The First Husband

by Laura Dave

  “She kicked you out?” he said.

  Jesse nodded, his voice getting smaller. “Sammy hasn’t put down Cheryl’s watering can since. The kid even sleeps with it. That means he’s traumatized, right? We’ve probably traumatized him. Dex seems to be handling it all a little better, but last night he took a hard swing at Sammy to try to get that can. So I can’t really take that as a sign of progress.”

  Griffin just stared at his brother. “Cheryl kicked you out? Why would she do that?”

  “Well, she needed to catch her breath for a minute,” Jesse said. “That can happen.”

  “When, Jesse? When can that happen?”

  “You know,” he said, “when you find out your husband got someone else pregnant.”

  I looked at him in disbelief—what did he just say? As if reading my thought, Jesse nodded again.

  “It’s complicated,” Jesse said.

  I looked at Jesse for so long that someone might have wondered if I were thinking it was possible that he was going to take his words back, say something different instead. But maybe I was also looking at him for that long because I was scared to look any other way—to catch Griffin’s eyes and see what he was or wasn’t thinking about what his brother had just revealed.

  But Griffin wasn’t saying a word. The next several, I was guessing, were going to have to come from Jesse. Then they did. And they were for me.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “Griffin’s a little rude. I’m Jesse. Griffin’s brother. Who are you?”

  He held out his hand, which I imagined was sticky from the Fudgsicle. But I took it.

  “Griffin’s wife,” I said.

  10

  “He’s actually a genius, believe it or not,” Griffin said. “Like a certified one. His IQ is off the charts and he skipped two grades in school when we were growing up. Got a full ride to MIT at sixteen years old. Though maybe that did more damage than good. . . .”

  We were lying in bed—my first night in our bed—and I was staring at the ceiling, only a bedside light still on. I was blinking too quickly, trying not to give into the tight ball taking hold in my chest, trying not to focus on the little-person-size hole in the wall near our bedroom door—the result of a paintball fight gone awry. It was now covered with a bedsheet that was unequal to the task of keeping out the outside world.

  Instead of focusing too hard on any of that, I tried to make out the designs on the ceiling overhead, still mostly visible in the soft light: the intricate and beautiful designs, interstitial numbers and words, stand-alone letters, an entire system I couldn’t quite comprehend, right above my head. Griffin had just come to bed, after a longer conversation with Jesse, one I didn’t partake in, one in which Jesse provided some details about this other woman—he knew her from graduate school—and fewer details about what he was going to do now.

  Now Griffin was whispering. I knew why and I wasn’t sure why. Jesse and the kids were in a bedroom across the hall, watching a movie—Raiders of the Lost Ark, I believed—the volume turned to high. They were laughing and shouting at the screen, shouting louder than the movie itself. Silent contest apparently over.

  “I just wish that you hadn’t gotten such a bad first impression of him,” Griffin said.

  “It wasn’t so bad,” I said. “Really . . .”

  Then I cleared my throat because I wasn’t sure what to say next. A bad first impression, though, seemed like the wrong terminology. Someone’s mother being loud or eerily quiet was a bad first impression. Someone’s childhood friend drinking too much wine and getting silly. But finding a married brother-in-law living in your new house with his young twin sons because he’d impregnated a woman who wasn’t his wife? That seemed like something else.

  Still, I tried to think of something supportive to say—something to get both of us out of our heads. But, the truth was, I was feeling judgmental of Jesse. And that wasn’t the only problem. This was the first time since I’d met Griffin that I was aware there was something I didn’t know how to say to him.

  Griffin turned onto his side to face me, resting his hand on his elbow.

  “They just don’t have anywhere else to go right now,” he said. “I mean, I guess they could go stay at my mother’s in New York City, but Jesse hasn’t really told her what’s going on yet. He doesn’t want to deal with her reaction and I can’t say I exactly blame him for that.”

  “I get it,” I said.

