Eleven days, twelve hours until Halloween
Corinne
I’m walking through the ER, and everything is still.
This can’t be right, I think. The ER can’t be this quiet.
But it is. It’s motionless, silent. I peek into an exam room, and Jackie and Jude are lying on gurneys, their eyes wide-open, their mouths slack.
They’re dead and bloody, and I scream. Only, no noise comes out.
Even my screams are silent, and I can’t seem to move to help anyone.
I try, because I’m a doctor, and maybe I can bring them back, and I struggle against the air, against unseen hands restraining me.
But I can’t. I can’t get to them, and they’re dead, and I couldn’t stop it.
“Corinne!”
A voice, my father’s, calls out from across the hall. I’m terrified, and now I can move, but only toward him. Unbidden, one foot steps in front of the other, until I’m standing in front of the curtain. Shaking, I pull it back.
My father sits on the table, his mouth a bloody grotesque mess.
“You haven’t fixed it yet,” he accuses, and his teeth are missing. “Fix it.”
“I can’t fix it,” I insist. “It’s yours to fix.”
“No, it’s not,” he argues, and blood streams down his chin. “It’s yours.”
I’m confused and I stand still, and the whispers seem to come from everywhere, surrounding me, filling my ears.
Cuntcuntcuntcuntcuntcuntcuntcuntcunt.
They hiss and spin and strike me, and then...
My eyes startle open, and I stare at the ceiling in my bedroom.
I’m soaked in sweat, and my fingers are wrapped in a sheet. I untangle them and allow the circulation to flow back to my hand. Rubbing at it, I stare at my husband. He’s sleeping peacefully, burrowed under his pillow, oblivious to my torment.
It’s the second nightmare in one night.
It was so real that I thought it was.
I sit up in bed and take a drink, then take several deep breaths, willing my racing heart to slow. As I move, Jude hears me and stirs.
“Co?” he asks in confusion. “When did you get home?”
“A few hours ago.” I run my fingers through my damp hair, and Jude notices my sweat.
“What’s wrong?” I can see his concern, even in the shadows.
“A nightmare.”
“Oh, babe.” He sighs, reaching to rub my back. “It’s okay. I’m here. Nothing bad is going to happen. I won’t let anything hurt you.”
My husband’s fingers feel good on my skin, familiar and soothing, and I’ll never want anyone else to touch me but him. I allow myself to relax, to close out the images from my head.
“I’ll never forget it,” I tell him softly.
He nods. “I know. No one would. But you can move on from it, Co. It doesn’t have to hold this power over you.”
I squeeze my eyes closed, because my brain knows that. It really does. But my heart... My heart isn’t so logical.
“I just wish I could unsee what I saw,” I offer limply.
Jude pulls me into his arms, and his warm breath moves my hair.
“You can’t,” he replies simply. “But we can deal with them, babe. I promise you.”
“It’s been years,” I tell him, and I feel so dejected.
“I know. But the mind works in powerful ways,” he tells me. “You know that. Be patient. I really think you should see someone, babe. You need help working through this. You should’ve gotten help long ago.”
“I don’t know,” I answer doubtfully. “I don’t want to see a psychiatrist.” I stare at the ceiling and remember my panic attack. “Or maybe I do. I don’t know.”
I don’t say what I’m thinking...that I’m afraid of what I’ll find if I poke around my head too much. Something feels like it’s there...lurking just behind a wall...waiting for me to find it.
Jude squeezes my hand. “Just hang in there. We’ll figure this out. What time do you work today?”
“Second shift.”
I know he hates second shift, and so do I. It means I can sleep in, but it also means that I won’t see Jude until almost midnight. He sighs, hard, just like I knew he would. When you’ve been married so long, you can anticipate your spouse’s reactions.
“I swear. It won’t be for much longer,” I tell him, and I mean it. “As soon as they get another doctor in, I’ll transition to Family Practice.”
“I’ve heard that before.” Jude is wry.
“I know. But I mean it.”
He turns to me, his eyes almost green in the early morning light. There’s something there in those mossy depths, something I haven’t seen in a while.
“Are you sure? Because that would mean that you’d actually have to spend time with me.”
His words are pointed, barbed, at the same time as they are insecure.
His implication takes my breath away.
“What are you talking about?” I ask hesitantly, because that’s crazy. “You’re the most important person in my whole world.”
“You have a weird way of showing it sometimes.” Jude’s eyes are hard, and he’s staring at me, and I see the truth in his gaze. He feels neglected.
I taste guilt in my mouth.
“Oh my God,” I breathe. “Jude, I’m sorry. I never want you to feel that way. I love you.”
Something passes over his face, and he shakes his head, and his attitude is different.
“I know,” he tells me, and he sounds so tired. “I’m sorry. I’m just being passive-aggressive because I never see you. This will pass. These hours...everything.”
“Do you really believe that?” I ask, and he nods again.
“Yeah. I do.”
I grab his hand and squeeze it, his fingers entwining with mine.
“You know, let’s make a deal,” I suggest. “All honesty, all the time. If something bothers you, just tell me. And I’ll do the same. That way, we don’t get worked up about things that aren’t even true.”
