The Ex

6

“Most men probably feel that way when they unexpectedly see their ex-wife after years have passed,” Molly said.

She and David were lying in bed in the sultry dimness of the summer night. It was cool enough that they didn’t have the window-unit air conditioner on. She liked it that way, so she could hear Michael if he woke up. Still, she could feel the sticky dampness of perspiration beneath her on the smooth sheet, slowly molding her form to the contours of the mattress.

Beside her, David sighed. It was more a sound of frustration than of weariness.

“I’m glad you told me about meeting her,” Molly said. She raised her upper body and strained her neck so she could kiss his cheek. It was damp and warm and he needed a shave. Traces of cologne or soap still lingered with the scent of his perspiration.

She stayed propped up on her elbows for a few seconds, then let herself fall back, her head sinking into her pillow.

“She surprised me, Mol.” David said softly.

“Sure she did. It’s like your past sneaking up on you while you’re thinking about lunch.”

“That’s exactly what it was.”

Molly was suddenly and acutely curious about Deirdre. She’d never even seen a photograph of her, other than a blurred snapshot David had made a show of tearing up and throwing away. A tall woman-at least she’d appeared tall in the photo-with a lot of hair and a fiercely beautiful smile. “How did she look?”

“Oh, the years have made her…kind of plain, I’d guess you’d say.”

“There was no need for you to worry over telling me about it,” Molly said. “So you ran into Deirdre at the deli and talked to her for a while. What were you supposed to do, spit olives at her?”

He laughed softly in the shadows. “I wish that had crossed my mind.”

“You’re not the first man to see his former wife and experience discomfort. It doesn’t mean anything other than that you’re human.”

“Being human can be a problem.”

“You’re happy,” Molly said, “right?”

She instantly regretted the doubt that had crept into her voice. Or maybe only she had heard it.

“Hell, yes, I’m happy.”

The bedsprings whined and she felt his hand brush her cheek, then gently caress her breast through the oversized white T-shirt she slept in. She was aware of a tightening deep inside her and her breathing quickened. The T-shirt was wound around her body so that much of its excess was pinned beneath her. Across its chest, distorted by the twisted fabric, it was lettered FOR SLEEP OR SEX. She’d received it at a bridal shower as a gag gift, but she found it practical and comfortable. The thin cotton strained and stretched, and David’s hand was beneath the shirt and sliding slowly toward her left breast. His breath was warm in her ear, then his tongue.

“Wait a second, please!” she breathed.

“What’s wrong, Mol?”

“Nothing. Really.”

He withdrew his hand and she swiveled on the mattress and stood up. The firm wood floor felt cool beneath her bare feet. She pulled the T-shirt over her head and tossed it in a twisted, pale heap on a chair. Then she slid her panties down to her ankles and stepped daintily out of them, as if relieving herself of shackles. Sounds from the street were filtering in through the screen, cars swishing past outside, faint voices shouting blocks away, the throbbing bass beat of a car radio that faded quickly, a distant siren making exuberant loops of sound. The sheer white curtains swayed slightly in the faint breeze as if in a slow, ghostly dance. She left the window open and switched on the air conditioner mounted in the window alongside it.

When she was sixteen, her father had left her mother and her for another woman. Her mother died two years later, and Molly had never quite escaped the notion that the terrible stress of the desertion had triggered the cancer. Her father had left his new lover, and a few years ago had remarried, to a woman named Verna who owned an art gallery in Detroit. Molly wasn’t sure if she’d ever forgiven him, or if she fully understood what forces had moved him. Had there been something lacking in her mother? In herself?

She tried to shake such thoughts from her mind and returned to David’s shadowed and patiently waiting form on the bed.

David moved close to her. “What’s wrong, Mol? Still thinking about Deirdre?” He kissed her neck. “Well, I’m not. Like she said, the past is buried and dead.”

Molly lay very still. “My past with you has been my happiest time.”

“Mine, too,” David whispered.

“Men leave women,” she said softly. “I know it’s unreasonable of me to think that way, and it’s because of my childhood, but it’s the kind of thing that inundates the mind and changes things forever. That’s how I feel and I can’t help it. Men leave women.”

She felt the backs of his knuckles lightly caress her cheek. “Not this man, Mol. Not ever.”

She turned to him and they kissed, and his hand found the small of her back and pressed her to him. She could feel his erection hard against her thigh.

“Try not to wake Michael,” she heard herself say.

But it was she who moaned and cried out, clinging possessively to him as they made love.

In the morning, while David showered, she made coffee and stuck two slices of whole-kernel wheat bread in the toaster.

He came into the kitchen and kissed her, dripping water from his hair still damp from the shower. Neither of them spoke about last night or about Deirdre. Everything seemed reassuringly normal to Molly.

He cooked eggs and bacon while she quietly finished getting dressed, careful not to wake Michael. After breakfast, she and David would deliberately rouse the child and play with him for a few minutes, then David would leave for work and Molly would dress and feed Michael and walk him to the Small Business Preschool, six blocks away.