  And I did. From what Griffin had told me about his mother. She was a geology professor at New York University. A fitting profession being that she was so steady for the family, filling the house with so much love. But while she was apparently incredibly loving, she was also incredibly emotional. Especially when it came to her sons. And high emotions right now wouldn’t help anything.

  “He just needs some time to sort this all out. And with the twins going to a kindergarten near here for now and Jesse feeling good about that . . .” Griffin said. “I don’t know if I feel right asking them to leave right now.”

  “No.” I shook my head, gaining some resolve. “No, of course not. I’d never ask you to do that. I’d never ask you to ask him to leave. He’s your brother. And he needs you.”

  “But you’re my wife,” he said. “And so do you.”

  He wrapped his arm tightly around me, so I could hear that that mattered to him too.

  “I’ll be fine,” I said. “I promise you.”

  “This is just such a bad time for all of this, you know? We just got here. We’re trying to settle in. You’re trying to get used to everything. It’s just such a bad time. . . .”

  I moved closer to him. “Griffin,” I said, “I’m not sure there is ever a good time to move in with your brother because you got a woman pregnant. Really not sure that’s ever making it on to a greeting card.”

  Griffin laughed, kissing me sweetly on the forehead. “You’ve got a point there,” he said.

  “We’ll be fine,” I said. “We’ll just, you know, have to lock the door when we have sex.”

  “And make sure the sheet is secure,” he said.

  I smiled.

  Then that was what he did.

  11

  I woke up the next morning disoriented and more than a little confused. It wasn’t unlike when you take a nap in the afternoon and wake up in the evening, no daylight left to help you out, the scrambling starting in your mind: Why am I asleep right now? What day is it? Am I home?

  Part of the reason for my confusion was that Griffin’s bedroom was still so dark—middle-of- the-night dark—due to the brown, floor-length curtains that apparently could keep out all forms of light. It was probably not a bad system for a chef who often needed to sleep during weird hours. But as I started coming to, I didn’t like not knowing what time it was, whether I had even made it through the night yet. Why Griffin was gone.

  I flipped over onto my stomach, pushed a thick curtain out of the way, and peeked beyond it, out into the world. The winter sun was streaming in hard and fast. It was so strong, in fact, that it reminded me of a California morning. I put my hand on the windowpane, waiting for warmth to hit my palm, but it was ice-cold. Burning me. The little thermometer on the pane’s edge weighing in a minute too late at a whopping six degrees.

  I got out of bed, threw on sweatpants and an extra pair of socks, and headed downstairs to the kitchen, where I found Jesse and the twins at the kitchen table, having breakfast. Jesse was dressed in a wrinkled suit, working hard on tying a tie around his neck while the twins focused on eating their Eggo waffles. Or, rather, Dexter was focused on sticking his tongue through the circle he’d made in the middle of his waffle, and on spinning the waffle around his face. Sammy, meanwhile, was stuffing his waffle into the watering can. The maple syrup—or what was left of it—was in two puddles beneath their feet.

  “Good morning,” I said.

  Jesse looked up and smiled at me in the doorway. “Hey there, sis-in-law,” he said.

  “Hey there,” I said, still standing
in place, somewhat awkwardly. My feet, even through the socks, were getting pretty cold on the wooden floor. So, while I was trying to stay still, I was also moving from one foot to another.

  “You like coffee?” Jesse asked.

  “Only the first four cups I have each day,” I said. “The fifth starts to lose me.”

  “Then you’re at the right place, come sit for a minute,” he said. “We’ve got some great freaking coffee.”

  He pointed with his tie in the direction of the thin, silver thermos in the middle of the table. His proof.

  I headed to the table, taking the empty seat next to him, as Jesse let his tie go for a second and reached over to screw open the thermos for me, pouring some coffee into the cuplike top, handing it over.

  The steam was piping out the top and I breathed it in, cupping it in my hands and taking a long sip.

  “Whoa,” I said. “You weren’t kidding. This coffee is good. Out of this world good, actually.”

