Page 12 of Lover
Nervous, and red around the ears, she picked up the notebook I’d abandoned in the chair, asking me a question, which I missed, so busy was I daring for something to happen.
“Hm?” I replied.
“Your cartoon book.” She held it up with a grin, returning me to the moment.
“Oh, yes, on the shelf with the yearbooks over there. It’s worthless, but I’m a fool for nostalgia.”
It became uncomfortably silent as she walked to the bookshelf, both of us aware the conversation had not gone well. I considered the remainder of the tar-like coffee, then raised it to my mouth. Why not? The bitterness would ground me, at least.
“You said your mother inspired your interest in folklore, but what made you focus your study on the malevolent?” she asked.
I froze, the question unanticipated, my immediate, natural answer graciously sticking in my throat.
You did.
The quiet stretched on too long. She glanced over her shoulder, curious, only to find me glued to the spot like a man turned to stone. I cleared my throat, knocked back the rest of the sludge, and replied somewhat hoarsely, “My wife.”
My contempt for this deception flooded me full again, burning my insides like a branding iron hot from the fire.
I placed my cup down with some roughness and hastily excused myself from the room, making up some horseshit about files I’d forgotten.
When I was out in the hallway, I ran a hand through my hair. Once, twice.
For over a week I had obediently abided by the rules and not a damn thing had changed and I was still no more than a distant, unfamiliar employer with whom she was attempting to build a tentative, professional friendship with. There was no scheming grandmother to shove us together with a gleam in their eye. There were no bright parties to steal glances in, to ask for dances, no bustling of people to distract from our absence so we could walk the gardens together alone after dark, talk, and lean on each other by and by.
There was only frigid inhibition made worse by our mutual fear, both born from the same terrible secret we were keeping in our own ways.
I didn’t go far, lingering in side halls to pace off my nervous energy. When enough time had passed to make it appear likely I’d gone to fetch papers, I returned, though I had none to show.
Prepared to be fictitiously untroubled, I entered.
Millie was kneeling on the floor, her attention rapt, her brows drawn down in disturbed fascination.
I glanced at the book she was holding, the cover green as uranium glass.
The journal. I’d forgotten, never hidden it, and now she was reading all her own secret words and desires, the documenting of some of our most intimate encounters. I wasn’t sure which would be a worse outcome, the words loosening her memory too quickly or having to witness the nonrecollection of her own love staring up at her from the pages.
She raised her eyes, spotting me. Driven by adrenaline, I reached her in several purposeful strides, snatched the book from her fingers, and threw it into the fire, more fiercely than intended, showering the rug with sparks.
“Professor,” she gasped, and I turned to her, my panic presenting as anger.
“Those were not papers meant to be pried over.” My tone was biting.
“Yet they were in a pile of notes you asked me to organize,” she snapped.
“Are you incapable of deciphering between personal entries in a journal and academic notes on mythological bogeymen?”
Undue, but my frustration was keen. Irritation at myself for my error, frustration at Millie for failing to recognize even her own words.
“Professor Hughes.” Her voice rose, the sharpness of it bringing my temper to heel, chastening and intriguing me. “I won’t be blamed for reading private notes when those very notes were mixed with items I am being paid to examine! I had nointention of prying into your personal life, and I ask that you not scold me for something that wasn’t done with ill intentions.”
This was new. The firm, clear voice—the fiery defense. For the first time I observed an intensity in Millie I’d always believed lay dormant, the assertive woman I’d only partially glimpsed during impish arguments and passionate nights. She had grown into herself in the years we were apart, and I worried over what hardships she’d faced to force the change. It had always been my intention and my promise to protect her from everything, and here she was, protecting herself from me.
I stood down and moved to snuff out the smoldering rug with my shoe.
With no way to explain my behavior, I simply said, “You stand up for yourself. I’m surprised.”
“Were you hoping I’d be a simpering schoolgirl you could bully?”
