My Husband

Gertie
29 Years Old

I sat on the side of my bed, wringing my hands. My head hung, partly out of shame and partly because I wanted my long hair to cover my face. My husband was standing in front of me, and I had just told him I was pregnant again.

"So, how far along are you?"

"Three months." I paused, my voice threatening to crack. "I'm sorry, Damon."

I didn't want to be an unfaithful wife, I didn't mean to cheat. But right now, that's what it felt like I did. No matter how many times I questioned this marriage, or how Damon outwardly told me how many women he had while he lived part from me, I felt guilty for inviting another man into my bed.

It wasn't a real marriage. We'd agreed on that when we did the ceremony. Damon was just helping me save face.

But we did have a happy life together, sometimes. The first year of marriage was wonderful, it felt like a real marriage. Every Sunday breakfast together, every night by the fire after a hard day of work, and every kick from the baby in my belly that he smiled at made me feel like the happiest wife on earth. I still remember Damon holding Susan in the hospital, as proud as if she were his blood. Susan Lillian Salvatore.

Then we brought the baby home, and something wasn't quite right. Damon was attentive and helpful, but after a while he grew silent. I thought he was just tired from the screaming newborn, Lord bless me, I certainly was.

Damon started going out of the house for his nightcaps. I never minded him drinking, only when he insisted on leaving the house to get them. It felt like he was distancing himself from me. He'd been so good to me though, and I was ever so emotional after giving birth the first time.

I smiled and said, "Yes Dear. Go right ahead. I don't mind."

That phrase felt bitter and unnatural on my tongue. Especially since I never felt the need to be any less assertive with Damon than I was before. Something changed in the atmosphere of our house, and I along with it.

That change in my attitude, and leaving the office, made me more attractive to a former boss of mine. We still ran into each other in town. James often complimented how good I looked for a new mother, how I still glowed, and that Damon was a lucky man to have me for his wife. Too tired to quip but too starved for a compliment, I only nodded and said a small thanks to James for his kindness. I remember him remarking, "That shyness is very becoming too. I wouldn't be the reason for it, would I?"

If I were being myself, I probably would've flirted back just for the fun of it. But I was married now. Even if I had barely seen my husband for more than a month, he was still my husband and the father of my daughter. I wasn't used to marriage, and Damon's sudden absence wasn't helping.

One night, when Damon hadn't bothered to come home for a few days, I decided to go to him. I found a young girl to babysit Susan, dolled myself up like I was still young and single and went out to surprise my husband.

That was all we needed, I remember telling myself, A spark. A reminder of how much fun we used to have.

I found the bar I knew he liked best. I couldn't stop smiling as I walked in, the anticipation making me look like I'd stuck a hanger in my mouth while getting dressed.

Then, just a few paces into the bar, I saw him. Handsome and rugged as ever, with two girls draping themselves over him. As usual, he didn't mind one bit.

I remember swallowing hard, unsure whether it would be worse to walk up to him or leave. I opted slink myself quietly to a barstool, unable to hold myself up any longer. I don't know how long I sat there before he found me, but he was still drunk and smirking when he did.

He words were all a blur, not even because he was intoxicated-it had more to do with what I was going through than any other supporting factor. "My wife." I remember suddenly not liking that title. "You look gorgeous! Tryin' bait in some more guys for yourself, doll? Well, good luck, I have a few of my own to take care of. Don't worry, I haven't forgotten about you. I'll see you in the morning."

Even though he did come back home in the morning, I did feel forgotten.

"Are you angry at me Gertie?" He asked over coffee.

"No."

"Then why do you look so down in the dumps?"

"I'm tired. I still have the baby, you know."

Damon sighed, "We agreed this wasn't real remember?"

"Yes, Dear."

"So we can both do whatever we want." He clarified.

"Go right ahead."

A pause. His eyes focused on his finger tapping his coffee mug before he looked back at me. "I compel them afterwards. And I would never bring them here. This is your house, and I won't do that to you."

I answered robotically, "I don't mind."

We never talked about it again. In fact, Damon officially went back to travelling within the week. He said I had a handle on things with Susan. And if I missed him, he'd send me postcards to look at.

I held out for nearly two years that he would come back. He did send postcards, sometimes with a number attached for me to call him. They made me smile, and I felt a little less forgotten. But I didn't feel loved. Not like I thought I had been when we married, not like a wife ought to be.

After all that time, I did intentionally flirt back with James. No one looked at me anymore, except him. My body wasn't the same, and both the baby and my wedding ring sent a clear message. Sometimes, I hate to admit, I took off the ring just to see what would happen. Nothing ever did. It was as if they sensed it.

