Washington DC, 2018

We return home after dinner at Waterstone Grill. This was our place. Before before Maddy and her place, Peanut Butter and Ellies. Sometimes —before I became pregnant— mom would watch Maddy as she did this night but once I became pregnant you and I went out by ourselves, less and less. It was a hard pregnancy. Did you believe we were losing the momentum of our love affair? I traced it over and over these last three months: the trajectory from the Paris flea market where you proposed to me to your affair with Leora Hall...and to now. So much has happened in that limbo of your love affair with that ugly woman.

We enter the foyer, the entry way lit up and a cut crystal vase of wild flowers from the garden sitting on the hewn oak hall table. Mom's doing. It was pretty, the lavender and daisies, a couple of black eyed susans. She liked that—mom. Her taste was more Martha Stewart country. She didn't understand our industrial / European antique aesthetic. I didn't understand her shabby chic, white washed cabinets and shaker furniture. Maddy loved her sectional couch, it made for a "better Wild things boat."

Oh Please don't go. I love you so.

Mom brightened when we entered the kitchen. She was leaning against the kitchen counter, glass of red wine in her hand.

"There you are!" She said. She was only looking at me. "How was it?"
"Maddy asleep?" You ask, you move to the cabinet and retrieve a glass of wine.

"Oh am I in your way?" Finally she acknowledges you but without a smile and with fleeting eye contact.

"No Joyce. You're fine."
Joyce. Mom notices it. I notice it.

"She's asleep." Mom said. "I spilled some wine on your island here." The kitchen island and the deep indented butcher block. I look down at the Burgundy blight. The psychotic shadow: blood, then now she's ruined my antique. My God damned $8,000 butcher bloc I am protective of our antiques. My instinct is anger. It was so expensive. Then I admonished my own snobbery. But the red stain, somehow.

"Did you leave it for a while mom?"

"What do you mean?"

"It's stained. You must have let it sit there."

'It does't matter Annie. What difference does it make? We'll sand it a little or bleach it."

"You're rich—What do you know?!" I snapped at you.

A silence falls. It endures and the sound of the refrigerator rises. The three of us wait. The stress starts the engine in my mind. I'm going blank. My mind still moves in and out with the wind but I don't' reveal it.

I think you and mom started talking again. Instinctive small talk. I don't know. I was lost for a moment. I was losing it.

My mind travels back before the children. Dissociation. Dr. Antol gives it a name and it irks me, Edward. Does reminiscing have to have a pathological label? Can't I calm my self with happy times we shared? "But for how long," the glum psychiatrist inquires. She writes something down—this irks me too. How long do these episodes last, Annie?" Episodes. Everything is clinical after you've been psychotic, after you've tried to kill yourself. Still I leave in my mind. I leave you and mom there to navigate the tension.

You and I are moving the island. Don't you remember? The furniture movers gave up on us. Wanted to take it back and have the antique dealer disassemble it.

"Don't be silly," you'd said to them. You took out two fifty dollar bills. One for each. "no. no. Don't be silly." Everything you said back then stirred a giggle inside of me. That was ours. You have to admit that, don't you? That humor. That silliness.

"Just bring it around the back of the house." It's not like the narrow brick walk was easy for them to navigate. But the movers were successful. The $50, your gentle casualness was incentive for them. The thin one, the older one for whom I had unconsciously worried about heaving that heavy oak kitchen island—I did, I worried he was too old. You were young and healthy. But you were rich. He had sweat on his forehead, a long square face and he wore suspenders just as my grandfather always had. I directed him to place the piece up on the deck. It occupied a quarter of it once it was set in place. In a years time the deck would be replaced. The whole yard landscaped designed-by me. I walked back to the edge of the garden—unlike most of the row houses, we had a half lot behind our house. It was such an anomaly in DC. "how on earth did you get this?" Lucy had asked about the yard. "You have to use Jon Renaldo, my landscape guru." You and I exchanged a look when she said it...yes, be both were falling in love with Lucy, our interior designer. In the end I didn't use Jean Renaldo. I did it all myself.

