The Bond

Chapter 3: Wife

Chapter 3: WifeClara loved music. She danced, swayed, hummed, kept a diary, and believed in chakras, crystals, and read tarot cards.

“Dual desires,” she said when I finally allowed her to read my cards.

Until that moment I’d been half listening, stroking Jett, who lay coiled atop her deck of tarot cards. The secret treasure I’d hidden in my heart had been discovered, and I felt fear. I didn’t want to lose this woman.

“There’s a lot of duality in your cards’ paths, desires…”

“I love you,” I said. My heart was pounding, so I thought it would break.

“Decco, the night we met I saw you making out with a guy at the festival.”

“What?” My brain feverishly tried rewinding to that night. There had been someone…a roadie? Maybe he worked the band’s merch table. That had been hours before we’d met.

“f**k!”

Clara came, reached under my shirt and pressed her palm against my heart. “It’s okay.”

“No one knows,” I whispered.

“Not even Ivan?”

“He’s the only one.”

“So, someone knows.”

“He’s my best friend,” I said. “Telling him was like telling myself.”

“How did he take it?”

“He didn’t care. He came out in high school.”

“That’s brave,” she said, “considering the size of this town.”

“He doesn’t give a f**k what people think. My being bi meant nothing, except I could sneak into gay bars with him.”

“I hope I get to meet him, he seems so mysterious.”

“He’d agree,” I said.

She smiled. “How long has he been in Europe?”

“Months, since before we met.”

“Does he know about me?”

I nodded.

“And?”

“He’s intrigued…as much as Ivan can be by something other than himself.”

“He’s selfish?”

“He’s…Ivan.”

“When did you come out?” She asked.

“I think I just did.”

“First time with a guy?”

“Years ago,” I answered.

“That’s a big secret,” she said.

I shrugged.

“Decco, I don’t care, I’ve been with women. Sexuality is,” she shrugged, “like everything else, moving, changing, I’m not scared of it.”

“I don’t want you to think I’d…”

She put her hand over my mouth. “I don’t.”

In a minute we were in each other’s arms.

When Pop died, Clara’s love and compassion were unfailing, and in some strange way, our love was deepened by my father’s death.

I think it gave me something to grip when the grief became too much. The farm, the work, the dirt, spoke so clearly of Pop, it practically wailed with his loss. My mother grew morose. Her usual crankiness became edged with cruelty, we fought, and she cried until the day she told me she was moving. I’d just come in from the fields, trying to comprehend what needed to be done, how to pick up where he’d stopped.

“I can’t stay here,” she said. “I want to, but I can’t.”

My mother lost what I’d gained—love, a partner. There was nothing for her to hold on to, except memories, and the place screamed with them, so much I thought I’d leave or go mad, but again, Clara came, brought life, love, and light. My mother needed out of the shadows, I wish I’d been more understanding.

All I said was, “Don’t.”

She touched my face, patted my shoulder and used part of my father’s generous life insurance money to move across town into a smaller house, with new carpet, where nothing was falling apart.

“What are you going to do?” Clara asked. She’d come over after class, tucked herself into my father’s chair, the sun was setting, the light bathed the room in crimson gold. She smelled clean, I smelled of sweat, dirt.

“Don’t know.”

She toyed with dust motes, blinked, and said, “Let’s get married.”

I’d been lying on the old couch and nearly fell off. “What?”

“Married, let’s do it.” She laughed.

“Serious?”

“Yup.”

“Yup?”

She got off the chair, came and kissed me. “Let’s do it,” she unbuttoned my jeans.

“It?”

“Yup.”

Right after she graduated college we got hitched; tiny justice of the peace ceremony, lots of music, food, family and friends. The party was held in one of the barns.

My mother, mostly absent from the farm and my life, decided the news of my wedding was the ideal time to come out of mourning and back into my life.

“Doesn’t she have any family?” Lila asked, looking around.

“Don’t start, Ma,” I said, pulling on my necktie.

“You couldn’t wear a tuxedo?”

“No,” I said.

“I’m surprised she wore such a shabby dress,” she said, watching Clara dancing with Ivan. “When did Ivan get in?”

“Twenty minutes after the ceremony.”

Lila liked Ivan, but I could tell by the way she pursed her lips she was fighting a salty comment about his unexpected appearance.

“Perfect timing,” I’d said, hugging him.

“I hate churches,” he’d whispered.

“There were no priests at the town hall,” I returned.

“I hate town halls more,” he laughed, and drifted off into the party.

“It was her mother’s dress,” I told Lila, who was still staring.

“Poor girl,” Lila sighed, then sipped wine from an equally old glass. Nothing here was ever new, so it surprised me how much Lila was concerned about Clara’s dress.

“She looks happy to me,” I said, wishing I could kick everyone out and commence the honeymoon.

“I can’t believe she has no family…”

“Her parents died when she was a kid,” I said. “Her grandmother raised her.”

“I know the story, Declan,” Lila snapped.

Luckily, a cousin came and swept Lila onto the floor to dance.

Staring at Clara, I hoped she was happy.

