heartbeat pounds under my cheek and his breathing speeds up, but his hands remain at his sides. Finally, he wraps his arms around me, and after a few minutes he seems calmer.
“Do you still love her?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he says.
He holds me tight and one of his hands slips under the back of my blouse. He rubs my skin in a circular pattern with his fingertips. It feels amazing. My brain is sending all kinds of fight or flight signals, but the light pressure of his touch eventually dispels my anxiety, and I tell myself that there is nothing even remotely sexual about this situation, at least not to me. After a while, I lift my head off his chest.
“Stay with me for a while,” he says.
I’m suddenly exhausted, and the fatigue runs bone deep. It’s as if the weight of his words is more than I can handle; I can’t imagine what it’s like to be the one to say them. The temperature in the room feels as if it’s dropped ten degrees, and the cold surrounds me. “Okay,” I whisper.
Daniel reaches over and flicks off the lamp on the table beside the couch. The firelight is the only thing that illuminates the room. Daniel shifts me, so that my head is in his lap. He strokes my hair.
“Do I remind you of her?” I ask.
“You remind me of the good parts,” he says. He notices my shivering and the soft fabric of the throw blanket settles over my body. “Better?”
“Yes.”
“Does he know about me?” Daniel asks.
Right before I fall asleep I say, “No.”
• • •
When I wake up the room is dark and it takes a few moments for my eyes to adjust. My head still rests on Daniel’s lap and his arm is thrown across my shoulders. The guilt arrives full force. I may feel completely disconnected from Chris, but falling asleep at another man’s house, no matter what the circumstances are, is a significant transgression. I sit up and glance at my watch. Almost 3:00 A.M. I’m completely wide awake and all I can think about is leaving.
Daniel stirs. “Claire?”
“It’s okay. I’m going home. Don’t get up.”
He gets up. The last dying embers in the fireplace emit a soft glow and Daniel turns on the lamp so I can find my shoes, cell phone, and purse. He helps me into my coat and I don’t know what to say, so I hug him tightly. He hugs me back until I finally pull away.
“I have to go.”
He slips on his shoes and walks me to my car. The snow has stopped falling and the winter sky looks clear. The air feels crisp and cold.
“Be careful,” he says. “Watch the roads. They might be slick.”
I hear something in his voice, but I can’t identify it. Melancholy. Longing. Regret. Or maybe he’s just tired.
“Text me so that I know you made it home safely.”
“I will.” I drive away, feeling guilty, conflicted, and empty.
42
claire
When Chris walks in the door on the evening of December 23, a fresh wave of remorse washes over me, especially when I notice how tired he looks. While I was asleep on Daniel’s lap, Chris was probably still burning the midnight oil at a Holiday Inn Express somewhere.
He sets down his suitcase seconds before Josh and Jordan tackle him. He gathers them in his arms, holding them tight. It isn’t hard to tell from the expression on his face and the way he kisses Jordan’s cheek and ruffles Josh’s hair that he missed them.
“Do you think you’re on Santa’s nice list or his naughty one?” Chris asks.
“Nice!” they yell.
“I was maybe naughty once,” Jordan admits.
“Just once, huh?” Chris teases. “I wonder if your mom might tell me otherwise.” Chris looks over at me and grins.
“Maybe twice,” I say.
Chris’s good mood fills the room. He’s been looking forward to this break for a while now, and I was worried he might call to say that his boss changed his mind about letting him have the time off. The kids would have been crushed.
“Do you want something to eat?”
He shakes his head. “I ate at the airport. And frankly, I’m looking forward to not doing so for a while.”
“I’ll make all your favorites while you’re home,” I say.
He nods and smiles. “That would be great.”
“Go get your pajamas on,” I tell the kids. “Santa wants you to go to bed on time.”
They don’t want to leave Chris, but they do as I ask because they’re more worried about upsetting Santa.
“I got promoted,” Chris says. I can tell by the smile on his face how happy he is.
I smile, too. “That’s fantastic, Chris! I knew you would.”
The kids will be thrilled. My household can find its equilibrium.
“So you won’t have to travel anymore, right?”
“Eventually.” Chris leans up against the counter, arms crossed. “I’m not even gonna try and spin this, Claire. The promotion is great, but I’m going to be even busier than I was, if that’s possible. I’ll be doing both jobs until they hire my replacement. I don’t know how soon they’ll bring me back to headquarters. Hopefully it won’t take too long.”
I don’t want Chris to know how disappointed I am that his return from the field isn’t imminent, so I say, “It’s okay. We’ll get by.”
“I don’t think we should say anything to the kids just yet.”
“No.” I don’t mention that I never say anything to the kids unless I know it’s set in stone. I’ve learned that lesson the hard way.
Jordan comes tearing back into the room. “Dad, will you watch Frosty with me? Please?”
“Let me get changed, okay?” Chris comes back downstairs a few minutes later, wearing gray sweatpants and an old KU T-shirt. Josh and I pop popcorn and join them on the couch.
“This is nice,” Josh says. “All of us here together.” Chris and I look at each other and smile, and it’s all I can do not to burst into tears when I think about how lucky I really am.