There I'd stood, back near the flower garden and examined our beautiful antique Baker's table "rescued" from a 19th century shop in new Castle England. Pine, zinc shelve and bins on one side, and 24 drawer on the other, cast iron handles. Zinc casters.

"God it's beautiful" I had whispered. The mover, the one in the suspenders unbeknownst to me, standing right by my side.

"I wanted to tell you what a wonderful couple you are."

"Oh I'm sorry. I didn't see you there. Thank you for saying that."
"Gives an old man hope."

I smiled at him and touched his shoulder "that's very sweet."

Two days. Lucky us, it was sunny and warm. End of august. Then I heard it...the middle of the night. Back then our room was just a mattress and box spring, and that Turkish rug. The old windows and rotted sash. Cold air assaulting us in gusts through the uneven sashes, through thin panes with cracked glaze we couldn't bear to tape because we didn't want to lose the grandeur and beauty of those insanely tall iron windows with the wavy antique panes. That was also before the iron beams. The ceiling still crumbling lathe and plaster. A wood beam that bowed. We thought for sure the ceiling would fall on us.

"Edward, wake up—the Island"

We were saving our precious child —oak that has never been exposed to rain. We both ran out to the back deck and Edward you created a make shift little tent, a clear tarp, clothesline rope left. In the basement. Tied to eye-hooks from the backdoor frame and the tree.

We had coffee there in the kitchen at 3:00 in the morning, sitting in a half renovated kitchen. Do you remember? You were glad for the extra time in the morning to work on your book. I was still taking design classes. I was almost done with my architecture certificate. You worked and me? Instead of working on my portfolio, I crawled back and under the down and wool blankets, my hair still damp from the early dawn rescue of our precious island.

All of it right there within our reach. And not six hours later, the sun was out and we were back to work. We had been brought tears, laughing hard because the enormous island was too big to make it through the back door. An idea! Cut a hole in the back exterior wall — put French doors out to the back deck - maybe a pergola over the deck. Eventually, once I'd designed the garden, brick pathways, hosta beds and trees that by the time Maddy was born only three years later, now shading small little zones. I had't realized back then lost in inspiration that the urban oversized garden transitioned from formality, a screen porch with iron furniture and potted plants, out to a patio, a radiating circle of brick, an eight foot diameter surrounded by hedges and shrubs, some sculpted topiaries in copper planters, a laurel hedge enclosing the patio, a private little tea garden. Two cast iron urns opened to, a stone winding pathway into a less manicured Jungian unconscious. Our passion just beyond the harmony we project to the world. A final surprise, my heart I always thought, a hidden water feature, something for our future little daughter to discover. There inhabiting a far back corner of the yard - a cement sculpture your friend form New York designed for our wedding present: a four foot sphere ball on a cube pedestal. Copper basin, already patina green on the bottom. Now, small plastic animals live in and around the fountain but back then was a fabulous culmination of landscape architecture. But, back then—you didn't know did you? One of our summer cocktail parties "soirées," You deep in intellectual discussion — over literary plot theory spicing your intellectualism with examples from your own book, your students' questions.

"Is there such a thing as as a reverse arc?"

"of course, the man in the hole—"

I always circulated, made sure everyone was happy—I always made sure of that—filling wine glasses. Stealthily depositing your fresh gin and tonic in front of you on the iron and glass table top. Your eyes reflecting your love for me in the candle lit garden. That particular conversation prompted by the recent machine analysis of plots, a topic populating most intellectual periodicals, discussions. Man. In. The. Hole. Plot. The Godfather. Your finger drew an invisible rendering of Vonnegut's story grid on the glass top of the wrought iron table. I found my narratives in furniture and buildings, you always found yours in stories and in your emotional fixations. One of those nights your brother and I had stumbled upon each other in the shrouded little room near the fountain. A small part of me wanted my youth back. Not your brother, not Jack. I just wanted to return to myself before the incident. The time itself, nothing to do with you or our marriage. He kissed me. I recognized the familiarity of him our teenage selves. At first his kiss was just friendly. As if we were saying hello, as if he'd just arrived. A kiss on the lips. Then he took the opportunity for more. I kissed him back. But, Edward I didn't desire him. I was simply caught in the rules—the dark void—of your family.

