The Nightmare Daze

16. Spinning Threads

Isabel

I wonder what he would do if he knew. Lying here in Elliot's bed, it's hard to even look at his sleeping face, softened from the day, no longer turning away from me. I know our troubles run deeper than my wrongdoing. I know that I tried with him, I really did. But the burden of my affair with Elijah is all-consuming when I am under Elliot's roof. I can't stop imaging the look on his face if he ever found out. And maybe part of it is fantasy. Maybe there is a part of me that longs for him to be just a little bit hurt by my betrayal. It's a horrible, selfish thought—but lately I've been giving into the horrible, selfish side of myself.

The day in the library should have been the first and last time that I slept with Elijah. I'd intended to tell him firmly that I couldn't see him again, that I was really quitting this time, but the look on his face stole all of my words. It's such a simple thing for someone to be excited to see me—it shouldn't sway me like it does. But when Elijah smiles at me, a secret sort of look that is mine alone, I feel my heart caving to him even farther. Saying no to him was never an option.

"Do you typically look that way when you watch me sleep?" Elliot's eyes are open now, and I lay my head back onto the pillow and close my own eyes.

"I don't watch you sleep."

"Then what is it you're doing now?"

"Am I not allowed to look at the man I married?"

I mean it as a joke, but it doesn't sound like one. It sounds like an accusation. It isn't Elliot's fault that I slept with another man and feel guilty over it, and I know I shouldn't take it out on him. But knowing what it can be like to feel so much for someone else—it makes me resent him all over again. Why should this man have all of my feelings, all of my youth? Why does he get to waste what I would have freely given him?

"You were quieter than usual today. Something on your mind?"

"You're not around enough to know what I'm usually like."

He doesn't say anything for a long moment, long enough that I begin to think he isn't going to say anything at all. "Fair enough," he grumbles, sinking back into his own pillow. The morning is still early. If I were a good wife I would press my body close to his and mend the tension that I've let slip between us. But I am not a good wife anymore, if I ever was to begin with. Elliot never wanted a good wife anyway. Instead, I slip from the cover and begin to dress, all while I can feel my husband's eyes following me around the room.

"Where are you going?"

"The library."

"Come back to bed, Isabel."

"You should rest more. I'm sure you're tired from your travels."

"I missed you while I was away." Why does he get to say things that tug on my heart like that when he has no desire, no interest in offering me more in the daylight hours?

"Then you shouldn't have been gone so long." By the time I step into the hallway, the walls feel as if they're closing in on me. How can such an enormous place feel so cramped? Elliot's presence seems to fill every empty space, sucking the air from each room I step into. When I close the door of the library, I take a moment to absorb the holy silence of the place. Here is a place where Elliot does not go, where his presence can't travel. It is solely my shelter. I pick up Lady Audley's Secret and turn to the end of the book where I've marked my place. I've tried so many times to read the ending, but I see too much of myself in Lady Audley, and I don't want to know how her story ends. I don't want to see myself in the framework of a story built like a cage. I close the book after a page and choose the a volume of poetry that Elijah insisted I take home with me.