• • •
On Christmas morning, the kids wake us up at five fifteen. We were up way past midnight, assembling and wrapping toys. My eyes feel like they’re cemented shut.
“Go back to bed,” Chris mumbles. “Please, I’m begging you.”
“But, Daddy, I want to see if Santa came,” Jordan says. “I was actually naughty several times. I’m very worried.”
Expecting them to go back to bed is highly unrealistic, so I sit up and yawn, rubbing my eyes.
“Yay, Mom’s up,” they shout. I nudge Chris.
“Come on. I’ll dump some Baileys in your coffee.”
He groans but finally sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed. After he pulls on some pajama bottoms and a T-shirt we follow the kids’ excited cheers and head downstairs. The wrapping paper flies, and we spend the morning eating eggs and bacon and cinnamon rolls, and putting batteries in all the new toys. Chris joins me on the couch where I’m drinking coffee and trying to figure out Jordan’s new Barbie camcorder. He has a gift-wrapped box in his hand.
“Want to open your present?”
Just like last year, we’d both claimed that we didn’t want or need anything for Christmas, but Chris insisted that I have at least one gift under the tree. I take the box from his outstretched hand.
“Sure.”
The box is ornately wrapped in red and green. I open it. Nestled in the tissue paper is a sterling silver picture frame. It’s a picture of Chris and the kids and me, taken at my parents’ house on Thanksgiving. “Did my mom send you this?”
&
nbsp; “Yeah, I asked her to e-mail me the pictures from her camera.”
I laugh. “Did she know how to do that?”
“No. I had to walk her through it. It was hysterical.”
In the picture, Chris and I are sitting on the raised hearth of my parents’ fireplace. Josh is on my lap and Jordan is on Chris’s. Everyone is smiling. “It’s my fault that we didn’t have a family picture taken last Christmas. And I wasn’t home long enough this year to get one taken professionally. This is the best I could do.”
“It’s perfect,” I say.
I hand him a square box wrapped in blue with a big bow on top. He unwraps it and pulls out a DVD case. The disk is silver, but the case is blank. “What is it?” he asks.
“You’ll see. Play it on your laptop when you go back out on the road,” I say. “Not before. Just trust me.”
He nods and snaps the disk back into the case. “Okay. I’ll wait.” He leans over and places a soft, gentle kiss on my lips. “Merry Christmas.”
We spend the next week together, as a family. I keep my contact with Daniel to a minimum. Chris tries his best not to work too much. The kids have never been happier.
And just when I feel as though we’ve made some progress, he’s gone again.
43
chris
I snap the DVD into the CD-ROM player on my laptop. I’m in some hotel in Oklahoma, and I’ve had a shit day. Being home for a week made it twice as hard to get on the plane this morning, not to mention the fact that I’ve been putting out fires and appeasing people all day long. It’s ten thirty and I’ll be lucky if I get to bed before 1:00 A.M.
The disk whirs to life and the first image in the slide show pops up on the screen. It’s a family photo, taken the first Christmas after we had Josh. Then, in order after that, each subsequent Christmas card photo except for the year I was unemployed. I didn’t want to take a picture that year, wouldn’t come out of the office in fact. Claire posed the kids in front of the tree and if anyone noticed that Claire and I were missing, they didn’t say anything. Well, they didn’t say anything to me, but maybe they did to her. After the holiday photos there are individual photos of the kids. I smile as they slowly pass by. There are pictures of me and Claire when we were in Hawaii. I pause the one where she’s splashing in the ocean, wearing a pink bikini. I haven’t seen a smile like the one she has on her face in that picture in a long time. I play the slide show twice, watching as photo after photo of my wife and kids passes by, not unlike the way they are in real life because I’m not there. The slide show comes to an end, and I think about calling Claire. It’s late, though, and if I don’t get started on all the work I have to do, I’ll be up all night.
I miss my family profoundly.
44
daniel
I call Claire at eleven thirty. It’s a Tuesday night, so I know her husband won’t be home.
“Too late?” I ask when she answers.
“No. Not too late,” she says.
I love her voice when we talk late at night. It changes. Gets softer. Like she reserves it just for these calls. She sounds sleepy but she also sounds happy to hear from me.
“Are you in bed?” I ask.
“Yes. I was reading. I just closed my book and turned off the light. What are you doing?” she asks.
“Same thing you are,” I say. “Just lying here.” I haven’t been able to stop thinking about her. She was on my mind all day and now that I’m in bed I’m really having trouble getting her out of my head. I picture her under the covers, wondering once again what she’s wearing even though I know I shouldn’t be thinking about that, because it’s torture and it’s pointless. “How are you feeling?” I ask. She’s had a bad cold and hasn’t stopped by in more than a week because she said she didn’t want to give it to me.
“Much better,” she says. “The kids will probably bring home more germs soon. I better enjoy the respite while I can.”
“I’ve missed having you around.”
“You have?”
“Yes.”
“I’ve missed you, too,” she says.
