Lisa Rippner felt like the Buddha, the Bu-Dai Buddha.

She was neither enlightened nor particularly friendly, and she didn't assume that she'd eventually take the place of Gautama Buddha; she wasn't even feeling particularly fat today. She did however seem to always have her husband rubbing her stomach like she was some rotund golden statue at a Chinese restaurant.

As she stood and made dinner, he'd come up behind her and rub her stomach. Sitting watching TV with the kids at night, he'd sit next to her and rub her stomach. Before he left for work every morning, he'd kiss her and yes, rub her stomach. And now, as they lied in bed, Jackson was propped up on pillows reading financial reports, left hand snaked under her tank top and rubbing her stomach yet again. Holding her magazine to her side, she watched for a few long moments before smacking it down on the duvet and looking at him. He didn't seem to notice or care.

'Stop that.'

'Hm?' he questioned softly, neither stopping his reading nor rubbing.

'My stomach,' she said, trying to squirm out from under his hand. 'Stop rubbing my stomach.'

'Does your stomach hurt?' he asked breezily as though he'd only picked up one word, again not stopping.

'It's annoying,' she replied, reaching down to tug at the bottom hem of her tank top. 'Stop!'

Normally, this would lead to a massive tickling fight, but Jackson just took his hand away, reaching up to push his glasses higher on his nose before reabsorbing himself in the financial reports from work. Lisa kept hold of the bottom of her tank top, looking at him with her eyebrows raised pitifully. A couple of long minutes passed, each second heralded by the long, thin hand on the clock in their room.

'What is it, Lisa?' Jackson finally asked, but again didn't bother looking at her.

She looked down, pressing her hand atop her stomach, which had started having a greater arc over the last week or so. 'Are you feeling okay?'

'I'm feeling fine,' he said detachedly. 'How are you?'

'Has something happened at work?' she asked, sitting up and looking at him with concern. 'Or did I do something?'

He dropped the papers to his lap, rolling his eyes to look at the ceiling as he tipped his head, his mouth open slightly. Dropping his head back down, he looked over at her, very plainly annoyed.

'Did I not just say to you that everything is fine?'

She pinched her lips together before turning her back to him and slipping down under the duvet. Yanking at the duvet, she pulled it over her shoulder with a little angry grunt. As much as she hated to admit it, this had become the norm. Only months after returning from Syria, they had moved with their children to New York City. Jackson immediately started a job with Crédit Suisse and spent a lot of his time on planes between New York, Boston and Zürich working as a project manager for the asset management of both private individuals and corporations. He had teams of people working under him in both America and Switzerland, and it was usually a person from one of these teams who would come to their penthouse in Greenwich Village on weekday nights to inform Lisa that Mr Rippner would not be able to make it home for dinner because he had to catch a flight to Zürich.

She had to admit, it hadn't been bad at all for the last three years. They were a moderately stereotypical upper-class family up until about two months earlier. Jackson and Lisa roamed the city as socialites, attending operas and museum exhibit openings. Hediyeh, now nearly eleven, was near the top of her class at her all-girls middle school, The Chapin School, and, as she was proud to say to everyone, reading at the college level. Whether she truly, deeply understood what she was reading or not, Lisa wasn't sure, but she was quite good at sounding out words immediately. Jonathan, after passing his terrible twos, had started attending nursery school in the afternoons. According to his teachers, he wasn't the most social of children and more than a bit germophobic, but of all of the kids in his class, he had the most developed vocabulary and best understanding of complex questions. Lisa was concerned about his social skills, but Jackson didn't seem to care as long as Jonathan continued impressing his teachers intellectually.

About three and a half months earlier, Lisa went in for a routine gynaecological exam and came home with the news that they'd be adding another member of the family around Jackson's birthday the next year. A couple more weeks passed and they found out that it would in fact be two new members of the family, dizygotic twins. Right before Jackson's last trip to Switzerland, they received the news that the babies would be a boy and a girl.

His last trip to Switzerland, that's when life had taken a huge dive. When they met him at the airport, he just seemed distant. As they sat in traffic in the Queens-Midtown Tunnel, Jackson completely ignored the kids as they asked questions about what he'd done in Switzerland, if he'd brought any presents home for them, if he'd heard about the great test grade Hediyeh got. Lisa made the excuse for him, telling the kids that Daddy was tired because he'd been very busy. They were kind enough to not mention that Daddy had never been tired before when he got back from Switzerland. The two of them stayed quiet from the opening of the tunnel until they got back to the house, and the three of them were left to fend for themselves that night when Jackson immediately went from the car to their bedroom, slamming the door behind him.