I just wanted to feel beautiful again.

Was it too much to ask that I wanted a husband who loved me and whom I could have the chance to love in return?

You knew who he was when you married him. The voice in my head would say. You brought this on yourself.

But he did love me, didn't he? He could've left me to bare Susan without a cover story. Damon loves Susan! He was never so happy as when I was pregnant with her.

Was he? It didn't take long for him to stray. And he said it himself, "It's not real". He wouldn't even care if you had an affair yourself. He was practically encouraging it when you found him. Does that sound like a person who loves you even a little?

…

…

…

So I let James fill that void. I let him tell me how pretty I was. I let him kiss my hand and stop over for drinks by the fire. Then, as my needs progressed and the hole in my heart festered, I let him do other things.

That's how I wound up pregnant with my second child and my first son.

That's what I was explaining to my husband in 1950, after spending a month tracking him down and begging him to come back. I sat on that bed when he arrived, feeling guilty for my own weakness.

He only responded with a clap of his hands. "Well, I guess we're going on vacation then!"

My confusion pulled me briefly out of my guilt. I looked up at Damon with a curious expression, "What?"

"Vacation. Albeit, a longer one than normal, but we can easily avoid suspicion." Realizing that he was mostly thinking out loud, he clarified, "We pack up ourselves and Susan, high-tail it to the tropical island of your choice, and you give birth the best luxury suit they have. By the time we get back, we'll be all "Oh yes, it was a second honeymoon with Susan! Only meant to be for two months, but we couldn't risk traveling with a new baby arriving!" By the time we get back in a good year or two, no one will notice."

I must have looked so forlorn, because when his eyes met mine he stopped joking and smiling. I let my head fall into my hands to cry.

The truth was, I wanted him to be angry or upset. It would've been some kind of proof that he cared, at least in my young mind. All this seemed to prove was that everything we were was all because he wanted to be nice, and everything we could have been was dashed to pieces.

Damon knelt in front of me, wiping my tears away to see my eyes better. "Hey, hey, look at me. Gertie?"

I couldn't talk, I was so busy trying to calm my outrageous hormones that I could only sniffle at him.

"Come on, lie back. Take a nap. We don't have to start packing until you want to."

We lay on the bed for a little while, my back to him and his arms wrapped around me. I felt his breath in my ear, and it both frightened and soothed me. I kept sitting there thinking about how pitiful it all was. We were both trapped in a loveless, careless marriage all built on a lie to suit the public image. It just didn't seem worth it.

Damon's breath suddenly grew heavier. I heard him start to pant and felt his arms tighten around me, then I felt nothing-he was no longer holding me.

Getting up from the bed, I saw Damon hastily fleeing towards the door. I had only managed to catch him by the arm in time to see his face transforming back to normal from his red-eyed, vein-ridden, fanged features.

"You're hungry." I stated, rather stupidly.

"Yes. I need to go, but I'll be back in an hour. I promise."

I almost nodded and said, Yes Dear. Go right ahead. I don't mind. But somewhere, down in my soul, my old self rose up to ask a question that had been burning in my mind for the last five years.

"Have you ever fed on me?"

That made Damon pause in the doorway. He turned back to me, looking as though I said something completely absurd like "Don't you know the sky is made of porcupines?" He replied, "No. Where would you even get that idea?"

"You've always told me about how you feed. How compulsion works." I felt my old frankness slowly building up, "Have you ever compelled me to let you feed? Or made me forget?"

"No." He said with absolute certainty, "What, do you not believe me?"

"Well, if you haven't then why?"

"I don't feed on you." Damon tried to leave on that but I held him back.

"That's obvious, but it doesn't answer my question: Why not?"

He was starting to get annoyed, "Do you want me to feed on you? Is that it?"

"I'm just. Curious." I paused, "Is it because I'm your wife?"

Damon rolled his eyes, and he said in the most matter-of-fact tone, "It's because you're Gertie, alright? You're my Gertie and I don't feed on you. Honestly, you should be grateful I'm not feeding on you, especially when you're keeping me from doing just that when I need to."

He left me on the bed, a dumb smile spreading across my face.

It's hard to know exactly how I knew this or why it made me feel better, but the revelation was clear as day to me: My husband did love me. Maybe not as a wife, though better than just a good friend. He loved me as his Gertie. Damon wasn't helping me because he felt bad or responsible. There was something about me that he liked, the same something I liked about him.

My husband cared about me. Even if it wasn't completely in the way that I'd originally wanted.