"Ama me fideliter!/Fidem meam noto:/De corde totaliter/Et ex mente tota,/Sum presentialiter/Absens in remota."
(Lat: "Love me faithfully!/See how I am faithful:/With all my heart/And all my soul/I am with you/Though I am far away.") – Anon. Carmina Burana, "Omnia Sol Temperat"
Derek pulled the car into the garage and quieted the rumbling engine, watching in the rear view mirror as the door began to shut automatically behind him. The only sources of light were the headlights of the car casting long, strange shadows over the neatly stacked boxes, the ordered wall of tools, and the haphazard collection of fishing rods leaning against the corner. He switched off the headlights and was plunged into darkness.
He had a feeling.
The last time he had felt this feeling, he had found Addison and Mark screwing each other in his bed. He hoped he wasn't in for a repeat performance. Or did he? There was a tiny voice in the back of his head, a very, very quiet voice that murmured only on the occasions when he let his guard down. The ghost of a whisper asking if it was worth it; if he really wasn't looking for an excuse to end this charade sooner rather than later.
He shook his head and grasped for the briefcase on the passenger seat. There was nothing wrong. But the mood persisted, and he kept the garage lights off; he didn't want to see anything. Of course, that meant he had to fumble with his keys on his way to the inside door. Fuck. And trip over an old can of paint.
Derek stepped into the silent, dark interior, dropping his briefcase just inside the open door to his study. "Addison," he called out. "I'm home."
Silence.
The uneasy feeling in his stomach began to grow, twisting and gnawing at his insides. Derek rubbed his damp palms against the fabric of his slacks. She was here. Her car was in the driveway. His wife was in the house somewhere and not answering. He couldn't help but wonder if she was alone.
He took a deep breath and started up the stairs, his feet hitting every second step in quick succession. "Addison?"
Still nothing.
But he hadn't seen any familiar leather jackets lying on the floor.
His pace slowed as he reached the landing. The long cream coloured hallway looked longer than it ever had before. Derek walked toward the closed bedroom door; one foot in front of the other. His breathing rate slowed to a crawl but his heart began to race, a physiological contradiction that made his head spin and his stomach roll. He halted his forward progression at the door, dropping his forehead to rest against the dark wood as he forced himself to inhale two gasping breaths. His bedroom, or former bedroom; the threshold he hadn't crossed since that night so many weeks ago. Derek squeezed his eyes shut tight as the sight of Addison's naked form draped over Mark's torso flashed in front of him.
He had to know.
With a determination he hadn't been certain he possessed; he turned the knob and swung the door open, surging into the master bedroom.
It was empty, ordered in Addison's usual care, the bed immaculately made. Derek felt his knees weaken, and his arm shot out to grasp the nearby bookshelf tightly. A battery of mixed emotions flooded his mind and his knuckles turned white from the force of the grip. It was empty.
"Hey stranger," Derek's head jerked towards Addison's voice, and he saw her standing at the doorway of the en suite bathroom, a silk robe wrapped tightly around her slender frame. "I was hoping you'd come in here tonight."
Derek could only make a vague, incoherent sound, his body and mind still reeling from the anxiety of the last few minutes.
"I was thinking," Addison continued, stepping towards him slowly, "that there is something else we could do to get back to where we were before…all this."
Derek's eyes widened and he slowly backed away as she moved closer. His unsteady knees hit the edge of the bed and he sat down hard on the mattress. "Addison….I…"
"I was thinking we should have sex tonight," Addison blurted in a rush, her robe dropping to the floor and puddling at her feet.
He stared at the expanse of bare flesh: the long, sculpted legs; the toned, flat belly; the delicate tracery of her collarbone arching into an elegant line of neck and throat. She wasn't naked, her breasts and privates encased in wisps of expensive, black French lace. Addison was a very beautiful woman. At one point he considered her the most attractive woman he had ever met: tall, shapely and poised. Now, he still knew she was beautiful, but her image was tainted.