Now I want you back. .

Leora.

Before that and now again, Me.

But now, after the affair, after the baby, in between my mental descents, you and mom in restrained innocuous conversation. Our first date since the reconciliation, back here. I fear this is your prison. This home, our masterpiece constraining your imagination. You told me once that being a novelist -above teaching, above anything-gave you life. We were high when I asked you, above me? You lit another joint and smiled at me then affectionately moving closer not teasing but earnest "No Annie not above you. You are my soul."

I'm back but neither of you knew I'd left. Disassociated.

Now, mom is smiling. She's gotten old I think. The subtle lines around her lips, the corners of her eyes. My awareness pops in and out of your conversation as I linger with the fridge open until I remember the Sauvignon blanc—by the time I open the cabinet and reach for the glass, mom directs her comments to me "Annie you shouldn't drink so much while you're nursing Alexander."

"True," I say as I pour.

I know she's shaking her head. I know regardless of what you think you will not betray me. You won't validate her at my expense. I know you'll always take my side—even at your own peril or disadvantage.

"Annie says you're busy with your book tour."

You laugh at the suggestion that it's a tour. "I wish" you say. I watch you speak and then I'm back to that day, hunting the Paris flea market. You were funny and flirtatious. I was the eye of the storm and together we let the winds and innocuous tragedies rage around us. The sky was so perfectly blue - what Lucy would have called Cornflower Blue, favorite hue of famous Dutch painter, Johannes Vermeer. Almost no pigments of green—I think it was just endorphins. Now, in my memory the light turns everything real - no super real - an old movie. It's beautiful and you are being silly trying on and then buying a WW2 leather aviator cap, rabbit fur. Oh God, you look silly. Your face now framed, leather straps hanging down. I beg you to take it off...it's too embarrassing. But you won't. You approach the dealers in that stupid hat and ask silly questions about the "provenance of everyday items or antiques, feigning a distinguished seriousness. Acting distinguished. Looking foolish. I push ahead of you, loving your attention but acting as if I don't know you. Browsing the stalls, tables stocked with European housewares and clocks. Arragemets of Patisserie rolling pins, a metal flour sifter. A wooden bowl, a metal screen over a pan.

It's not your way with most people, this extroverted silliness, except you are in love, uninhibited. "Darling, Darling" you called a bit too loudly. Now you've found a pair of round antique eye glass frames, glass in only side. "Annie darling Come here darling! Help me select a —"

I turn. An older woman shakes her head and gives me a concerned look. Did you know I had to control my expression and if I had whispered "appelle la police" they would have hauled you off, questioned you. Instead I laugh and roll my eyes at a dark haired woman, mom's age, straight hair pulled back in a pony tail. A distinguished looking art dealer with manners that remind me of Lucy-arms crossed.

"Do you like this?" A French accented english. She's holding a rustic no a primitive cutting board. I shake my head and turn to look at you again.

"No. Thank you."

"With you?" She asks her eyes giving me an opportunity to communicate danger. fear.

A laugh erupts—"he's my boyfriend."

"Ooh,"she catches on and shakes her finger at you. Naughty. Tsk. Tsk.

"Thank you," I laugh and rush off.

"Annie" now you sound more serious but I don't look back "I won't" I insist. I'm walking fast away from you, down the dusty outdoor path, increasing my pace past vendor and dealers—old furniture and rusty metal farming parts.

