After six months Anna still felt frozen. She had been unable to offer herself to John as a wife but he had not asked. He had not done anything past kissing her and holding her, and asking her to tell him how she was feeling. His affection had not diminished even a bit, but he made no moves toward the act of love.
They had found the best ways to sleep and to hold each other. Usually Anna slept against his back, or he turned and held her hand as they slept, but now and then one of them would forget or become restless, and the moment would make Anna blush.
She forgot as she cuddled against his back and draped her arm across his waist; her hand came in contact with his taut desire and she drew back, cringing at the awkwardness of it; the feelings of shame and horror rolled through again, squashing her heart under their spiked wheels as they passed.
"It's-I'm sorry-"
He rolled over to gaze at her.
"We've discussed this. It's just one part of a marriage. One piece of furniture in the house of a marriage,"
"It's the furnace of a marriage," said Anna.
"We have blankets," he said, "And each other,"
Anna reached for him but stopped. He laughed a little, shoving a wad of blankets between them. "Oh, that," he said comically, and Anna remembered the jokes they had shared, the gentle humor that had made her so at ease with him when they first shared a home. How she missed that feeling, that pure comfort that seemed would never come again. His body wanted her. She should answer him. She wanted to answer him, but the cold that had descended over her seemed like a permanent frost. What if she never thawed again? Would it be fair?
"You...you could divorce me for it, you know,"
"For...?"
"For...not fulfilling my wifely duties. Under the law, you could be rid of me,"
His eyes widened. "Oh!" he said, "I could, couldn't I?"
Anna sighed. "Never mind, I-"
"No, now, wait," he said, "This is a very important thought. It's a very important question, even. And it deserves an answer. Don't you think?" He came up on one arm, looking down at her. "Let's think this through. I could be rid of you,"
Even the sound of the words was bitter. Anna sighed again, not knowing what to say now.
"So, then that neat, shining knot at the back of your neck...when I look at it during the day and I know I'll be the one pulling the pins out later," he thoughtfully stroked her hair across the pillow, "And I know I'll be the one watching those golden locks cascade down your back...I could be rid of it,"
He stroked the curve of her nose from forehead to tip. "And this mind that saw treachery where I couldn't, that tried to advise me on the law, that found evidence to free me from accusation not once but twice, saving me from shame and unemployment and then from prison..."
He laid his warm, wide hand gently on her chest. "And this heart that is the finest, I swear, the finest heart that ever took a beat, that made you kind to me when no one else was, that demanded we marry, brought you to the courtroom when no one, not I nor anyone would have blamed you for staying home because of the horror of it. But there you were, all through my trial, for my sentencing and when I was told I would hang the only thing I wanted to see was you, to see you looking at me. And there you were,"
He was tracing her face now. "You walked beside me though Hell, delivered me from out of Hell and loved me the entire time, stood by me when no one else would have. You were not just loyal, but loving, so loving that when I thought I would hang I knew I could hang like a man because you saw a good man when you looked at me with those stormy blue eyes, you saw a good man. And that would give me the strength to do anything.
"But I could, under the law, be rid of all that.
"We can revisit this if you want to, but the answer will always be the same, Anna. I would break every law in the land to keep you. If that one piece of furniture in this marriage never returns, I would break every law on earth to keep you. To have you as my wife,"
A fat tear of his fell on her lower lip. She sipped it up before he could wipe it away.
"You are all I want. Do you understand me?"
Anna nodded, then sobbed.
"Good," he said, rolling onto his back and pulling her head onto his chest, "Then you have your answer,"