The Affair (The Relationship Quo Series Book 5)

by Nicole Strycharz

  I had two options.

  To schedule a D&C or pass the baby naturally.

  Without Noah to make the decision with me, I chose to go home. On the way back, I called Lark. My emotions seemed stunned, unable to display themselves. Or maybe I’ve grown so used to disappointment, that I have none.

  Lark never answered, so I left him a voicemail. “Lark, it’s Noah’s wife.” I looked at the hand holding my stomach. My wedding ring was reflecting the red of a stop light. Then I realized it was silly, the habit of holding my stomach, there was nothing there to comfort. “Please tell Noah… that… I had an emergency… and to call me.” I swayed with the car as it drove on. Then I hung up and tried to process, knowing my husband was not going to call.

  LORENZO

  It sounds pitiful but lying in bed without Ruby is as empty a feeling as it was the first few times, she started finding other men to keep her warm and chase off the demons.

  That’s why I sit at my stool near the window in our living room and smoke. Gives me something to do instead of lying there and thinking.

  And somehow, I’m out of vino. An actual crime in my family, but booze isn’t what’s been getting me through Ruby’s latest dalliance. It’s Lydia. Therefore, I lost track of my bottles.

  With heavy lids, I tossed my cigarette out the window and stripped to my boxers before getting in bed. The sound of traffic and sirens, like a lullaby for me. I was asleep instantly.

  My phone went off in the night, and I startled awake. I have a slight fear that while Ruby is out, she’ll have a breakdown, or some type of emergency, and my phone ringing while it’s still dark, amplified that.

  I saw the time was past midnight and fumbled to get hold of it and answer, not even bothering with names.

  “Yeah?” My throat sounded deeper and gravely… more than usual, making me sound annoyed when I wasn’t.

  “I’m sorry,” the plea came to me wrapped in tears, and I sat up thinking it was one of my sisters.

  “Angela?”

  “No…” she fell apart again, and the sound of her crying notified me who it was.

  “Lydia?” the fog in my brain cleared a little. “What’s going on?”

  Her crying overwhelmed her speech and I thought up scenarios.

  “Is it Noah?” I asked.

  Nothing.

  I just waited, a ripping sensation gutting me in the dark while I did so at the sounds coming down the line.

  “I…” she could hardly speak. “I need you, please?”

  I stood before she finished. “Just stay put, yeah? I’ll be there.” I don’t have to ask where Noah is. Ruby is missing, that answers that. My question, is what happened? But I sense she can’t handle answering over the phone.

  She hung up, and the weight of what she didn’t say, frightened me.

  I was back in my clothes in no time, wallet and keys gathered. I don’t remember starting my motorcycle or driving to her place.

  Arriving at her house, I ran to the door and found it unlocked. “Lydia?” I checked in a rush around each room, but she wasn’t down here. “Lydia!” I ran up the steps and into the first room on my left. It was a dimly lit bedroom, and she was curled on the bed. Her tears wouldn’t stop and the red stains on the sheets told me the thing she couldn’t.

  I crouched down by her. “I need to take you to the hospital—”

  “I just came from there,” she hid her face. “They can’t do anything.”

  Her pain seemed to clamp around her middle, forcing her to curl in on herself.

  Tears of grief are agonizing to listen to. They come in waves, just like her physical pain.

  She wasn’t the Lydia I thought I knew. The positive, doe-eyed, conservative woman was replaced by someone that could hardly drag herself from the pit. Her gray eyes seemed to darken at the corners. The orthodox, insecure lady that couldn’t wear skirts above her knees, was in only a t-shirt and panties, legs quaking. I held her against her headboard, and then on the floor beside her bed, and then by the window. Like when we have coffee, we didn’t speak.

  Sitting here, she keeps her fists wrapped in the fabric of my shirt, her body tense and shook.

  I know I’m not the one she wanted here. She wanted Noah, but Noah isn’t available. Yet, as each moment ticks by without his call, or his showing up, I can feel her giving up. On him, on hope.