“You working on something today?” David asked when they were seated opposite each other at the kitchen table.

“Book on architecture from Link Publishing,” she said, salting her scrambled eggs. “I’ve got the rest of the week to finish it.”

He took a sip of coffee and smiled. “What do you know about architecture?”

“What’s an architect know about dangling participles?”

“Good point. You gonna finish on time?”

“Easily. It’s going to be mostly photographs of European cathedrals. The text is all about flying buttresses, opposing stresses, Gothic spires, that sort of thing.”

“Saaay, you do know about architecture.” His sarcasm was good-natured, and not the sort of remark he’d have made if he felt any tension between them. Grinning, he forked in a final bite of egg, then washed it down with a swallow of coffee and stood up. He was the usual David, all right. She smiled, feeling pleased and secure. “Gonna wake up Michael now?” he asked.

“We can.”

She stood up from the table and David followed her into Michael’s bedroom. It was a small room, painted pale blue with decals of fish and sea horses on the walls. Toys were piled in a blue rubber laundry basket in a corner. More toys were lined on shelves alongside a narrow dresser. On the top shelf was a penny-stuffed piggy bank Michael’s grandfather-Molly’s father-had sent him from Detroit last winter when Michael had had the flu. A delicate butterfly mobile dangled from the center of the ceiling, swaying gently in the stirring of air caused by the opening door.

Muffin, the brown and orange cat that was a gift from the previous tenant, uncoiled from where he’d been curled near the foot of the bed, stretched, then left by way of the window that was propped open six inches by a stack of weathered paperback books to allow him access to the fire escape.

Molly and David watched their son sleep for a few seconds. He was fair and blond, as David appeared in his childhood photographs. His round face was set in the blank-slate serenity seen only on children in slumber. He was lying on his side, his knees drawn up, his tiny ribs starkly prominent with each deep and even breath. Mortality was so apparent in the very young. He was perspiring slightly and his down-like hair was plastered to his forehead.

Each morning was like the beginning of a new and fascinating chapter for Molly when she stood alongside her sleeping son. She knew she would nudge him awake, kiss him, and another day would unfold in their journey to his adulthood while they learned from each other. He was her reminder that life was an exploration.

She touched his soft, bare shoulder and he stirred and opened his eyes. Smiled.

“Big Mike,” David said, and bent low and kissed him gently on the forehead.

Michael stretched out his arms and David lifted him effortlessly, holding him well away until he was sure he hadn’t wet the bed. Then he hugged him, kissed him again, and while Michael was still chortling he handed him carefully to Molly and turned to leave for work.

This must be a ritual as old as the family, she thought. Fathers readying to leave for the hunt on primal, misty mornings lost forever in the past. She smiled. Not a politically correct thought? She wasn’t sure. But it was a lovely thought, even if she was soon to begin work herself.

David turned back as if on a whim and kissed her forehead, then ruffled Michael’s hair. Michael reached up and rufffled his father’s hair right back.

“Have a good day, you two,” David said, and left the bedroom.

She heard the floor creak as he walked into the bathroom, probably to recomb his hair, as she sorted through the dresser drawers for something Michael hadn’t outgrown.

David laid his folded suit coat on the toilet lid and ran water in the washbasin. He wet his hands and slicked back his hair, then raked a comb through it and checked his image in the mirror. He’d splashed a little water on his shirt but the spots would dry soon.

As he scooped up his coat to put it on, something fluttered from one of its pockets and landed on the hexagonal white tiles alongside the vanity.

A small piece of paper, folded once so sharply that it would be permanently creased. He picked it up and stared at it, trying to remember if it was a note he’d written to remind himself of something. He couldn’t recall putting it in the pocket.

He unfolded the paper and saw a phone number scrawled in black ink. Below the number was a message: Don’t be silty. We should be friends. Call me, please. Deirdre. P.S. Say hello to Molly and Michael.

David crumpled the paper and lifted the toilet lid.

But he paused and stood with his hand above the water. He was slightly surprised that he couldn’t release the note. Couldn’t press the lever that would remove it from his life.

He glanced at himself in the mirror, then looked away as he stuffed the note into his hip pocket, shrugged into his coat, and left the bathroom.

He could dispose of the note on the way to work, in the subway station, or at the office. There was no rush. This wasn’t some kind of goddamned test. Despite a persistent discontent some mornings in the dawn of waking, or at bad times during the day when he would contemplate the futility of his job, he was a settled and happy husband and father, probably less worried about the future than most men his age. Certainly he was more blessed than many he knew. He had unexpectedly run into his former wife yesterday and had an uncomfortable moment, that was all. They were grown-up folks living out their lives as best they could while trying not to experience or cause pain; there was no need for adolescent conflict here.

And no need for him to see Deirdre again before she left town. He would either disregard the note, or he’d phone her and politely repeat his opinion that it would be best if they let the past lie undisturbed. Whatever in its chemistry might tug at him, he could and would ignore.

He called goodbye again to Molly on the way out.