Derek sat paralyzed as he was inundated by flashes of that night. The details he had hoped to forget brought into appalling focus in his mind's eye: the beads of sweat rolling down the ridges of Addison's naked spine as her back arched over Mark's torso, the contorted expression of pleasurable pain on his former best friend's bearded face, the frenzied thrust of two pelvises moving in synch, Mark's large hands gripping the taut flesh of Addison's buttocks, Addison's long fingers pinching her own nipples into hardened peaks. The groans, sighs and screams as the two figures created ripples on the bed.
Oh god, he was sitting on the bed.
Derek leapt to his feet, stumbling backwards towards the open door. "Addison," he exhaled between desperate gasps for air. "I can't. Oh god, I can't."
He made it to the guest room, his recent bedroom, in seconds, collapsing against the shut door. He was drowning; he needed to breathe. Derek staggered forward on unsteady feet, sinking slowly to sit on the edge of the bed. He dropped his face between his knees to prevent the contents of his roiling stomach from making a reappearance.
The muscles of his body tensed in unison at the soft knock on the door. "Yes?" he croaked.
Addison stepped into the room, leaning against the inside of the doorframe, but not moving closer. Her robe was once again covering her body, the sash cinched in a severe knot at the waist. Tiny rivulets of mascara traced lines down her pale face. "You couldn't look at me," she whispered, a far cry from her usual confidence. "Do you really hate me that much for what I did?"
"I still see it," Derek exhaled. "I can see the two of you on the bed." He took a deep breath and let it out in an angry hiss. "The same bed Addison. Did you really think I was going to fuck you on the same bed that he did? He was the last man in that bed."
Addison whimpered. "I just want things to be back to what they were Derek. Is that even possible? What are we doing here?" Her voice was rising with each word. "I want you to try. You don't say anything in therapy; you barely talk to me outside of work. We're not having sex. We were good at sex, Derek. What do want this to be, a celibate marriage?" She paused and continued in a quieter tone, a sheen of tears glistening over her grey-blue eyes. "You have to give me something here, Derek. I need to know that you want this, that we have something to fight for, because I think we do, but if you don't…"
"I don't know," Derek interrupted in a low tone. He looked at her with sad, red rimmed eyes. "Right now, Addison, I don't know."
"Okay," Addison whispered, the tears overflowing to run lines down her cheeks. "Just…let me know."
Derek nodded, returning his gaze to the floor between his feet.
"Goodnight Derek," she breathed, shutting the door softly behind her.
Derek couldn't reply, but he knew she waited for over a minute of silence before he heard her feet pad quietly down the hall to the master bedroom. He fought the urge to scream. His hands dragged through his now messy curls, gripping tightly onto a few curly locks and tugging hard; anything to distract him from the pain and nausea overwhelming the rest of his body.
He fell back on the bed, staring up at the flat white ceiling and wishing things were different. It wasn't supposed to be this hard. This was never supposed to happen. He was supposed to have the happily ever after with the love of his life. Adultery and anger should never have entered the picture.
That quite voice was back, a little louder this time, questioning if Addison was the love of his life. He believed in soul mates, but no soul mate would cheat on her husband. He wasn't naïve enough to think that life would be completely idyllic, but this amount of cruelty and hurt shouldn't happen in the happily ever after. For the first time in over a decade, a tiny part of his mind began to question if he and Addison were meant to be; if she really was the love of his life. There was that shining possibility that somewhere there was someone who would fit perfectly into his existence, and turn his world on its head. He just wasn't sure if he wanted to look, or if it was possible to find her.
There was a crack on the ceiling, a spindly tendril winding out from the overhead light. An imperfection in Addison's idyllic home, and yet it suited him just fine. It made the immaculate setting a little homier, a little more him.
He had refused sex with his gorgeous wife who had offered herself to him on a platter. He was questioning his marriage, those important vows which he had sworn eleven years ago: to love, honour and cherish his wife forever. He wasn't sure if that trust could be regained. He…he needed a drink.
Derek rolled onto his side and snaked an arm over the side of the bed, feeling around under the side table for the bottle of scotch. He heaved himself into sitting position and grabbed the glass from the nightstand, filling it to the brim with the amber brew.