  I’ve decided that if he shows up, I’ll deal with the consequences. The biggest hurdle will be leaving here without shoving his head up his own ass. Obviously, Lydia doesn’t care whether or not he arrives early, she’s decided she needs me, and I wouldn’t abandon her in the midst of this no matter what.

  As four in the morning approached, I coaxed her up off the floor where she fell asleep with her head in my lap, and I left her to run the shower in the bathroom adjoined to her bedroom. She handed me the PJ’s she wanted while I led her into the bathroom and tested the water. “Get in,” I said softly.

  She’d passed the phase of tears. She’d faded into the more painful place, where even crying takes too much energy. Her face was pale, lips very light pink, and her eyes were swollen and wet, but she mostly stared at the floor.

  She tried three times with no success to put her hair up in a clip. On the fourth attempt, it snapped out of her hands and rolled across the floor. I picked it up, and gently gathered her hair. Twisting and tucking, I managed to get most of it up off her neck.

  “Lydia,” I held her elbow.

  When she turned around, she walked into my chest and rested there.

  “You need the water,” I said. “And to rinse the blood away.”

  “My arms feel too heavy,” she admitted in a rasp. “Everything is spinning.”

  I held the bottom of her shirt. “Do you trust me?” She was quiet. “I won’t look.”

  She nodded against my shoulder.

  I gently pulled upward, removing her shirt.

  She took off her own underwear, then stepped into the shower. Being too unsteady on her feet, she used my arm as a brace.

  “I’m right here,” I said, slowly closing the curtain part way.

  “Don’t leave—”

  “I’m gonna stand right here.” I crossed my arms and stood with my back against the end of the shower wall, watching her silhouette. Anytime she swayed, I would put my arm out, but she managed.

  When she finished, I stopped her from coming out. “Sit down, let the water run, and I’ll be back.”

  I went into her room and stripped the bedding.

  I took it down the stairs and found her laundry area. This wasn’t new to me. When Ruby had her secret abortion, she bled a while, and I cleaned it. She couldn’t bear it herself.

  Removing the stains is almost ritualistic. Knowing the blood belongs to the mother and the life unlived.

  I found where her other bedding was and made the bed up again. There was no more trace of a miscarriage.

  Returning to the bathroom, I shut the water off, held up a towel, and guided her out, wrapping her body in the fabric. I stayed more as a support for her to lean on while she dressed, in a clean shirt that looked big enough to be mine, so I imagine its Noah’s, and flannel pants.

  Afterward, she stayed in the doorway staring at the bed.

  “I’m sorry…” she said in the smallest voice. “I didn’t mean for you to have to…”

  “It’s fine.”

  “And I’m sorry that I…”

  I frowned at her. “That what?”

  “I didn’t know who else to call.” She dug her fingers into the wood of the frame. “Noah’s phone is off. Lark wouldn’t answer. If I called one of the women from church, Sara, then… they would want to know why I can’t get Noah. They would ask, where he is…”

  “You don’t need to apologize to me.”

  “And… you are… the only person in the world… that understands… exactly what I just lost.”

  The mood of the room was thick with many different emotions. None that have a name in the En
glish language or any other.

  “Lay down.” That was all I could think to say.

  She came to sit, and I handed her Advil for the pain. It wouldn’t help her shattered heart.

  “Can you stay?” she asked. “Noah won’t be back… he’ll go to Lark’s to clean up, then to work, as usual when he spends the night with her. Could you just… stay?” her eyes filled again. “Maybe just an hour or…”

  “I’ll stay.” I grabbed a pillow from her bed and sighed as I tossed it on the floor beside her bed. She was still Lydia, rules of propriety still applied. But I like that about her. I like that about us. Because I would never sleep in another woman’s bed, anyway.

  I laid down on the floor, my back being bitten by the hardwood under me. She laid down on the mattress, on her side to face me, and dangled her hand over, seeking mine.

  I held it.

  She took a breath, shuddering.

