Chapter Four: A Secret Begins

POV: Emily

The nausea hit me first in the elevator. I had been standing there, coffee in hand, on my way down to meet Alexander's driver for a scheduled appearance at some charity luncheon. The elevator started moving and my stomach turned so violently I had to press my free hand flat against the wall.

I made it through the luncheon by drinking water and rearranging food on my plate and smiling at the right moments. Nobody noticed. I had gotten very good at performing fine.

That was three weeks after the night I had decided not to think about.

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By the second week of feeling wrong, I started paying attention. Not to the nausea alone. To the tiredness that sat behind my eyes no matter how much I slept. To the way certain smells hit me like something physical. Clara had made fish one evening and I had walked out of the kitchen so fast she called after me asking if I was alright.

"Just a headache," I said.

I said that a lot now.

At night I lay in bed and counted backwards and then counted again and each time I arrived at the same answer, which was the answer I was refusing to look at directly.

++++++++

Alexander had grown quieter since that morning. Not that he had ever been loud. But there was a difference between his normal distance and what existed between us now. He came home later. Left earlier. When we were in the same room he found ways to face slightly away, phone in hand, attention elsewhere. We spoke about logistics. Times, dates, what to wear to which event. Nothing else.

I watched him sometimes, when he wasn't looking. I watched the way he carried himself through his own home like he was passing through, like nothing in it belonged to him in any way that mattered. I wondered what had happened to him, specifically, to make a person that sealed.

Then I would remember the coldness of that morning and stop feeling curious. One afternoon I was coming down the hallway when I heard two of the cleaning staff talking in the laundry room. The door was half open. I wasn't trying to listen.

"How long do you think this one lasts?"

"Clara said a year contract. Same as the last arrangement."

A short laugh. "They never make it the full year. He makes sure of it."

"The cold shoulder treatment?"

"Works every time apparently. They either leave early or they stop trying. Either way he gets what he needs and moves on."

A pause.

"She seems different though. The new one."

"They all seem different in the beginning."

I walked past the doorway without slowing down. I kept my face completely neutral all the way to my room. I sat on the edge of the bed and pressed my hands together between my knees and breathed slowly until the tightness in my chest loosened enough to think.

They all seem different in the beginning.

I sat with that for a long time.

++++++++

I bought the test on a Tuesday. I didn't take the house car. I walked six blocks in a cap and jacket and paid cash at a small pharmacy where nobody knew my face. I bought two different brands because I didn't trust myself to believe one answer.

Back at the penthouse I waited until Clara had left for the evening and Alexander's schedule showed a dinner meeting until nine. I locked the bathroom door and sat on the edge of the tub and opened the first box with hands that weren't entirely steady.

While I waited I looked at the ceiling. There was a small water stain near the light fitting, barely visible. I focused on it and thought about completely unrelated things. My father's garden. A book I had been meaning to finish. Whether I had replied to my friend Sola's last message.

My phone buzzed on the counter. I turned it face down without looking at it. Then the timer I had set went off. I reached for the test slowly. The way you reach for something when part of you already knows what it's going to say and is trying to delay the moment of knowing for certain.

I picked it up. I looked at it. I put it down on the counter and picked up the second box to try again and see if I was day dreaming..

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The second test took longer to process because my hands were shaking badly enough that I had to set it down twice before I could open it properly. I sat back on the floor with my back against the tub. The tiles were cold through my clothes. I didn't move.

I thought about the night I had promised myself not to think about. I thought about the morning after and the sound of a cabinet closing and keys being picked up. I thought about contract wives who never last the full year.

I pressed the back of my hand against my mouth and breathed through my nose until the wave passed. There were no tears. I was somewhere beyond tears, in the strange numb place that comes after a shock lands and the body hasn't caught up yet.

A year. We had a contract for a year. No emotional involvement. No complications. A clean transaction, he had called it.

I almost laughed. I picked up the second test from the counter edge where I had set it to develop. I already knew. I had known since I reached for it. But I looked anyway because some part of me needed to see it again, needed the confirmation to be undeniable.

Two lines. And it was positive, I was still sitting on the bathroom floor staring at it when I heard the front door open.

He was home early. His footsteps crossed the living room. Moved down the hallway. I heard him pause outside the bathroom door.

A knock. Two short, quiet knocks.

"Emily." His voice, flat and unreadable as always, came through the door. "Clara said you didn't eat today. There's food."

I didn't answer.

A pause. Then the door handle moved. I had forgotten to lock it properly. The door opened and Alexander stood in the doorway in his coat, keys still in hand, and his eyes went from my face to the test sitting on the counter in front of me.

The silence that followed was the loudest thing I had ever heard..