Later, when everyone left, Clara, Ivan and I smoked a bowl, lit candles, put on music and I watched them play with Jett, whom she’d retrieved from his terrarium.

“He didn’t go to the wedding?” Ivan asked, taking a hit, then passing the pipe to Clara.

“No, he doesn’t do parties,” she replied.

“Only music festivals,” I added, dropping down beside her and resting my head in her lap.

“That’s right,” she smiled.

She’d changed into shorts and one of my T-shirts, and I still wore my suit without the tie. Ivan was wearing black and dark purple, stylishly handsome, untouchably groomed. He smelled of wine, and spice.

“Decco, this chick,” he pointed at Clara, “good catch, man.”

I lifted my beer. “Thanks.”

“Chick?” Clara, about to hand the bowl back to Ivan, reneged. “This prick,” she pointed at Ivan with the pipe, “good catch, man.”

I toasted Clara.

She kissed me on the cheek. “I’m going to take a bath, this chick will see you upstairs.”

I sat up. “See you in a few.”

Clara hugged and kissed Ivan. “Welcome home, friend.”

We watched her leave, Jett wriggling between her fingers.

Ivan came and sat beside me. “You happy?”

“Oh, yeah,” I said.

“Good.”

“You two hit it off,” I said. Secretly, I’d been nervous, uncertain how they’d react to each other.

“She’s gorgeous, smart, and walks around with a snake in her hair, that’s pretty badass.”

“That she is.”

“What’s Lila think about her?”

“Surprisingly cool, Lila’s come a long way since Pop died.”

“Really?” Ivan sounded surprised.

“Lila is still Lila, but they like each other, asking for more would be expecting trouble.”

“True,” Ivan said. “What about her family?”

“Doesn’t have any.”

“How’s that possible?” Ivan asked.

“Her parents died in a car accident when she was teenager, then she lived with her grandmother.”

“That’s rough,” Ivan said. “Though, family is massively overrated.”

“You back for good?” I asked, wisely deciding not to take the bait.

“Absolutely not, fly out day after tomorrow.”

“Good to see your parents,” I said, standing. I offered Ivan my hand.

He accepted and I hauled him to his feet.

“Yeah,” he nodded.

“You good?” I asked.

“I’m always good.” When he smiled, his teeth gleamed in the candlelight. “Walk me out?”

“You don’t have to go,” I said.

“Um, yeah…I do.” He nodded toward the stairs. “I can practically feel your b***r from here.”

“Yeah, well, anticipation…”

“Far be for me to c**k block the wife,” he said.

“Wife—I like the sound of that,” I said, following him out, my gaze lingering on the staircase.

Outside the air was cool, pleasant, the world smelled of flowers, summer, and sweet expectation.

“Sorry about your dad,” he said.

“Yeah, it’s been tough.” I’d forgotten how long he’d been gone. Ivan had sent flowers with his parents to the service.

“I hear business is good,” he said.

“Getting there,” I answered.

“f**k, Decco, you’re married.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” I said, marveling at the words as though hearing them made the world new.

Ivan leaned on his car, black, stylish and sleek. “She knows?” He turned his dark eyes on me, and for some reason I shivered.

“Of course.”

“f**k, and?”

“It’s all good,” I said.

“Wow, good on her.”

“I’m in love with Clara, period. There’s no one else for me.”

Ivan opened the car door. “Good for you, too.” He slid in, not unlike a snake himself. “There’s a lot of someone else’s waiting for me across the pond.”

“I bet,” I said, closing the door.

He put the window down. “I kept your secret a long time.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“It made me feel special, like I knew something no one else knew.”

I grabbed his arm. “I appreciate you.”

“You better,” he laughed. The sound was cold, and brittle, like the breath of winter had snuck through summer’s back door.

“What?” I asked, sensing a shift in his mood.

“How’s it feel to be out of the closet?”

Something in his tone irritated me. “Was I ever in the closet?”

“Mr. Perfect,” Ivan sneered.

“You f*****g kidding me?”

“Are you?”

Somewhere a dog howled, a car passed, wind chimes hanging in front of the store tinkled in the breeze.

“I don’t want to fight,” I said.

Ivan started the car. “You never do.”

“What do you want from me?”

Our eyes met, some history, secret and long, passed between us. His cell phone buzzed, and the moment, whatever it was, passed.

“Congratulations on your marriage.”

Staring into the darkness of Ivan’s car, his gleaming eyes and flashing teeth were the only distinguishable features.

“Ivan—”

He held up his hand. “Don’t. Go inside to your wife.”

Before I could say more, he drove off.

“Everything okay?”

Clara startled me.

“Yeah, yeah, come on. Let’s go inside.”

“You sure you’re alright?”

“Yeah,” I smiled, “except for one thing,” I picked her up. “Me horny…me want wifey!”

She laughed and I tossed her over my shoulder, and she playfully beat on my back as I raced through the house, both of us laughing like fools, as I knocked stuff over to get her upstairs to bed.

Our bed.

This bed. The bed I am in alone, and it is cold, and the night is swarming.