“I’ve gotten used to seeing you sitting on my couch.” I like stealing looks at Claire when she’s got her head down, reading or typing, with my blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Like she belongs there.
“I like sitting on your couch. I like it when you make me lunch,” she says.
“That’s because I’m an excellent cook,” I say.
“It’s not usually a hot lunch,” she teases.
I laugh. “Details.”
“I can hear the wind outside my window. The meteorologist on the news said that we might break the record for a January low.”
“I’m sure you’re plenty warm. Something tells me you’re all bundled up.” What I wouldn’t give to be able to put my arms around her. Heat her up so that she wouldn’t want anything covering her.
“I’m in flannel pajama pants and a sweatshirt.”
“I’d be sweating.”
“You run warmer than I do.”
“You aren’t going to ask me what I’m wearing?”
“I’m pretty sure I know what you’re wearing,” she says.
Of course she does. She’s got a husband who’s sometimes home. One who probably also sleeps in his underwear, or naked when she’s beside him. I’m wearing boxer briefs, but being specific with her will accomplish nothing. As much as I’d love to really let loose and tell her—explicitly and in full detail—what I’m thinking about when I call her late at night, I can’t. Crossing any kind of line, even on the phone, is up to Claire, and not me. And there’s no one here to help me with the hard-on I already have, so I should probably stop while I’m ahead. “I’ve got Monday off. Come over?”
“Sure. I’ll come over after yoga.”
“Okay. Go to sleep,” I tell her. “Stay warm.”
“I will. You, too,” she says.
For the first time in months, I think about calling Melissa. But that would be a real dick move, so I disregard it immediately. Even if she agreed to come over, I still wouldn’t be satisfied. I’d only be pretending that it was Claire’s hands stroking me. Claire’s lips on mine. It’s easier if I just take care of this solo, because in my mind Claire can do everything I desperately want her to do, and I can imagine it in full Technicolor, without the distraction of another woman.
It isn’t quite the same. But it’s less complicated than calling Melissa, and it’s almost enough.
45
claire
To: Claire Canton
From: Chris Canton
Subject: Awards banquet
The annual awards banquet is Saturday, February 12th. It’s black tie. Buy yourself something new. Anything you want.
To: Chris Canton
From: Claire Canton
Subject: Re: Awards banquet
Okay. I’ll go dress shopping. Would you like me to rent you a tuxedo?
To: Claire Canton
From: Chris Canton
Subject: Re: re: Awards banquet
That would be great, thanks. I’ll get fitted while I’m on the road and e-mail you my measurements.
I miss you guys.
Chris’s confidence is at an all-time high since his promotion and this event is important to him. He’s still waiting to come in from the field, though. “Any day now,” they tell him, but they haven’t hired his replacement and Chris doesn’t think they’re working all that hard to find someone else. He tries not to let his disappointment show. I try not to ask him about it. We’re both glad we didn’t say anything to the kids.
I drop Josh and Jordan off at Chris’s parents the day of the banquet. His mother greets me with a kiss on the cheek and a hug. She smells like Shalimar. Chris once told me that his mother is one of the hardest women to buy a gift for. “I have everything I need,” she always claims. “Fo
ur healthy and happy kids and now all these beautiful grandchildren.” Finally, under duress, she mentioned once that she loved the scent of Shalimar and she received so many bottles of it on her next birthday and for Christmas that she says she’ll never run out. It’s a smell I’ll always associate with her.
“Be good for Grandma and Grandpa,” I tell the kids, kissing them and giving each of them a hug.
“Why not?” I sit perfectly still as she cleanses my skin, removing what little makeup I’m wearing, and starts over. She applies foundation and blush and lines my eye in blue and silver. These are colors I would never have chosen on my own, but when she holds up a hand mirror in front of my face I’m taken aback at how good it looks. She’s smudged it a bit so the line isn’t too harsh and she’s painted my lips in a pale pink to offset the dramatic eye makeup. My lashes have been lengthened with three coats of mascara and then curled; I hardly recognize myself. I thank her and pay, adding a nice tip.
Chris’s car isn’t in the garage when I return home and a silent house greets me when I walk in the door. I pin my hair loosely on top of my head and run a bath, careful not to let the water get too hot and steamy so it won’t ruin my makeup, then sink into the warm water. I should have remembered to light a candle or bring a book, but I don’t have much time, so I wash and then close my eyes and relax. When I get out of the bath I pat myself dry and soothe my skin, parched by the cold air of a lingering winter, with a thin layer of my favorite scented moisturizer.
In our bedroom, I walk to the dresser and pull out a strapless bra, thong, and thigh-high stockings. I’m just about to step into the thong when Chris bursts through the bedroom door, startling me. He’s already dressed in his tux. The black looks striking against his blond hair and the cut of the suit flatters his build. He stops in his tracks, a surprised expression on his face.
“Where were you?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer me. Although it’s been a while, Chris has seen me naked thousands of times. His hands and mouth are more than familiar with my most intimate places, and he’s had an up close and personal view of both children being born. But as I step into the thong and fasten the bra his eyes track my movements as if he’s seeing my body for the first time. I stop what I’m doing and look over at him.
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