  “Five things you can see,” I said when her breathing quickened from the grief again. “Four things you can touch,” I added as one of her tears slid down the back of my hand.

  “Three things you can hear,” we recited together. “Two you can smell; one you can taste.”

  She fell asleep counting the things she could smell.

  LYDIA

  Lark must have erased my message without listening to it because Noah never asked me about my emergency. He came home after work in a cheery mood the next afternoon.

  I didn’t say anything. Every time I tried, I couldn’t help the little voice inside saying, he doesn’t deserve to know.

  There was no way for him to know. We were not having sex, so he didn’t feel or notice the pad I wore while the miscarriage persisted.

  The next day, at church, I felt half alive. Nothing about the day gave me joy, I couldn’t summons the desire to be falsely happy, and even scarier, no one that I thought knew me and cared, seemed to notice. Not even Noah. No one.

  All but Sara.

  “So, did you finish Sombra?” she asked, scooting in beside me where I sat at a pew.

  I dragged my gaze from where Noah stood with the Elders of the church, to where she was. “No.”

  She scooted closer. “Are you okay?”

  I slowly shook my head. “Mmm, no.”

  Her face replaced the humor with real concern. “What’s going on?”

  I blinked a few times. “I miscarried the other day.”

  Her sharp intake of breath didn’t affect me as it should. “Oh, lady, I am so, so sorry, do you need anything? Anything? I really do mean anything, because I’ll do it.”

  I held her hand, sensing she meant it. I like her. I think I’ve even come to love her.

  “How is Noah handling it?” she asked.

  “Oh, he doesn’t know…” I found the words spilling from my mouth. “He was out having an affair and his phone was off.”

  She looked at me, waiting for me to retract something, but I didn’t. “Does he know that you know?”

  I shook my head. “No.”

  “Are you going to tell him?”

  I’m not sure if she means tell him I know or about the baby. Doesn’t matter, the answer is the same. “Not yet.”

  On the day of Christmas Eve, I felt a sizzle in my fingertips. My emotions were right there like an arrow pulled back and poised to be released from the bowstring.

  I was almost desiring a fight.

  Noah came down from his office and showed me his laptop while I was preparing to carve the ham. “What do you think?” he asked.

  I looked with little to no interest. “What is that?”

  “Notes for the couples counseling.” He sounded as excited as he does when a kid from his work flourishes or a kid from Youth Group graduates high school. “We start on the first Thursday in January. I meant to tell you that. This is some of the topics I thought we could discuss.”

  I’m not even looking anymore. I’m trying desperately not to laugh. What a joke our marriage has become, and only one of us is aware of it.

  “So?” he prods. “What do you think? Did you see the bullet points?”

  “I think that whatever you think is best.” I stabbed the ham with my serving fork and then took up the butcher knife to start carving.

  “Have you thought up points that might work well for this? Because a woman’s perspective of marriage is important in these things.”

  “Nope,” I sliced the ham, finding deep satisfaction in the cutting.

  He frowned a little. “Do you want to work on them together?”

  I stopped and pretended to think about it. “Nah, I won’t be doing the counseling.”

  His face fell. “Wait, Lydia, we have to do it as a team, I can’t council without you. We already committed to the Elders.”

  “You committed; I was told to let you be your own man.”

  He set the laptop on the table behind us. “I don’t understand, I thought we were doing this together.”

  “So did I.”

  “What does that mean?”

  I went back to carving. “I just acknowledge that; I am not qualified to tell other couples how to be healthy couples. In fact, I think we need to be counseled. But forget that. This is me, letting you be your own mess— I mean man.”

  He took the knife and the fork from me and tried to make me look at him. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. I just don’t want to be part of counseling.”

  His surprise infuriated me. “Is it because you’re too tired? With the baby coming, maybe it is better that we have fewer commitments.”

  “Oh, that,” I pulled free and took back my carving tools. “We won’t be having one of those anymore. You can make all the commitments you like.”

