My Husband's Girlfriend

by Cydney Rax

  “I had just left the car wash on Saturday when Dani called. She got a flat and asked me to come help. Brax was with her, whining in the background. So Dani described where she was and I drove over there. I brought along a jar of food so she could feed the baby while I changed the flat. We were in broad daylight, Anya.”

  “That’s why it’s so sickening—”

  “Let me finish. I get the jack but realize I need to take a leak,” Neil explains. “I ran out the house before taking care of that, so that’s what you saw.”

  “I didn’t see any men’s rooms on the shoulder of the freeway, Neil,” I protest.

  “Right,” he says. “I asked Dani to cover me so I could take care of my business. Men do that sometimes, you know. It only takes a few seconds. So when you noticed me walking back toward the truck zipping my pants, that’s all that you saw, Anya.”

  “Thanks, Neil.” Riley looks at Dani. “You want to add anything?”

  “Hey, look, I’m sorry for making a mess out of everything. I am. Maybe I should have called a tow instead of Neil, but the price they charge is such a rip-off. In spite of all that, nothing happened. I had my baby with me! But even if I didn’t, nothing would’ve happened, I swear to God.”

  “Woman, please,” I say.

  “Dani’s right,” Neil agrees. “I wouldn’t disrespect you like that.”

  “Ha!” I say, and walk in a circle. “Neil, you need to let me know where you stand. Do you want to be with her?” I nod at Dani. Her eyes widen and she steps back, shaking her head.

  “This isn’t about that, Anya,” Dani insists. “Neil clearly loves his family. I’ve never, ever tried to come between that. I don’t even want to. That would be one big mess now, wouldn’t it?”

  “Then what do you want?” I ask.

  “I–I dunno. I need my own place, a new gig. I want to take care of my child and live my life in peace and security. And yes, I’d like to have a good, solid relationship one day. You just don’t know how badly I do, but so far it escapes me.”

  Dani’s voice is quivering. Thick lines stretch across her forehead; her thin lips are turned downward. She looks like how I feel. Emotionally I am so drained, I feel like I haven’t slept in months. I figure that if Dani is going to successfully find a job, she needs as little stress in her life as possible. The quicker she gets a job and moves away, the sooner Neil and I can resume a sense of normalcy.

  “And, please listen,” Dani continues, “I want you and Neil to go out tonight, spend some time together. I’ll watch the kids. You go to a movie or a comedy show, and just laugh and be with each other. I don’t mind.”

  “Gee, thanks,” I say. It’s like she’s giving me permission to go out with my husband.

  “May I say something?” Riley interjects. “Anya, don’t you find it strange that you, the wife, would ask Dani what she wants?” Her voice is gentle. “Dani is correct about one thing: This is not about her. So what do you want, Anya?”

  I gasp and lean against Neil, my knees nearly crumbling underneath me. Someone asking me, Anya Meadows, what I want…

  “I want my freaking husband. I want my life back,” I say firmly.

  Neil stares at me. Dani stares at Neil. I take a deeper breath. “I want Neil to want the same things I want.”

  “And what would that be, Anya?” Neil says.

  “Church. Will you attend prayer service with me tonight?”

  “Uh, I don’t know about that,” he protests. “I’m not ready for that.”

  “I just don’t believe you, Neil,” I say, appalled, “and I’m not sure why I ever did.” I glare at him and advance a few steps closer to my car while still facing him.

  “Neil, what’s the matter with you? Why won’t you go to church with your wife?” Now Dani’s shrieking, and that’s the last thing I want.

  “Neil won’t go because Neil’s a coward,” I answer, and stop. “He begs me to go to church but he won’t go. I hate that about you,” I tell him, wanting to gouge out both his eyeballs.

  “Anya—” Neil says.

  “Don’t Anya me. I’m so pissed right now, I–I…” I close my eyes and wish I could go away to a better place. And as I tune out Neil, Dani, and Riley, mentally I am transported to another time. Saturday, May 12,2001. I’m thirty-four. Three-year-old Reesy is wondering what happened to the little brother or sister we told her was on the way. I’m not quite sure what to tell her, so I say nothing.