He smiles. “I like that. It’s a good idea.”
“I have them sometimes.” I grin back and he chuckles. “In fact, I can go first right now...because I have a concern.”
Jude waits, and I continue. “It bothers me that we don’t have much of a sex life anymore,” I tell him honestly.
He stares at me, and I can practically see him biting back a sharp retort. His tongue must hurt from the effort.
“Okay. Point taken. And it bothers me that you’re not home more. It bothers me that we haven’t started a family yet, Corinne. We’re not spring chickens.”
A heavy feeling of dread drops onto my chest like it always does when he talks about having a baby. I swallow hard, then again, then again.
“I promise to come home by dinnertime at least twice a week.” I make a spur-of-the-moment resolution, addressing one thing at a time. “Can you promise that we’ll have sex once a week? I miss our sex life, Ju. It makes us feel closer, and without it...well...”
Without it, I feel so distant.
He grips my fingers.
“Yes. That’s a deal.”
We’re quiet then, and I almost think I’ve escaped an uncomfortable subject, but then Jude brings it up.
“What about our family?” he asks after a few minutes.
I swallow again. Hard.
“I...I don’t know.”
Jude’s hazel eyes look more green in the light, as they do whenever he’s upset. I try to meet his gaze, to meet the disappointed look there, but it’s hard. I look out the window instead.
“You don’t know what it’s like,” I tell him quietly. “Living under the shadow of what my father did. I can hardly stomach the idea of bringing a child into that.”
“Into what?” Jude is frustrated now, as he always is when I speak of this. “You didn’t commit your father’s crime, Corinne. No one knows us here. Our child would never have to deal with it.”
He’s right. Of course he’s right.
But I’m not telling him the entire truth. I’m not telling him that I’m afraid of genetics. I’m afraid that our child might inherit my father’s mental illness... In fact, I’m afraid that I even have or my sister. My father didn’t snap until he was an adult.
Jude watches me, watches the wheels turn in my head. “It’ll be okay,” he tells me, and his voice is understanding. “Our baby would be okay.”
I nod. “I know. Maybe soon.”
Jude blinks away his disappointment at my non-commitment.
“Want to go get breakfast?” I ask him. “It’s almost morning. We can go to your little place—so I can make it up to you for coming home late all week.”
He pauses and almost seems reluctant.
“We can,” he tells me. “Or we can stay here and spend some quality time together.”
He stresses the word quality, and I know what that means. I’m so tired, but I don’t want to tell him that. I was the one who just asked for a better sex life, for God’s sake.
“What do you have in mind?” I flirt, ignoring my exhaustion, and I rub my hand on his leg. Once upon a time, that would’ve made him instantly hard, but we’re not twenty-five anymore, so it doesn’t.
“Let me show you.” His voice is a growl and he flips me over.
I suck in my breath because this is new—his roughness, his coming at me from the back. His fingers bite into my shoulders, and he pushes me into the bed. His passion is palpable, and it’s been so long since I’ve seen him this way.
Excitement laps into me, and I exhale in a rush.
My fingers curl into the sheets, and I hold on as he slides his fingers into me, rough rough rougher. One finger, two, then three.
I moan, and he moans into my neck, his chest rubbing my back, his heat leaching into my own. The friction is delicious, and the aggression is pleasingly different.
It’s so unlike him, so unlike us, and for a minute, I revel in that. He’s taking a renewed interest in our sex life, taking my words to heart.
But then...then...
He grasps my neck from behind. His fingers curl around the sides of my flesh, not truly hard, but hard enough.
I suck in my breath, and for a minute, a strange minute, I feel panicked.
I don’t know why. It comes out of nowhere.
I feel subdued, compressed, constrained. It’s suddenly terrifying, and I can’t breathe.
I can’t breathe.
My lungs are hot and I scramble around, pulling away from Jude, turning onto my back and pushing him away. It takes him a minute to realize what’s happening. His eyes are glazed over with sex.
“Jude, no.” I push at him. “Don’t.”
He comes to a halt, pausing over me, his forearms shaking with the effort.
His breath comes in pants, then it slows, then he rolls over to the side.
I feel a bit weak, and I’m embarrassed by the panic. What the hell is wrong with me?
“I was just trying something new,” Jude says finally, his voice low. “I wasn’t really choking you. I would never hurt you, Corinne. Surely you know that.”
“I do,” I answer quickly. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I guess it was just unexpected. It wasn’t like you...and...”
I don’t know what else to say. My heart is starting to slow down now, and I feel ridiculously self-conscious. What the hell is wrong with me?
“It’s okay,” he assures me, but somehow his voice seems empty, or offended. Something seems off. “We won’t try rough sex again.”
“It’s not that,” I protest. “Just maybe tell me first next time.”
“Okay.”
We’re silent for a while, and he turns to me slightly, his lips in my hair. It should feel intimate, but instead, it doesn’t. It feels like we’re a million miles apart. We’re doing the right things, but it’s lacking substance. We’re on autopilot, going through the motions. I wonder if Jude feels the same way, and I wonder why it feels this way.
