Impostor Syndrome

Chapter 1: Ing

"Ing". Her little personal "word". It was such a stupid, silly thing she'd come up with back in high school, years before she'd ever met him. But she'd told him about it and they'd since joked about it more often than she could possibly remember.

They knew each other inside and out by now, their reactions and thought patterns. So it wasn't the affair that made her doubt the man standing before her, looking and speaking exactly as Will might have done, were he capable of such a thing as he was saying. It was the look of confusion at that simple, casual utterance of her word as she didn't know what else to say to such information.

Will would have nodded, muttered a "yeah" and then they likely would have sat silently while they figured what to say next. She knew this because of every family death, sick or injured child, and all the difficulties as she'd sorted out past traumas. And now their passions were flourishing, their daughters were approaching adulthood, happy and healthy. And their sex life never had slowed down much from the early days aside from keeping it discreet from the girls. He always looked happy to see her, never seemed distant, took no issue with the changes of her body. She couldn't think of any suspicious time away, any woman who seemed too close to him.

Was this denial? Was it like that "condition"–excuse, she felt–that some men got where they thought their partner had been replaced and ended up killing her? Tended to happen when the female partner surpassed the male in success, which is why she thought it was just another excuse men had for killing women. And yet here she was, doubting what her own eyes saw when she didn't like words she was hearing.

"Anne?" he asked.

She cleared her throat. "Um, who was it?"

He paused a second before responding. Will would have done that. Maybe she really was losing her mind. "Kayla."

Maybe not. "I thought you didn't like her."

"I don't."

"Then why?" Will wouldn't sleep with a woman he didn't like.

"I guess...I missed the newness between us. When you used to be surprised every time I'd come up with something."

Anger flashed hot behind her eyes and if she wasn't in doubt of this man she'd likely have hot angry tears streaming down her cheeks, but her tear ducts held. That felt good for once. "It was your idea to stop certain things, and you know why I was surprised!" And the sex ultimately hadn't been less exciting as she'd feared. She'd never been bored with him, not once, and neither had he as far as she'd known.

"I know," he said. "And it's not that I don't like what we have between us, or that it isn't fun anymore. It's...we're entering a new stage of our lives where we're the old married couple and then maybe one of gets cancer or dementia and that's it." He sighed. "I'm not ready for it."

"You're older than me."

"And closer to being an old man, yes."

"Well, this is a hell of a time to figure that out."

"I know, Anne."

"Ing," she said again, and again that look of confusion. He looked like Will, he spoke like Will, and yet... "When?" she asked.

"First time was last year, when you went to Prince Edward County."

With her aunts, she remembered. What she also remembered was how excited he'd been to have her in bed with him the evening she returned, as he had after any time apart.

"So...what? You've just been waiting for every time I'm away with friends or family a handful of times between then and now? I assume it's been during the day when the kids are occupied."