Something is going on

CW: sexually suggestive language, mild domestic violence

The baby was making noises off and on. Marie heard it dimly, half awake. She moved to sit up and then fell back with a thump. Cassy was talking, babbling softly. Not crying. She would go back to sleep.

A black wave hit Marie’s face and crested over her brow, pulling her back into sleep.

***

She heard a cry in the distance as she sat at the table. Yellow and hard plastic. School tables outside in the quad for lunch. Cement floor. Gray trays with plates and cardboard milk. It was pizza day. It got grease all down your palm. It dripped down her chin with her first bite. Slimy and greasy but the cheese and pepperoni were still yum.

There was a cluster of kids to her right. They were talking. One of them turned. It was Chris. He smiled and looked at her and laughed then turned back. She saw him lay his left hand on the shoulder of a girl with long blonde hair and short running shorts. Perfect legs. Pale skin. His hand grazed down the middle of her back and rested on her ass, then back to her waist. His hand squeezed.

“Come on. What she thinks hardly matters. You coming over?” Chris asked.

“Soon,” the blonde said. “You know I want you right?”

“You got me,” Chris answered, his arm pulling her close.

Another kid: “Look at her. She’s just sitting there.”

Chris laughing. He grabbed the girl’s hand and then leaned in and kissed her slow and deep.

Marie’s anger was a bubble of oil pushing at her insides until it spouted out with engulfing ferocity.

“How could you? How could you? How could you do this?” she screamed.

Chris shrugged and chuckled. “Uh huh. Just leave me alone.”

Laughter. “Look at you.” Laughter.

The whole group - laughter.

“No! No!” She grabbed at his arm. He shook her off.

He didn’t want her anymore. He was leaving her. He was laughing at her. He didn’t care. He didn’t care.

Pizza grease on everything. Her eyes couldn’t stay open. Down on the ground as they walked away. Heavy, heavy, heavy.

***

She couldn’t move. Heavy. Her eyes opened. The light in her bedroom was cold and blue. Very early morning then. Chris was sleeping beside her. It had been a dream. It was just her head messing with her. Why did it have to hurt so bad if it was just a dream? Why did her brain do that to her?

Her pillow was warm and damp. She turned it over and thumped it. She lay back down, breathing hard. She touched Chris softly with one hand, to feel that he was really there.

She put on her headphones, put a movie on Netflix, and darkened her tablet screen. She snuggled back under the heavy blankets that were just hers. Chris was the king of sheet and blanket stealing. Early in their relationship they had figured out to divide and conquer. No sharing.

She shifted uncomfortably. Turned to the other side.

His hand on her back. He kissed her. He liked it. No. It was a dream. He, the real he, is right here.

Slowly she succumbed to the darkness once again. When the baby woke her with a sharp cry it was 7:27 and time to get up.

***

Friday was an uneventful day. Marie went to the library with the baby to pad her bookshelves. She was slowly building up a collection from garage sales and thrift stores. Her mom had told her that even at 9 months old, you should get a baby used to sitting and reading a book. Marie did want Cassy to love books, as she did.

***

Cassy was short for Cassidy, a name that fit her daughter well. Curly brown ringlets and bright chocolate eyes. A warm smile and a belly laugh when tickled. She loved animals and Marie would often take her to the park near their house to look at all the doggies.

Marie wondered what Chris would do if she just showed up one day with a dog. She had been tempted.

Chris was working from home, as he had for over a year and a half now thanks to the Covid pandemic. Marie sometimes missed solitude, but she was happy to have him more to herself.

Back before she was pregnant with Cassy, Marie had been working as a nanny. She didn’t bring in big money but felt satisfied with her job. She worked long hours and felt like she was always only seeing Chris coming and going.

When they had time together she would get to hear all of Chris’s war stories. He worked as a PM at Microsoft and spent most of his days in redundant and banal meetings. His job consisted entirely of interpreting people to each other in order to piss off as few people as possible and still make things happen. He should have some version of that on a t-shirt or something.

Work required him to be a real people person. Marie had gone to enough work functions to see him really greasing up a crowd. Telling funny stories, nagging the right person to get a laugh out, introducing people to each other. He was Mr. Social Bee. But at home, with her, he mainly shut down. Isolated himself. Buried himself in his phone.

This hadn’t always been the case. When they had first been dating there was a real banter component. They went out all the time. Bars and clubs and art galleries. He was a huge personality. She enjoyed being part of his limelight. But then he had started working from home. They couldn’t go out to do much together for months. And then she got pregnant. Since then there had been a sullenness to him at home. He used up all his gas at work, leaving only exhaust fumes for her.