I feel a moment of panic, because marriage isn’t supposed to be like this.
“Jude?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you feel like something is wrong? With us, I mean?”
This rouses him, and I can feel him staring at me, and a weird tension pops up between us. I can practically feel it on my skin, like it’s a living thing.
“Maybe.”
“What should we do?” My level of panic increases, and my grip on Jude’s arm is tight, and the weird tension grows.
“We’ll be okay,” he rushes to reassure me. “Because we want to be. It’s just a slump. Our priorities aren’t in order. We just need to get them straight, Co. We’ll be okay.”
Just as soon as I change my whole life to suit his ideals.
Where did that awful thought come from? I chastise myself. He wants only what every normal person wants—to see their spouse and have children. What is wrong with me? I have no call to resent him.
Minutes pass before Jude gets up.
“I’d better shower for work.” He retreats to the bathroom, and the bed is empty without him. He doesn’t have time for a run, and I doubt he’ll have time for breakfast.
I run my hand over the empty sheets, idly looking at the Jude-sized indentation he left behind. Whatever semblance of intimacy I felt twenty minutes ago is gone now, even though my thighs are still damp from his presence between them.
Something in me wants to go to the bathroom and step in the shower with him, and force a sense of intimacy to return. But something else tells me in a louder voice that I can’t force it. It’s not there to force. We have to somehow figure out how to rebuild it.
I throw on a robe and trudge to the kitchen to make some coffee, and I pour Jude a go-cup. When he comes out from the bedroom, his hair is still damp, his face freshly shaved, and he has that “clean man” smell. He’s long and lean in his black trousers and cream-colored sweater. I kiss his cheek, and his mouth curves against mine.
It’s quick, but it’s there. A smile.
“It’s going to be okay, right?” I hate the uncertainty in my voice. He glances at me quickly, and I remember for the millionth time in my life that my husband is a very sexy man. His hazel eyes glint in the sun warmly, and I search them for truth.
“Of course, Co. It’s not even a question.”
He’s sincere, and he’s sure, and I feel a bit better because of that. I watch his black Land Rover disappear from the driveway. Marriages go through peaks and valleys. I knew that when we got married. It just seemed at the time like valleys would never happen.
It’ll all be fine. It has to be. We both work too hard at life to not be fine.
I can’t shake the uncertainty, though, and so I do the only thing I know to do. I call my sister.
“Hey, you,” she answers cheerfully on the first ring.
“Do you and Teddy have issues...in the bedroom?” I ask hesitantly without preamble.
My sister pauses. “Issues as in...”
“As in, you never make time for sex, and when you do, Teddy can’t get it up half the time?”
Jackie laughs, a raspy sound. “Of course. That’s what happens when you get old, weirdo. The soldier just doesn’t salute as easily.”
“I’m not old,” I tell her. “And neither is Jude.”
“Of course not,” she agrees. “But in penis years, he’s like...fifty-five. So be patient.”
“Penises aren’t like dogs,” I tell her. “They don’t have their own time system.”
“I disagree. Once a man hits thirty, years double for penises. It’s practically a fact.”
“Odd that I didn’t learn that in medical school.” I’m droll and Jackie laughs.
“Do you guys try new things from time to time, to spice things up?” I’m hesitant to ask, but the words come out anyway.
“Hell, yeah. Variety is the spice of life.”
Okay. Maybe Jude was right to try something. Maybe I’m a lunatic for freaking out. Something about it, though... Something felt wrong. Really wrong.
We hang up and I take Artie outside.
I stand on the patio and watch her move slowly around the yard. Her muzzle is white now, and her once-strong haunches are thin.
“Artie, come in, girl!” I call, and she rambles leisurely to me. I scratch her ears, and she closes her eyes.
She’s been my family for the longest time. Her and Jude and Jacks. They are all I need in this world. I feed her breakfast before I get ready myself, adding some scrambled eggs to her dog food.
“Don’t tell Daddy,” I tell her. Eggs give her gas, and she knows it. I think she smiles at me.
I shower and actually have time to get ready for work leisurely, instead of getting called in early. I blow-dry my hair and put it in a long braid draped over my shoulder, because that makes me feel young and pretty. I still feel the afterglow of sex with my husband, and I want to keep the good vibe going. I apply makeup and lip gloss and the whole nine yards.
When I walk into the ER an hour later, I feel good, I look good, and Lucy stops in her tracks with an armful of catheters for the supply closet.
“You got some,” she crows. “I can see it on your face! God, why do I have to be a crazy cat lady? All I get is fur on me all the time, no orgasms.”
I laugh without meaning to, and she growls at me. “You don’t get to laugh at my pain.”
This, of course, only makes me laugh at her again, and she rolls her eyes.
“It’s slow today,” she tells me. “For once. It’s just you and Dr. Lane, and there’s a girl in exam room twelve who wants to see a female doctor.”
I nod and head in that direction, stopping to pick up the chart from the door. Glancing through it, I get the main facts.
Female, twenty-four years old, presenting with a migraine.
I slip through the curtain and find her sitting on the table, her feet swinging. She’s young and cute, and I greet her with a smile.
Because I did get some today.