  It’s mid-morning on this day. The sky is overcast. Neil and I are in our bedroom. I’m rolling sheer black stockings up my thighs. Neil is standing in the doorway glaring at me, but I continue getting dressed. I’m wearing a long black wool-blend dress. My pumps are black, and so are my dangling earrings, and the string of beads that loop around my neck. A black mourning veil covers my face.

  “Anya.” Neil steps up to me. “Are you sure…?”

  “Of course. If I did it for the other baby, I’m doing it for this one, too.”

  Neil shakes his head. Despair swims in his eyes.

  “You can come with me, Neil. Not too late.”

  He doesn’t utter a word, and I slowly walk downstairs and out the back door, my heels clicking on top of the cobblestone walk until I’m in the middle of the backyard. I’m clutching a Bible in one hand and a white lily in the other.

  I lower myself until my knees are touching the coolness of the dry, hardened ground. I wince staring at the mound of soft dirt that I prepared one day ago, two weeks after the death of what would have been my third child.

  “Good-bye, my sweet baby,” I mumble to the little shoe box I buried in the makeshift grave, the box whose contents contain my heart, my dreams. Inside the box is the first pair of baby booties I bought for this baby. Right next to the booties is a yellow-and-blue rattle that Reesy loved to bang against the table when she was younger. A mass-market baby-names book is there, too, a book I wanted to thumb through but never did. And there’s a copy of the little white appointment card for the ultrasound scan I would have had had our child lived long enough.

  “I didn’t know you that long, but you’re my child. And I love you. And one day I’m going to see you again. See you for the first time.” I bow my head for a brief moment of silence. And for the second time in two years, I find myself questioning why life is brought forth but always dies inside of me.

  Even though Neil couldn’t be here, your daddy loves you, too. Those were my thoughts, but the words stopped short of coming out my mouth.

  Then I set the Bible and the lily aside. I place the lid on the shoe box and lower it into the ground. Instead of using a shovel to cover the box, I grab handfuls of dirt and layer it on top until the box disappears. My fingers now caked with grime, I insert the root of the white lily deep inside the dirt, right next to the memory box, patting the mound firmly to secure the flower. I say a quick prayer and whisper a final good-bye.

  A voice within me urges, “Say good-bye again, this time to your past.” My body trembles and I know my fixation on my sorrows must one day take its last breath.

  Releasing memories of May 12, 2001, I find Neil, Dani, and Riley arguing with one another.

  “This is your chance, Neil. Do something for Anya, just for her,” Riley urges.

  “Yeah,” Dani pipes up, “don’t be such a tight ass.”

  “But why can’t we do something else?” Neil says. “I know church couldn’t be the only thing Anya wants.”

  “It’s okay,” I remark, and re-approach the circle where everyone’s standing.

  “Let’s just go have a nice quiet dinner and have a serious talk, okay, Anya?” Neil says. “How about some seafood, sweet margaritas—could we do that? I think this would be better than being around all those people at church. This way we can focus on us.”

  Tired as I am, I muster up a response. “I’m okay with that. Now let’s go home and get dressed.”

  Riley beams at me with a smile that makes her face look even brighter than normal. I turn toward her, fal
ling into her curvy arms. We hug for a long, long time.

  We go home to get dressed, and I make arrangements for Vette to watch Reesy. We’re not really saying much to each other, but during dinner at Little Pappa’s Seafood Kitchen, I decide to initiate our “talk.” The restaurant, thankfully, is scarce of people and we’re seated at our preferred corner booth.

  “You know, Neil, sometimes I wonder why others can see the things in us that we can’t see ourselves.”

  “Like?”

  “Like Riley taking a stand for me. I ought to be standing up for myself.”

  “Oh, but you do it, you just aren’t aware that you do. When you know what you want, you don’t seem too shy about speaking it.”

  “For the most part I believe that, Neil,” I tell him, “but I’m starting to figure out why I sometimes hesitate to speak up. I want to know one hundred percent that I can have what I want. But if I feel something is going to block it, I deny those wants and urges. I’ll admit I hate being disappointed.”

  “Oh, Anya…” Neil’s voice is gentle.