I stop only when a child — a little boy runs up behind me. He tugs on my t-shirt. I stop to help him see what he wants. He is six or seven years old, straight black hair with cute short bangs making his forehead look longer than it is. Freckles. His blue eyes the color of the sky...I think now that he was the spirit of our Alexander. He's our future little boy. For good luck we would eventually name our son after him. But back that day under the afternoon glow, the wide, dusty path between stalls. A patchwork of scents, antiques, fabric.

He pulls on my shirt, an apparition then. I leaned down to help him, maybe he's lost. He motions for me to let him whisper in my ear.

I pulled my hair back to expose my ear. The air is warm and the day is intoxicating. I am drunk in love. Silly. Pretty.

"Je suis Alex" He looks up at me, searching I smile.

"Bonjour Alex. puis-je vous aider."

He puts his finger to his lip. I bend down. Somehow I know he wants to share a secret to whisper. I turn my head and His hand is cool for some reason, as he touches my ear awkwardly as he tries to cup his hand in in a secret. A gesture he hasn't fully learned. He whispers, "veux-tu Edward'épouser?"

It takes a moment. The translation. Then the realization.

Will.

You.

Marry.

Edward?

My heart stops. I am afraid to look up. Afraid to start the engine that will be my future. I do look up and you're there bomber cap in your hands. Your hair mussed but you still look perfect. You are the most handsome man I've ever seen. I feel naked but I look into your eyes. The little boy runs and dust picks up as he disappears into the stalls and behind the old furniture but I only see you. I only see you.

I smile at you and we walk towards each other. I put my arms around your neck.

There's a ring.

"Did you buy it here? Did you just think of this?"

"No. It's my grandmothers."Will you marry me? I want you forever."

I nod and the ring is on my finger. The moment is lost because I'm so dizzy and I just want to touch your face. Kiss you. I know I'll have you. I don't have to worry. We belong to each other. Then, the French ladies and antique vendors cheer and applaud but I don't hear them, Edward, because there is an instant an old fashioned camera click, aperture fast-a permanent record that returns to me so often still.

"Annie," mom says and her expression drops. I don't even realize my eyes are wet.

"You're going to cry." Mom brings me back. Her arms are around me, she kisses me on top of the head. Not soon enough for me to miss her glare at you.

"What did you do now, Edward?"

"Ok Joyce." You tone is soft almost inaudible. You are not disrespectful; you love my mom. She loves you. She's so angry at you.

"Nothing"I whisper.

"You're my beautiful flower. I don't like to see you like this." You know I hate this endearment. It connects me to my dark life—that period after the night on the beach. This taboo that is present and yet you and I have never discussed it despite your relentless attempts to "process it" but it's tangible enough that you protect me from remembering.

"Don't call her that" you say. "Don't call her a flower."

I don't have to see it to know mom silences you you with a look. She remembers too, but I think in her mind it was the break up with Jack and an adolescent depression that followed. That's why—I'm sure— my postpartum disorder was not a shock to her. She'd seen her daughter dark, nearly dead once before. She'd seen her daughter's skin bloated and torn. We all said -the official story- was that I had been swimming after drinking—couldn't fight the current. Yet you and I know the truth or rather, you know the truth.

I pull away. I am going to cry but its too much. It's too much for mom to be right about you. I rush out of the room. Up the narrow stairs — we will update these to code. They're steep so we have a child gate at the top and bottom but still sometimes Maddy and I sit on the steps, between the gates—our "boat" and we read picture books. Because of you Where The Child Things Are is her favorite. Because of you she makes me read it over and over. And our little boat navigates its way to the place where the wild things are and in-between the gates we are safe from the monsters but she says she wants to be one but we can't on our boat. Our boat is where we are safe. So we venture down the stairs. I watch her so she doesn't lose her footing and fall. Your daughter and I are in our house—in our living room where the wild things are. Just the way you played with her before you left me. Just the same game. Her curly red hair, messy and adorable. We won't cut it because she wants to be one of the monsters. Just like you.