Marie tried to be supportive. She asked innumerable questions about his day and his meetings. Who was mad at whom, and who was working on which project. She tried to show interest. They watched movies at home together. They hadn’t had sex much since the baby was born, but she hadn’t felt up to it much and he seemed to understand. He never made her feel bad about it.

For the last month or so, Chris had started leaving home a few days a week to meet up with colleagues for working lunches and other meet-ups outside the office, which was still closed. Marie thought that maybe this new change was the source of her insecurity. He was getting out and having a social life and she was not. And she missed him. But that was it. She had never consciously questioned Chris’s loyalty to her. But then - she kept having these dreams, and they were hard to shake.

She cried and yelled. Sobbed and pleaded. Debased herself to get one look from him, one sign he still loved her.

***

That Friday, after the library, Marie took Cassy home for lunch and a nap. Cassy was halfway through a squeezie yogurt when the office door opened.

“Hey hon,” said Chris. “I have to nip off for a bite with Andrew and the gang. Something came up and we thought maybe hitting up Allister’s for lunch might be the thing. That ok?”

“Yeah, sure,” said Marie. She swallowed, her gut a tight knot. “When do you think you will come back?”

“I don’t know. Maybe 4 or 5? I might hit the gym after.”

“OK. No problem,“ she said.

He noticed something in her voice. “Everything fine? I can stay if you want.”

“No, no, that’s fine.” She wasn’t going to be the one keeping him from his work. She had no good reason to say no.

He was wearing a shirt she hadn’t seen before and he had shaved.

“Where’d you get that shirt?” She asked. “I haven’t seen it before, have I?”

“Uh, not sure. I think I got it a while ago. Found it in my drawer,” he replied, slipping into a jacket.

“Looks nice,” she said.

“Thanks,” he said. "See you later. Love you.”

“Love you,” she replied. The door closed behind him.

***

Marie put the baby down to nap and read a book. She was rereading The Stand, a Stephen King novel about a pandemic that wipes out most of humanity. She thought it was fitting given the times they lived in. She got a good chunk through the book and realized that she had lost track of time. The clock read 4:30. The baby was miraculously still asleep.

Cassy woke about ten minutes later. Marie got her up and set her up for play yard time. Marie started to think about dinner. She could make something that Chris would eat too, but he had just eaten out, so maybe he wouldn’t be hungry. No, she thought, I’ll just make food for Cassy.

Dinner came and went. Cassy finished her juice. She was covered in brown applesauce and orange juice and crumbs and bit of apple peel.

It was 6 pm.

Should she call him? Marie pressed her temples with applesauce covered hands. No. That would seem like she was controlling his time. Suspicious. She wasn’t suspicious.

6:30. She called and his phone went to voicemail.

6:45 and the front door opened. Chris came in looking at his phone and typing.

“Hey,” she said. She hadn’t wanted to make a fuss but she needed to make a fuss. She couldn’t help herself. Damnit. “Where were you? I thought you said 4 or 5. It’s 6:45.”

“Just took longer with the guys than I thought. Sorry about that.”

“I’d like a call if you are going to be that late.”

“Sure,” he said, hanging up his rain coat. It had some drops of water on it. She hadn’t realized it was raining.

His face looked a little red. His dark short hear was a little damp as well.

“You went to the gym?” she asked.

“No, didn’t make it there,” he said. “But I still think I’ll take a shower. You doing ok?”

“All good,” Marie replied.

Chris nodded and went up the stairs.

Marie looked toward the front door. His white and black jacket, dripping slowly on the tile, had a bulge in the pocket. He had left his phone there. She wasn’t that person. She wasn’t a snooper. She wasn’t…

She pulled the phone out and unlocked it. She had his passcode.

They had no secrets between them.

There was a number with no name attached, a local number. Five calls. All today. Texts. Where are you? On my way. Just wait up. Ok I’m waiting. Maybe it was one of his friends from work, talking about the meet up. Yes, of course.

A Facebook message popped up. An "Alexandria". Marie clicked on it, knowing it would show as “read” but…

Thanks for everything, it read. You’re the best. There was no message history. She looked at the profile. It was very bare, with only a few pictures, and only three days old. Why was a throw away account contacting him?

Marie heard noises on the landing. She clicked out of the messages and turned off the screen. She slid the phone back in his jacket pocket.

***

That night they watched a horror movie together. He was on his phone through the whole movie. Typing.

***

That night she had the same dream, the details slightly different.

The food court in her childhood mall. A dark haired girl. Then a time skip and there were two girls. Chris had one on his lap. The other was bending over suggestively and he was joking about something.

Fear and rage. Rejection. His lack of remorse. Laughter.

***

Marie woke suddenly around 6 am with cold sweat and anger like an infection under her skin. She couldn’t get back to sleep. Chris found her in the kitchen at 8 am, sitting stiffly on a stool and watching a video on her phone.