  “And sure, I’m almost forty, but everyone still wants their dreams to come true. Hoping isn’t reserved just for the young and inexperienced. But now I’m at the point where I am able to let go of a certain dream that I had—blessing you with a son.”

  “Don’t beat yourself up about that. It’s not a big deal.”

  “But it is a big deal. And I’m struggling to accept my destiny. In a weird way, if it weren’t for Dani, you wouldn’t have that son, would you, Neil? And because I encouraged you to hook up with another woman in the first place, it’s like I inadvertently gave you…” I wince and bite my lip.

  “Anya,” Neil says, incredulous, “please tell me you’re joking.”

  “No, no, no, think about it. My pregnancy didn’t survive, but hers did? Maybe her pregnancy wasn’t accidental since I couldn’t…”

  I know my reasoning sounds unusual, but at this point what else could I reach out for and grab on to? I want to bring closure to this issue in any way possible.

  “Anya, there’s something you need to know.” Drops of sweat spread across Neil’s forehead. “Baby, part of this is my fault because even though I didn’t act like it, I was torn up by the miscarriages. I blocked out the pain by staying busy with work, going on fishing trips, buying you almost anything you wanted, but deep inside I was devastated about our not being able to have another kid or two.”

  “Neil, you never told me this.”

  “I’m telling you now. And so when Dani and I hooked up, at first, I swear to God, she meant nothing to me. But we got carried away, and when she got pregnant…Anya…” He can barely look in my eyes. “I–I had no idea that I…when she found out and got the sonogram and it was a…”

  “Oh, Neil, please. I don’t want to hear this anymore.” Truth sure hurts. But truth is what we need to have to get us through and beyond this.

  “I can’t believe you have the nerve to tell me this,” I finally say to him.

  “I won’t ever talk about it again. I’m done.”

  “Sounds typical,” I tell him, “but can I ask you something and then I’m done?”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Do you know what today is?”

  Neil scowls. “No.”

  “Our other kids would have been three years and four years old this week.”

  “Oh yeah?” he replies, staring at me like I’m a goner.

  “I loved them enough to know this, Neil.”

  “Sure you did.”

  “And back when we lost the kids…” I squirm in my seat. “Why didn’t you come with me to say good-bye to the babies?”

  “Anya, you have a right to think I was being insensitive during that time of our lives, but you were a complete wreck.”

  “I wasn’t that bad.”

  “Anya, be honest. Don’t you remember how you’d cry all the time, you wore the same clothes every day, you didn’t cook for weeks, laundry went undone? And don’t you understand that both of us couldn’t fall apart? One of us had to be strong for the other. I was being strong, not being a jerk, as you accused me of back then.”

  “Neil, I did that? It sounds too bizarre.”

  “Anya, you may not remember, but I cared about you enough to put on the strong front, but sure, I was as upset as you. I just don’t show it the same.”

  “Oh God, all this time I thought you didn’t care about me, the babies…”

  “No, not true, Anya. It hurt me to see you hurt. But life has to go on no matter what happens. And that’s what I was focused on. That’s what I’m still focused on.”

  I stare at my husband, debating whether I should let his truth become mine.

  “Thanks for being honest, Neil,” is all I can say.

  Neil and I manage to enjoy a civilized dinner, then we leave the restaurant and head for the parking lot. He opens my door for me, starts up the Explorer, and says, “I want to take you somewhere.”

  “Where’re we going?” I ask.

  “Not home.” He’s heading east, in the opposite direction of our house.

  “Neil, stop playing. I’m ready to go home.”

  “No, not going.”

  He’s irritating me but I shut my mouth. We end up at the Comfort Inn on Westheimer Road. Neil checks in and gets us a room with a king-sized bed. With a huge grin, he holds both my hands and leads me inside the room. He hoists me up and plants me gently on top of the bed. He removes my pumps and then my skirt. He stares at my legs while he yanks his shirt over his head. I sense he’s happy to be in control.

  “First, Anya, I want you to know how good it feels to be out with my wife tonight. And thanks for going to dinner with me.”

  “Okay, fine, Neil.”