I can hear mom's hushed voice. She's describing it all to you. I know then and I find out soon after. She's telling you the details about the night I tried to kill myself after you left me. She's admonishing you. She's blaming you, but the doctors said it wasn't you. It was the hormones from Alexander. My last thought before swallowing all those sleeping pills was you. It was you and Leora Hall. It was the beach and the waves crashing. I was back there at Jona and Ellen's party. The saltbox beach house. I followed you. You didn't have to tell me what you did on the beach with Leora. I saw you and I heard you. I could have run up to you and stopped it, but I was frozen in the cold. I didn't want to go to the party in the first place. Alexander was so tiny but you assured me. Mom assured me he'd be safe with her.

I sat out on the beach long after the two of you had sex. Long after the cigarette you shared. You mussed her hair and kissed her before you both rose and started back. All I could think was How can you make love to that ugly woman in the wet cold sand? (Her face in some ways feminine, but yet something about her features masculine and her square shoulders awkward on a thin petite woman). She found a way to ignore the sand, how it must have stuck to her body after she removed her skirt, lay down. You unbuttoned her shirt and I watched all of it. Her body, so toned —not the body of a woman who'd just given birth. The way she touched you—it offended me Edward-jealousy, of course, but also how much she seemed to be acting—not natural, not spiritual/ transcendent as you described our love-making. I tried to see your expression. I was too far away but I can tell you, a wife should never watch her husband touch another woman.

You walked past me on your way back to the house but I was hidden in the dunes. In the dark. I stayed on the beach. For an hour at least before the flashlights broke through then blue black night. Up and through the dunes until Ellen found me. I was shivering?

"Are you all right darling?" She asked. She was always too young to use darling. Wasn't that what we had claimed.

Everyone was worried about me. You said it was baby blues.

"Come on," you said when Ellen called out to you on the beach. "What happened?" You asked. Did you know I knew?

You treated me like a sister. I was relegated to a platonic, unremarkable person. It was so much like those years at Slaters point when I was a teenager and you were an aloof brother of my boyfriend. Come on. You know what I thought? I thought fuck you—even in my desperate vulnerability there was a part of me that knew one day you'd feel shame for my seeing this side of you.

We drove home in silence. No facade.

"Are you leaving me?" I asked.

"Yes."

I held my hand out—you thought I wanted to hold yours. Comfort. You would oblige me, but I was giving you back the beautiful engagement ring and wedding band that your grandmother had given to you. I was releasing you back to the world for another chance.

You are in the doorway, smoking a cigarette. You only smoke when you're distraught or after you make love. I am under the blanket now up to my chin. You're holding Alexander who'd begun crying. You are keeping the cigarette away from the baby, arm outstretched after every drag.

"He's hungry," you say.

"How would you know?" I snap.

"I know."

"Give him to me."

You walk over. I reach for the baby and take him and once he's safely in my arms you lean down and snuff out the cigarette in the crystal ashtray that now sits on the table near our bed.You move it to the dresser.You crack the window.You are becoming more aware of yourself, Edward and the effect of your actions on our lives. Then you keep your eyes on me as I lift my knitted shirt and unsnap my nursing bra—once Alexander begins drinking my milk. You don't say a word, as if an argument would transmit to Alexander. As if there is poison between us and you're sparing our baby.

Then it happens to me too. When Alexander is in my arms, when I put his lips to my breast and his cries subside. When my body nourishes him, oxytocin floods and all I feel this love.

"Joyce was blaming me for the pills you took after I left."

I don't have words.

"Why didn't you call me?"

I let the silence underscore the hypocrisy. Shake my head. Keep my eyes on Alexander.

"Jesus Annie. You tried to kill yourself and didn't ask me to help you."

"It sounds melodramatic the way you say it. Really, you had no idea how bad things were? Yes you did. What was I supposed to do anyway? Call that apartment—Hi Lenore, would it be all right if I talked to Edward for a moment?"

"It's not a joke."

"Who's joking?"

You pace and then walk over and sit on the side of the bed next to me. Your eyes are drawn to Alexander. You realize something. "God. Jesus.What did I do?"

"I mock you "God Jesus what did I do?"

