Elsa stood at the front door wearing the strand of pearls we gave her for her birthday and a very chic Jackie O dress. She was practically holding the back of her hand to her forehead when I answered the door. I had just showered and was still wearing a towel. “I thought the weekend would never come,” Elsa said. “I have so much to tell you.”
“Thank goodness the weekend is here, then.”
She stepped into the foyer, pulling her pink rolling suitcase.
“Your uncle will take your suitcase upstairs,” I told her, closing the front door.
Elsa followed me to my room and sat on the bathroom counter while I dressed. She looked at the spreading bruise on my neck curiously. “How did you get that?” She pressed the bruise and I winced. It was still tender.
I kissed her forehead. I said, “It’s nothing, sweetpea.”
She gently traced the edges of the bruise. “It looks like something.”
I tapped her nose with the soft bristles of a brush and covered the bruise with makeup. “It’s nothing for you to worry about.”
Elsa nodded slowly. When she wanted a better answer, she would ask for one.
My husband returned from a racquetball game and the three of us had dinner, an unintentional family of which he was the architect. He grilled steaks and I prepared a salad and he and I shared a bottle of wine. Elsa drank pomegranate lemonade with fresh ground mint leaves she asked me to make. She found the recipe online; she is very curious. My husband sat quietly while Elsa and I talked, mostly communicating with the people who live in his phone. He often complains we don’t make him feel welcome but he absents himself and there is a difference.
She and I talk every afternoon after school, while she’s waiting for her mother to come home from work. This is our secret. When she calls, I always go into my closet and sit on the floor and listen to every intimate detail of her day. I commit them to memory. I keep a notebook where I take note of everyone in her life, who has wronged her, who she loves, what matters most to her. I would remember anyway but the record feels important.
Many afternoons, I leave whatever I’m doing and hide behind the tinted windows of my car wearing dark sunglasses just outside the gates of her exclusive private school. I pay the tuition, a secret my sister-in-law shares. Elsa learns important things every day. I make sure of that. I follow her home as she walks. She doesn’t have many friends. We live in a conservative area and her peers hold her mother against her. It kills me that she walks alone. I always want to roll down my window, tell her to get in the car, tell her we’ll drive until we reach something better. I know she would go anywhere with me. I have to be careful, though. Elsa takes firm, cautious steps, sometimes sings to herself. She always steps over cracks. On her front porch, she turns and waves even though I am out of sight. I smile and wave back even though I am out of sight.
My husband is always uncomfortable around Elsa because she looks exactly like me and she’s smarter than him. I am so proud of her. Every Sunday afternoon after she leaves he says, “It’s a little creepy for a kid that young to be so smart. She’s just like you,” and then he pretends to shiver.
Once, I said, “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
He and I don’t talk much on Sundays.
After dinner, he said he wanted to go out for a drink, maybe some dancing, suggested we get a baby sitter. I begged off. We always go out for drinks and I do not trust the care of the child to others. When I declined his offer, he said, “Can I talk to you in the other room?” I smiled at Elsa, told her I’d be right back and pulled gently on her hair which made her giggle. I followed him into the dining room.
He stood, hands planted firmly on his waist. “We deserve a date night too. Our lives shouldn’t be limited because her mother always pawns her off on us.”
“Her mother,” I said, pushing the words through the pulp of my teeth, “doesn’t pawn her off on anyone.”
My husband scratched his beard, slammed his fist against the dining table, a mahogany affair he chose. “Look. I feel like I’m pretty tolerant about this situation.”
I glanced back toward the kitchen and stepped away from him, trying not to raise my voice. “You don’t want to go there.” I poked my finger into his chest to punctuate each word. “You really do not.”
He grabbed my wrist, squeezing hard. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
I took a deep breath. “Elsa,” I called out. “Go watch TV. I’ll be there in a minute.”
“Should I help with the dishes?”
She really does make me so proud. I said, “We’ll take care of it.” I looked at my husband, then down at my wrist, in his hand. “And you can let go of me.”
His shoulders slumped and he apologized. I rubbed my wrist, now sore, red. For the most part, he’s not violent man.
I tugged on the hem of his shirt and started walking backward, pulling him after me. In the powder room, I said, “I don’t ask you for anything. That’s why we get along. Don’t make me ask you for this.”
He pushed his lower lip out but relaxed. I rubbed my hands over his chest, and scratched his beard the way he likes and tugged on his lower lip with my teeth the way he likes and fell to my knees the way he likes. I welcomed his cock into my mouth until my lips were pressed against his body. He became instantly hard. He leaned back against the wall and exhaled loudly, resting his hands lightly on the top of my head. He is very fond of my mouth. He did not take long to come; he was not quiet. That angered me, his lack of discretion. He said, “God, I love that you swallow.” As he pulled his pants up he was quiet, then he said, “You did that so you could stay home with her.” He sounded morose, lonely.
This is a fabulous story. I think there’s more to it—more possible. Perhaps it could be a novel. Very compelling, beautifully done.
Wanted to print out your Weekend Fiction, but there is NO easy way to do that – like a simple Pdf. Can you arrange that in the future?