“Everything ok hon?”

“Sure." Pause. "Actually, no. Bad dreams. Couldn’t get back to sleep.”

“Sorry about that. Anything I can do?”

“No, it’s fine. I’ll take a nap later.”

“OK.” He paused, then an exaggerated sigh. “I have another lunch thing. Won’t be as long this time. I promise. We have the new product shipping and there are some bugs to work out with management around messaging.”

She nodded and looked at her phone.

***

Marie had the baby dressed at 10 and fed before 11. Her husband left with a wave and walked to his car. She ran out with the baby to hers and quickly strapped her in. He said he was going to the same restaurant. She had to know if she was crazy or not. Only one way to find out.

She was in the driver’s seat. Car on. Hand on the gear stick.

She stopped. Breathed. She was dealing with postpartum hormones. That's what it was. This was crazy. She was not this person. This was not her.

She unstrapped the baby and walked back inside.

***.

A week passed with no dreams. Not that Marie could recall. The memory of her suspicions faded with each day.

This week her daughter had her 9 month check-up. Chris had said that he would come along to the appointment.

He canceled at the last minute.

“A meeting just came up and I can’t do it. I’m sorry,” he said.

“That really sucks but ok,” Marie said stiffly.

If Chris noticed her tone he said nothing.

***

The doctor appointment was unmemorable except for the flu shot. Cassy seemed miserable that night. Marie gave her Tylenol and put her down early. She could tell it would be a rough night and she was right. Cassy woke three times crying. More baby Tylenol. More breastfeeding. More rocking.

Chris slept through this every time. He took medicine to sleep. The baby monitor never woke him unless the crying went on for a really long time.

The last time the baby woke was maybe around 5 am. Marie didn’t even look at the clock that time. She just fed Cassy, rocked her, put her down, and collapsed back in bed.

Half awake sleep. In and out of darkness.

***

Chris smiling. On the beach. Dog was there. And SHE was there.

Marie was pierced and dominated by a nameless, amorphous fear. Chris smiled more and laughed.

And then laughed at her.

Anger spread its petals like a rose.

She yelled and cursed and begged. The tide rolled in and Chris had left and she was running after him. Running to catch him but couldn’t.

***

Marie woke to her 8 am alarm and rolled over. Chris was gone.

This was very early for him.

She messaged him. No response. He wasn’t active on Facebook Messenger.

She checked his home office. Nothing.

She went to the kitchen.

On the counter near the dish drainer there was a bouquet of flowers in a glass vase. Roses and daises. Pink and yellow. Her favorite colors.

She walked across the kitchen floor. The tiles were cold and the sigh of the air conditioning chilled her ankles.

There was a card, stuck in the stems. She pulled it out.

There was one word.

Sorry.

The baby cried in the background and the water dripped in the sink.

Marie dropped the card and walked back to her room.

She sat on the edge of the bed.

The baby cried.

No one came.

***

It was 9 am when Chris came in the door with a to-go order of pancakes and eggs from Denny’s. He had been feeling a bit bad about the way the last few weeks had gone. Being away from the house for meetings was making him even less available to Marie, while she was still mainly stuck at home. And he wasn’t any help at night with the baby.

He knew she was overwhelmed and not sleeping well. He had noticed a few times when she didn’t seem to track what he was saying or seemed irritated at small things. But he was fairly sure that things were generally improving. The baby slept through the night, most nights, and was taking regular naps. The house was generally clean, so he figured stuff was going better for Marie. He liked to think she had time during the day for herself too.

Chris felt especially bad about the last week. Too many meetings and too little time together. He had snuck in the bouquet the night before and planned to surprise her with breakfast in bed.

He came into the house and heard the baby crying.

He wondered if Marie was still asleep. He thought about getting the baby up. Letting Marie sleep in.

Chris walked into the bedroom. The cries were piercing.

Marie sat on the floor in a ball, rocking back and forth, headphones on her head and a glass of wine in her hand.

When she saw Chris she screamed and threw the wine at him. The wall went pink. Red sunk down into the carpet fibers.

Chris dripped wine from his shirt and held Marie until she stopped crying.

He got up Cassy, changed her, and came back to Marie, still on the floor.

Marie had calmed down by then. She told him what she had thought.

Chris said that he understood and loved her. He assured her that he wasn’t upset about her snooping or her paranoia. He suggested that she see perinatal psychiatry. Sleeping aids might help, maybe an antidepressant. Marie agreed reluctantly and promised.

Chris took Cassy to give her breakfast while Marie lay back down.

He put Cassy in the high chair and walked to the kitchen.

Then he changed his passwords.

All of them.