You are surprised. We don't talk to each other this way. But, Edward it is a privilege to be best friends and lovers. That is a privilege and you somehow thought that coming back we are still connected in that way.

You feel betrayed, I can tell. You shake your head, surprisingly defensive.

"It wasn't you." I say. Not comforting. I adjust Alexander. "The doctors said it was the baby. The hormones. Postpartum depression or psychosis"

You nod slowly. "What happened after—what happened—psychosis?"

"Mom told you all of it, I'm sure." I move Alexander to my other breast. He is almost asleep.

"Where's Maddy?" I ask.

"She's in her room sleeping."

"Is mom still here?"
"I'm not sure."

"What does Lenore think?" I ask you.

Your eyes turn downward. It's you. The same beautiful you and I don't want to see it. I don't want your eyes, your sandy blond hair. I don't want your tanned skin, light freckles on your forearm.

"Let's not talk about her anymore."

"I want to know."
"No you don't. You want to tear us apart."

I laugh and adjust Alexander, I button my shirt. "Us?" Which us? Tear who apart? Trust me Edward I have no intention of tearing you and Lenore apart. You two are a perfect match."

You don't answer. You don't smile. I know it's funny—it's a slip of the tongue. Who am I tearing apart?

You shake your head.

"Where are your things?" I ignore your obvious regret.

"My things? You mean my clothes and—"

"You've stayed here three days, where are your—yes, your clothes? Your books?"

"I'm getting them."

"So you can do what? Move back here?"

"Can I? Can't I move back into my Goddamned house?" You're almost whispering. Is it anger? Is it sympathy? I can't tell.
I don't say anything. Instead I pull Alexander closer. He's warm and if I love him, I think then I love you, Edward.

"For how long?"

"Forever."

"Yes." I tell you yes because what am I doing anyway? I've been plotting pretend revenge on you—mostly just a fantasy preoccupation, no real intention but things drift, Edward. Sometimes it seems as if we are stationary, but we are imperceptibly moving in a direction who's course we did not plot. Jack began texting me, it was before your affair and innocent enough—his marriage to Jane a disaster. That was obvious but after he left her, he began texting me. After you left, we started having occasional lunches. At times—when I was so dark and couldn't stop thinking of you and what you were doing— I'd tell myself he was still in love with me—or whatever it is 17 year olds feel. Puppy love I guess—but on those empty nights I'd elevate that and I'd also revisit the innocent times before the incident that obliterated it. I don't know what you'd think of this intimacy, probably nothing. In my mind I imagined it sometimes: really falling in love with Jack. The absurdity of it. Still, it satisfied my need for revenge and escape. I can't entertain it for too long because it always leads back to the blurry, blustery ocean —a night I know. A night on the shore—something happened but I don't remember what—then you. Then Georgetown. One of the excursions my mind sometimes likes to travel to. Back to the days before the night on Slater's Beach. That's it, I realize when I am reminded of the night on the beach as a teenager I reset-I think of the clambakes or the races to the point. I rewind a year or two when I was someone who was not raped.

Now when I feel the anxiety, the recollection of my ugliness— suicide attempt, my mind rewinds again, not so far. I return to our beginning—back in Georgetown—after the incident on the beach and before the kids. Our love affair. The one true love of my life.

The storm is over. We're almost back to shore. You sit on the edge of the bed and move the hair from my eyes. I think it's a sweet gesture. I can smell your scent-almost aftershave but you don't' wear it.

You gaze at me.

I'm that girl in your mind again. I don't know for how long. I can see her through your eyes. A good woman. Not Leora.

"Mom—Joyce — said you're going back to the firm—finishing—."

"Why do you say it like that? Joyce?" I ask. I adjust myself. Keep the baby close to my body so he doesn't wake.

"What?" You smile, that shy smile. Vulnerable.

"You called her mom all this time. Now it's Joyce?"
"She doesn't like me any more, Annie. Look what I did to her daughter."