  “You’re not wrong. I have approximately three things I’m really good at and making coffee is one of them.” He looked back down at his tie, tugging it into a knot, and then undoing it. “I brought my French press from home. It’s about a thousand years old. That’s part of the trick.”

  I smiled as I blew on the top, took another sip. “And why the silver thermos?” I asked. “Is that part too?”

  “No, just good for carrying it into Boston,” he said. “I have a meeting in Cambridge this afternoon.”

  I stopped midsip. “Oh, I thought . . .”

  He put up his hand to stop me. “Please, with my current behavior, offering up the good coffee is the least I can do,” he said. “It’s also, unfortunately, at this particular moment, the most.”

  He gave me a sweet smile, his hand holding his lopsided tie, still completely undone.

  “You need a hand with that?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “I’ll get it,” he said. “Probably when it’s already too late. But I’ll get it.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” I said.

  He was looking back down at his tie, going for it again, as I drank the coffee.

  “But I would enjoy if you’d entertain me with the story of how you and my big brother fell in love,” he said. “I can’t believe I didn’t know anything about what was happening with you guys. In another world, I could be pretty pissed off about that.”

  I laughed. “It just happened so quickly,” I said.

  “ ‘The only laws of matter are those that our minds must fabricate and the only laws of mind are fabricated for it by matter.’ ”

  I looked at him, completely confused.

  “James Clerk Maxwell. The guy who created classical electromagnetic theory,” he said. “I like to think it’s another way of saying great things tend to happen all at once.”

  I smiled. “I like that,” I said. “A lot . . . Is that what you’re in graduate school for?”

  “In a way,” he said. “An updated version. I’m working with a scientist named Jude Flemming, have you heard of her? I’m guessing not unless you’re up on the world of optical physics.”

  “Not so much recently, no.”

  “Well, Dr. Flemming is amazing, inspirational really. She’s only in her mid-forties and she already heads the department. Not to mention that she’s considerably changing how we understand optical fields,” he said.

  “Those of you who understand it,” I said.

  “Exactly.” He laughed. Then he pointed it in the direction of the counter. “By the way, Griffin left you a little love note over there. He didn’t want to wake you, but he had to head over to the restaurant to meet a contractor. He left you directions in case you want to go by and say hello.”

  I nodded. “Great, but I thought he told me he wasn’t heading over there until eleven or so,” I said. “What time is it?”

  “It’s twelve forty-five.”

  “Twelve forty-five?” I asked. I was in total disbelief. In my life, the entirety of it to that point, I had never slept that late. In the entirety of my life, I had never slept anywhere close to that late: work starting at 6:00 A.M. most days, work supposed to have started today at 6:00 A.M., so I wouldn’t be so late getting the latest column to Peter.

  “It’s those brown curtains, right?” he said. “They’ll do you in if you’re not careful.”

  “You’re not kidding,” I said.

  “We got a late start too, and I’m now completely screwed for my meeting,” he said. “Unless I go eighty miles per hour all the way there. Who am I kidding? Even if I go eighty all the way there.”

  “Who is your meeting with?” I asked.

  “My faculty adviser,” he said.

  “Jude Flemming?”

  “Jude Flemming,” he said. “I need to ask her for an extension on my dissertation. I get a little nervous asking her for anything.”

  “I can understand that.” I poured myself some more coffee. “How late are you getting the dissertation in?” I asked.

  “You know, about nine years.”

  I stopped midpour.

  “There are reasons,” he said.

  I nodded. “I’m sure,” I said.

  Then he stood up, his tie loose around his neck, and he began grabbing for several things at once: his keys, the mostly empty thermos, a shabby briefcase on the counter. “So you think you could take them?” he said.

  I looked at him, confused. “Take who?”

  “Sammy and Dex,” he said. “To school. The afternoon part, at least. It’s walking distance from here. And it would really help me out. They have an indoor peewee soccer league afterward that will keep them busy until after I’m back, but can you take them over there?”

