Ch 11

I hadn't the nerve to undress. I merely sat on the end of the bed and listened to Julia wash the dishes. The clock ticked miserably and loudly, consuming everything else in the room and muting the outside world. I should have been used to living alone. I was used to living alone. But this was different. This was her house, her life.

I should not have walked these stairs.

Dishes clanked together as she dried and returned them to the cupboard. There was nothing else—the clock taunting and the dishes berating me for what I had done in the dining room. Lisette was off playing as she often did on the nights Julia invited me over. Sometimes she played with Alexandre and sometimes she walks across the street to another girl's house. Julia had mentioned the other girl before. While I sat and waited, I attempted to think of what the girl's name was. That was how desperate I was to clear my mind that I resorted to racking my brain over a ten year-old girl's name.

I didn't even know exactly what I was waiting for. All I knew was that Julia had asked me to wait for her and I was obeying her wishes.

For the first time I looked around her room without the distraction of my own expectations. She had a small dresser in the corner with various jars of perfume and creams and whatever else women douse on their skin and into their hair. Why do women torment themselves so? Another meaningless thought, I knew, as I attempted to dry up the sea of misery I had created.

How cruel I was to her. How good she had been to me over the years. I sighed in disgust and examined my hands clasped in my lap. I would not have struck her. I wondered if she knew that now, if she realized that no matter what had transpired, I would not have laid a finger on her.

The lamp was turned down low, as always, and the room still smelled faintly of sandalwood. That alone should have done something, anything, to encourage my desire but there was nothing within me. Absolutely nothing that made me believe that tonight would go as I had originally desired. Now I wanted nothing but to crawl through the hidden doorway in my room and slink into the cellar. Hide. I wanted to hide.

This night shouldn't have mattered. Tomorrow Christine and I would enjoy a pleasant reunion over supper. Even if she refused me physically I would see her again. Of course I wanted to feel her but her voice…I could live only on her beautiful voice, devouring each note, consuming her every melody, ravaging her glorious range. She was part of me, just as music was part of me. In darkness there is nothing to see. Sound is what guides, not sight. I could be led to my death by her voice. In many ways I have already been executed by her and tomorrow I will resurrect myself quite possibly to fall victim again.

Julia's shoes clicked on the wooden stairs and I lifted my head to see her. She must have stayed downstairs long enough to dry her eyes but not nearly long enough for her complexion to clear. She said nothing as she entered the room, closed the door behind her and turned the lamp down so that all I saw was her shadow drifting in the darkness.

Her jewelry clinked into a small bowl I had seen on her dresser. The earrings came off first, then the wedding ring she wears as comfort to her daughter. I heard her draw in a breath as she reached around for the clasp on her necklace. The pearl at the end caught the moonlight for a moment before it dropped onto the wooden surface pf her dresser, the thin gold chain landing in the container with the rest of her jewelry.

She turned in the darkness and faced me, her fingers moving down the buttons from her neckline towards her stomach. It was too dark to make out her features but I imagined everything: the laugh lines that were forming around her eyes, the small bump on her nose, her high cheeks and arched brows. I could see her smile and the way it creased her eyes and brought out the roundness of her cheeks. I could see the twinkle in her eyes as she sat beside me in the parlor and teased me about Luc Testan's latest review of my work, of how she threw her head back and laughed when I was so flustered I could barely speak.

Julia. My God, I knew her face. Even without light I saw her in my mind. When had this happened? When had I memorized her?

Julia knelt and placed her hands on my knees. Her breaths were warm on the backs of my hands as she leaned forward and reached for the buttons of my trousers. Her fingers grazed against my inner thighs, perhaps searching for a hint of my arousal, but I was not thinking of gratification. I knew what she would do if I sat before her. I knew she would remain on her knees, submitting not because she wished to please me as her lover, but because she wished to satisfy me to quell my anger toward her.

My eyes closed in the night and again I saw her face, the same startled look she had shown when I had snapped at her. In five years she had never once looked at me with fear in her eyes.

I shuddered. The sensation of her skin against mine, the feel of her breath on me made my eyes widen in the dark. I panicked, and without reason, without thought, I bolted to my feet. I brushed her away and stumbled over her. My heart raced, thundering through my body, reaching out to every nerve and muscle.

Without a word I left her, half running, half falling down the stairs. How exactly I managed to make it from her back door to mine I haven't any idea. The only thing I know for certain is that her image was still with me as I wrenched the gate open, tore through the garden and into the solitude of my home.

That night, as I lay atop the coverlet, I dreamt of my former mistress.