"She loves you. Just like I do." It's awkward but I move closer with the baby, and I move in and kiss you—for some silly reason I kiss your nose. It's the few scattered freckles. You're so aristocratic and sincerely I love that about you. Especially when things are good. You're so lovely. The freckles are from sailing and skiing. Outdoors. I wonder if Leora is an outdoor enthusiast too? Does she fit together with you, the way we did? Is Leora athletic—does she challenge you the way I do? Is she a real contender—an athlete with more endurance than you?

You start to tear up. You wipe a moist not wet eye. You don't cry.

"Anyway" you're composure's back. "Are you going to go back to the firm?"

"Why?"
"Are you going to? Do you want to get your license and work with Nadine?"
"Mom says it will be good. The idea of concentrating on anything more than 5 minutes seems unlikely. You have no idea what I'm like now. The drugs. The baby. The mental illness."

"It sounds horrible, Annie."

I'm not going to cry.

You relax a little and I don't want you to take that liberty. I'm a storm—I vacillate in silence. I vacillate with a straight face.

"The psychiatrist said if you cheated again I would kill myself." It's a dagger. I know it is.

"Jesus Christ Annie. What a thing—"

"I thought that was wrong. Mom did too. She said I wasn't stable—not stable— Still, I told her she can't blame you. That I am in control my own fate. She said no I'm actually not. That right now you do. That what you did it was traumatic, she said. "

"It puts everything on me. You didn't even call me , Annie when you tried—before. It's not like you—but you can't cope with problems."

I laugh but it's out of contempt and it doesn't elicit the usual harmony between us: humor, attraction, trust, honesty. I whisper it slowly, almost threatening. "Fuck you for saying I can't cope. Who's been coping here?"

I am breathing heavily and feel as if I am going to faint. I vacillate so much Edward there is one thing on the outside and on the inside it's total fucking madness. I see your expression. You aren't one to cave to attacks. You also aren't one to say something like that if you didn't believe it. But really, I can't cope?

There's silence for so long that when I drink a sip of wine I feel the swishing is amplified, the way the liquid moves against the glass. I put it down, look at you again.

"Call you? Where? At Leonore's?"

Maybe I am the evil witch. It's the psychosis—the postpartum. I can think and stand and be. I can talk to you but yet I have the desire to spill it to tell you. To tell you I'm sane when I'm day dreaming. I return to the past. I visit you and I visit your brother. These are the only places I'm sane.

"No. Not at Leora's—what does that even mean call me at Leora's? No Annie, called me on my phone. Texted me. Called me at work if I was teaching or something—. "

"Well I didn't think you'd be reliable enough to save me. Sorry I got your girlfriend's name wrong."

"Ok. Ok." You say. You stand. You roll your eyes like I'm impossible. Shake you're head. You're going walk out and I don't know if it's out of the room or out of the house or out of my life.

"You can come back to us." I say. "please come back to me."

I don't hear you cry but I see you wipe your eyes as you leave without a word. I move deeper into the blankets with Alexander next to me. We are in a cocoon and this really-if I were honest—is where I wish I could spend the rest of my life.

I wake later to the smell of basil. You're making pesto and garlic bread. You must have been waiting for me and Alexander to wake up. How long have we slept? How long have I slept? Alexander's eyes are open. Alert. Content to examine the contours of our room. Is my little boy like me? Visual? Loving architecture-clean lines-the logic of design and it's quiet language of visual aesthetic in function and beauty? And Maddy? She's a story teller like you. She lives where you live: in the landscape of narrative arcs—always imposing cinematic conflict and hungry for the denouement.