  “Me?” I said, turning to the twins, who were still busy with their waffles, not so much as looking in my direction. “But they don’t know me, Jesse. Won’t that be weird?”

  Jesse turned toward them too. “Okay guys, this is your Aunt Annie.” He patted the top of my head. “Tell her hello.”

  They turned to me, giving me a once-over, neither of them saying a word, neither offering a wave.

  “Hi guys! ” I smiled at Sammy who was holding on tight to his watering can. “I like your planter,” I said.

  Still, nothing.

  “Okay, so, whichever of my big guys wants Annie to take them to school today more should tell her his name loudest, right now,” he said. “Winner gets a hundred bucks.”

  Both boys raised their hands high. “Me! Me!” they screamed in a rising, vocal unison.

  Then Dex waved his arms and screamed out, “I’m Dex! I’m Dex!” And Sammy held up his yellowing watering can and—using its spigot as a microphone—joined him with, “I’m Sammy! I’m Sammy!”

  Jesse smiled down at me, his tie somehow magically tied. “There we go,” he said. “One problem solved.”

  12

  We must have been a sight on the way to school, the wind and snowfall kicking up: Sammy and Dexter on either side of me, wrapped in enormous winter coats entirely covering their little bodies (Sammy’s watering can sticking out from beneath his), me in a light fleece unequal to the wind, all of us holding hands—shouting at the cars passing by, shouting at street signs, shouting at the sky.

  Even with the hundred dollars on the table, the boys had seemed nervous and unhappy to see their father go, and, so, in an attempt to cheer them, I suggested playing a game of I Spy as we walked.

  I wasn’t sure if it was exactly age appropriate, but Jordan played it with Sasha and that seemed like endorsement enough for the time being. And the boys seemed to enjoy it. In the twenty or so minutes it took us to go from door to door—from the quiet outskirts of town to its slightly less quiet center—they spotted train tracks, an out-of-business ice-cream parlor, a broken bicycle, several snowmen, a closed-down fruit stand (with the sign SEE YA IN MAY!), a giraffe (or, rather, a statue of a giraffe in someone’s yard), and dogs of several sizes (the people walking the dogs, the twins were far less interest
ed in).

  When we got closer to school, they also spotted the Williamsburg General Store, where I made the mistake of stopping. Because there, on the newspaper rack in front of the store, were copies of several national newspapers, including the New York Times, complete with a small advertisement for The Unbowed. The ad consisted of a photograph of a creepy playground at night, complete with a blurry image of a couple on the swings, so blurry you could almost miss them. But you couldn’t miss what was on the bottom of the print, in bold black letters. His name: NICK CAMPBELL.

  My heart clenched. My heart clenched just seeing his name, right in front of me, where I couldn’t ignore it.

  After Dexter “I spyed” the General Store, I was pretty close to adding, Funny because I spy a ghost.

  But by the time we turned onto the elementary school’s grounds, I’d pulled it back together, which was a good thing because, despite the school not being impressively large, it was impressively busy: a sizable group of kids finishing their afternoon recess, another group starting a basketball game, another playing boxball, wrapped up tightly in hats and gloves and winter coats. I spotted a teacher by the front door, clipboard in her heavily mittened hands, who pointed us to the kindergarten classroom on the far end of the floor.

  As we made our way there, I could hear music coming from the classroom. I was happily surprised to peek through the open door and take in a bright and colorful classroom full of paintings and art, and the entire kindergarten class, twenty-plus kids, engaged in a massive game of freeze dance. To Bach.

  I knocked softly and one of the two adults circling the massive bunch of dancing peanuts gave me a big smile. She hurried over to the door, her high ponytail bobbing behind her.

  “Hi hi hi!” she said. “We were wondering when you guys were going to get here! Come on in, we’re on the French Suites.”

  She heralded the twins inside, and, as they joined the musical fray, she slipped back through the doorway and joined me in the hallway.

  “I’m Claire, Dexter and Sammy’s teacher,” she said.