  “And I’m so proud of you for letting Riley convince you to resolve that issue with Dani and the truck and all that while it was still fresh. It’s so important for us to talk things out instead of staying mad and not talking.”

  “Look, I appreciate your words, but I’m not in the mood to hear all that.”

  “Listen to me, please.” He takes a deep breath. “Me going to help Dani…I want you to know I could have handled things better. But I was thinking about Brax, not her. And I really am sorry, Anya,” he says and kisses my hand.

  “Oh, Neil,” I choke. I feel conflicted. It seems Neil’s trying, but should I trust him again just to possibly get my heart broken? I don’t know if I can withstand another broken heart.

  “So, Anya, we’ve had our talks. I feel we’re in a good place.” He looks around the room, then focuses back on me, his eyes gleaming. “I want to know if you’re all right with being here with me like this. And most of all, do you forgive me?” Neil pleads, his eyes never leaving my face.

  I take a while to answer, thinking about all we’ve been through, knowing that forgiveness is like medicine—it’s a restorer of health, and the foundation of a clean slate, which I desperately need.

  “You know I forgive you, Neil.”

  “You sure? I don’t want to pressure you, Anya. Take whatever time you need to get some peace inside. I won’t have peace until you have it.”

  “Y–you mean that?” I say, impressed.

  He draws an imaginary X over his heart.

  “Ahhh, okay, that settles everything, huh?”

  We both laugh and I feel a lot better.

  “Now,” he says, and slowly looks me up and down, “will you let me get up in that?” Neil’s words shock me and make me hot. He clutches my left hand and kisses it and I want to smack his wrist, but I smile at him, blushing. It feels like we’ve just met and are getting acquainted.

  “You’re looking fine, Anya. Always have.”

  “Oh, so you’ve noticed.” Finally.

  “Can’t help but notice. Don’t work it off too much, though. I’m crazy about your big thighs. Love squeezing them.” He falls on top of me. I squirm underneath his warm body. I adore the attention, but I wonder whether I should give in o
r give him a hard time.

  “Neil…”

  He hushes me before I can say anything further, stealing my words away while he kisses me deeply, sensually. It’s been a while since we’ve kissed with genuine passion. I want to forget all the craziness that’s happened and enjoy the moment. I let the tension flow out my body, and I relax while Neil stamps wet kisses on my cheeks, lips, and neck. I grab his head and pull him closer to me, against my skin. I want him. I want this man. I can’t imagine leaving him. And I’m afraid to break up my family, the only family I’ll ever have.

  I cry when Neil makes love to me, nice, slow, taking his time. We use K-Y Jelly and a condom—make that three condoms, since the sex gets so slippery and sloppy that we have to keep trying. Neil calls in sick the next day and it’s the first time in a year that he’s done that. I wake up with my husband cradled in my arms. He assures me that he does love me, and I confess that yes, I love him, too.

  The next weekend, Neil and I are in his library. He’s standing up, arms folded across his chest.

  “Neil, could you just do this, not just for me, but for yourself, too?”

  “But how’s it hurting anything?”

  I wave the slick porno magazine in his face. “Do you even have to ask? Even though being with you has been good the past couple times, sometimes while we’re doing it, I wonder if you’re fantasizing about the women in these—”

  “Anya, I won’t lie. Most of the time when anybody’s making love to anybody, they imagine they’re with someone else. For men it might be Beyoncé. And for women, shoot, probably that Denzel dude.”

  “Please. I’ve never fantasized—”

  He shrugs like he doesn’t believe me.

  “But it’s not the fantasy,” I tell him, “it’s the addiction. I know you’re not the only man drawn to this stuff. Quiet as it’s kept, apparently a lot of churchgoing men have their Kama Sutra stashes—preachers, deacons, it’s not like you’re alone. I just want one less man that’s addicted. And I can’t see why it’s so hard for you to simply throw this junk away.”

  Neil opens his mouth but doesn’t say anything. I stoop and begin gathering up porno magazines, at least a dozen of them, flipping through the pages, my eyes widening at each graphic image. No, I don’t resemble any of these women—never have, never will—yet Neil insists I’m attractive. If that’s true, wouldn’t my beauty, my body, be enough for him?