He's quiet but taking everything in. What have you been thinking precious boy? I hear Maddy -and I hear you:

Then all around from far away across the world he smelled good things to eat so he gave up being king of where the wild things are. But the wild things cried, "Oh please don't go- we'll eat you up-we love you so!"—

Leora Hall crosses my mind. Lenore. Is she here in DC- at her small flat in southwest? Or is she back in New York City-Manhattan one bedroom. Is she alone, pining over you — and what of your life there at her house? Did she pretend to be your wife or was she satisfied to be a cosmopolitan mistress. Was it unspoken? You left your wife because you saw the darkness on the horizon. Was it that night on the beach, me shivering in the dunes? Was it the search party and what must have been a pale but rabid woman-almost psychotic. Did you weigh your options and decide on Lenore's peculiar asymmetrical features at once pretty and ugly? Did you enjoy making love to her so much more than your wife who had been pregnant for so long, tired. Depressed? Did you know Jonah called me and apologized for inviting her to the party? He actually said he knew she was a crazy bitch. He said she had a history of fucked up, crazy shit. Edward in the worst kind of irony, you left one crazy woman for another.

"Mommy!" Maddy squeals. "You and Alex are wild things!"

"You ready for dinner?" You're in the hallway. Maddy has your hand. She won't let you go. You pick her up and kiss her neck, her arms are tight around you. "I missed you sweet little girl."

She points her chubby finger at me. "You're a wild thing. Alex is a wild thing!"

I want to join in the joy. I want to growl "and we'll eat you up, we love you so!"

You and Maddy wait so I do it. I'll act the way I should feel. I narrow my eyes and growl. Oh please don't go! I'll eat you up I love you so!"Maddy squeals and shakes she buries her head further into your shoulder. You squeeze her tighter, pretend to be protecting her.

Our eyes meet. You mouth the words ,"I love you."

I say the words. "I love you."

That night, it is just us. Alexander somehow fell asleep in the pretty little nursery I -we- prepared for him. Such a tasteful design: Alexander's nursery. I was well then, during my pregnancy. I have been well my whole fucking life- except after the incident on the beach. Except after the babies.

Alexander's nursery. Remember that room? Lucy? We'd been awed by the medieval frescos, tapestries, coats of arms. Somehow this residual from our trips to Italy, bubbled up and inspired us to create a nursery for Alex—not a pottery barn castle decor, not a castle decor at all...the colors and frescos. Ancient Florentine.

She'd opened her leather portfolio, moves a photograph of a bedroom "Palazzo Davanzati." We spoiled her didn't we? She loved the freedom to elaborate on our taste—the budget. So she did it: the decorative frieze on the walls. Coat of arms frescos and those lovely trees...fruit trees with a heavy ivy green canopy. Gold details, borders like frames around the frescos. Magical a subtly masculine decor— subtle. Really it was. A palate of peacock blue-green—custom wallpaper. A commissioned madonna and child. His room had the same wide oak planks as the rest of the house but these we finished and polished to withstand toy trucks or blocks. A plush shag rug. A window seat just like in Maddy's room...child safety gates half way up the floor to ceiling windows. Of course the "centerpiece" the Wendel Castle chair—

Until tonight it was all I could do to get him to fall asleep and it would be with me, in bed, nursing on my breast. Otherwise, there would be no sleep.

I don't remember what I tried to say to you —the mundane things a wife would say before bed to her husband.

Later -after the pasta-after you've put Maddy and Alexander to bed we are alone in our room. The lights are out and I can hardly see your face, I feel your intentions. I want them. In the darkness you are slowly removing my clothes. This time...this kind of passion and desire. I don't want it to last forever Edward. I don't want to long for you out of jealousy and pain. It feels inauthentic. Desire for you to take you back from her. We have never been inauthentic.

You kiss my neck and then you hold your cheek to mine. Your eyes closed.

I whisper to you. "I tell myself I'm special to you." I whisper. Your hand is on my cheek, then unzipping my dress.

"You are special to me. You know that."
"I mean above any other." You open your eyes and grow serious, intent. I let you slip the dress off. I cooperate, adjusting my arms so it will slide off my body. You lean towards me then and kiss my neck.Your warmth, your breath, your scent. I am hypnotized.

"Annie you are everything to me."

I am weak and my body is trembling and you know this and you know me.

Edward, you know me.