  The confusion in his eyes, I was completely desensitized to it. “Won’t be having one?”

  “Mmhm,” I sawed through the ham with no trouble. “I lost it six days ago.” I slapped the meat down on a nearby platter.

  Noah reached out but I paused after lifting the carving knife again. “Don’t touch me right now.”

  “Honey—"

  I slapped more meat down, splattering the juices onto his shirt.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he sounded broken. Perhaps I should feel sorry for him. For us. But I do not.

  “I did… I called you plenty of times. When the bleeding started, when I was on my way to Doctor Anderson’s, when Doctor Anderson sent me for an ultrasound. On the way back from the ultrasound to Doctor Anderson’s office, and while at Doctor Anderson’s office, and again on the way home. Oh,” I laughed humorlessly. “I also called Lark, you were staying over with Lark, right? I called him and left a message, telling him it was an emergency, but somehow, he never received it.”

  His voice fell. “Lark and I, um… we had a falling out.” Noah’s eyes filled, and he didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands. “Lydia, oh, my God. What— how do I—”

  “It’s fine, I just came home, bled her away, and then moved on. That’s all we can do, isn’t it? Move on?”

  “Listen,” he stepped in my way and took my carving tools away a second time, laying them down. “We have to come together in this. You can’t take all this on by yourself. I should have been there, I can’t— I am so sorry that I wasn’t there— you are my life, this baby was my life. I never, I didn’t know… I should have… been here.”

  “Yes, you should have, but you weren’t.”

  His eyes darkened. “I didn’t know.”

  “Why was your phone off?”

  “It wasn’t.”

  “It went directly to voicemail. Where were you?”

  “I told you, I was with Lark.”

  I saw that his neck was turning red, his movements were quick, and I liked seeing him squirm for an answer he can’t give me.

  “Did Lark get my message?”

  “I don’t know,” he snapped a little.

  “Why don’t we call him and ask, or better yet, let’s invite him over for tonight. It’s Chri
stmas Eve, after all. We can ask him over for dinner.”

  “I don’t want Lark here for Christmas Eve. I just told you, we fell out.”

  “But it’s Christmas. We should forgive and forget. Why can’t we have him over?”

  He slammed his hand down on the counter, but I didn’t even flinch. “You just told me our baby died! Now you want to host a damn dinner?”

  I shrugged. “Why not? Lark is your best friend.”

  “Why are you punishing me like this?”

  “Am I punishing you?” I tilted my head, feeling mean, embracing the feeling that mean gave me. “Poor Noah, so much stress. Your wife wants you to invite your friend to dinner, it’s all so much to handle. Why don’t you go and pray about it, as head of this childless household?”

  He flipped the rest of the ham off its pan, off the table, and it plopped on the floor by my feet. “You were wrong to keep this from me. I’m your husband and you deliberately waited a week to tell me! A week! What the hell is that? What kind of person does that?”

  “Well, see, I told you I wasn’t fit to council.”

  My sarcasm went over like a led balloon. “This is funny to you? Our baby is dead, and this is funny? Hurting me is funny? You think that you are the only one that wanted this? That was looking forward to this? What about me, Lydia? What about my disappointment? This is wrong! It’s wrong and you know it!” He reared back before slinging more dirt. “And you know what? You know what? You’ve changed. Yeah, you. You aren’t the Lydia I love so much.”

  “May she rest in peace,” I said before picking up the ham.

  “Something’s wrong with you.” He stepped back. “Punishing me by not telling me and acting like this— it’s wrong.”

  “Punishment means taking something away,” I corrected, turning the ham over in my hands, grease dripping. “Like this,” I plopped it on his open laptop where it sat on the table. I admired my work with a head tilt. “Now, that is a punishment.”

  His shock reflected my own. I didn’t know I had it in me.

  He gestured to the ham. “Merry Christmas,” he flung, going to the door. “Enjoy yours alone.”

  “I’m never alone. God likes ham and has a really good sense of humor, tonight will be a hoot.”