He tried to make up for it the next day, but even the kids knew it was fake. Within a week, Lisa received notes from both of the kids' teachers that they'd been misbehaving in school and Hediyeh had even failed assignments. One day, Jonathan even went so far as to shove another child into the wall at his day care because the other child had sneezed on him. The teachers didn't want him there for the afternoon, Jonathan didn't want to be there ever out of sheer paranoia, and Lisa didn't want Jackson finding out that their son had been punished at school. For four days, she pretended to leave in the morning to take Jonathan to day care only to ride around on the subway for two hours with the boy sitting in her lap, sucking his thumb. Greenwich Village to Harlem to Queens to Brooklyn to Staten Island and back home. Jackson didn't find out and Lisa was able to convince Jonathan to go back to day care as long as he was allowed to wear a raincoat and galoshes whenever it was playtime.

The stomach-rubbing thing started a few days after Jonathan went back to day care. It didn't bother her at first because she thought he was just starting to act affectionate again, but when she finally caught a glance of his face in the reflection on the microwave, she got angry. He wasn't even reacting as he did it, his face as emotionless as her internist's when she went in for a physical. Every time after that, his touch just felt clinical and forced.

Jackson rustled his papers, tapping them on the hard surface of the nightstand before setting them down and clicking off the light. There was the sound of fabric on fabric as he slipped under the covers, scooting over to Lisa and throwing his arm over her waist. His lips pressed against her hair, giving her a light kiss before breezing over to her ear.

'Goodnight, Lisa.'

His tone was so clipped, so mechanical, she could almost feel her heart break. She curled into herself, pressing her face into the pillow, but Jackson didn't seem to perceive that anything at all was wrong. Within a couple of minutes, his breathing grew even, and she let herself cry.

---

'This isn't the life for you.'

If Jackson had had any change since marrying Lisa, it was that his dreams had become more colourful. No longer did the dishwasher or grocery list torment his sleep, their white and silver settled in the kitchen. No, now it was Lisa herself. Whilst a husband dreaming about his wife may be perceived as something romantic, it was naturally different for the Rippners. He knew he was dreaming but could feel himself shiver against the cold wind his brain had created for this exact moment. He looked at her face, which was bright red with windburn, tears making little shining lines down her cheeks.

'You're like an animal in a cage,' she murmured over the howl of the wind. A gust brought down more powdery snow. 'You're not a family man.'

He reached out and grabbed dream Lisa's wrists. 'I am a family man. I love my wife, I love my children, and I can't imagine how it would be without them.'

Dream Lisa shook her head, taking her hands away. 'If you have to try too hard then it's not worth it. It's not natural.'

'Is this what all of this is about? You think I want to be doing something else besides raising Jonathan, supporting you through this pregnancy, helping Hediyeh with her homework...'

Then, his subconscious began acting.

'You're never home,' said dream Lisa, who had miraculously become not the Lisa from years ago in Chicago but rather looked much like the wife who laid beside him right now, down to the tank top and boxer shorts. 'Give me your coat; I'm freezing.'

He handed her the coat, looking into her eyes. 'Leese, I—'

'You upset the children so badly when you came back from Zürich, Hediyeh has failed tests and Jonathan has acted out. Didn't you hear them crying that night you got home? For the love of God, Jackson, give me a fucking break!'

'I don't even remember getting home from Zürich! I woke up the next morning and was absolutely stunned that I was home.'

'Why don't you just tell me things? We need to get help for you before something horrible happens.'

'I don't need help,' he replied dryly. 'I can handle everything.'

Dream Lisa pinched her lips together with a grunt, and when he looked at her again, it was his meek little Chicago Lisa, dressed to the nines with her maternity suit and cashmere. 'I just want you to think about it, all right?'

'Think about what?' he asked as he started to hear a snow plough coming around to clear the roads.

It grew loud enough that it almost covered her last words. 'I don't want to be the reason why you're not doing something you love.'

THUNK.

When Jackson opened his eyes, he was no longer in bed but rather sprawled out on the hardwood floor, sharp pain radiating from the right side of his head. He tried to sit up, but only received a very bad head rush, and as soon as he thumped back down onto the floor, Lisa shuffled around the bed and bent down to him.

'Jesus, Jackson,' she said, reaching up to turn on the lamp. She pulled his shoulders into her lap, turning his face towards her thigh. Her fingers moved lightly over the side of his head, carefully combing back his hair from the bleeding gash on his scalp. 'Oh, honey...'

She clicked her tongue and he closed his eyes, nuzzling his face into the flesh of her thigh. Her hand slipped under his chin before she stretched up, pulling items off of his nightstand. A moment later, her hand let go of his chin and cupped around the gash before the coolness of water spilled over his scalp. She blotted at the water with his handkerchief, studying the cut carefully.

'It's not too bad,' she said quietly, dabbing at the area. 'Let me go get the first aid kit.'

She started to move, but he reached up and took her elbow. 'Stay.'

Knitting her brow, she settled back down, pressing against the cut with one hand and holding under his chin with the other. He relaxed, breathing slowly, his breath dancing over her thigh. She spoke with a choked voice. 'Doesn't it hurt?'

'No,' he murmured. 'I don't even feel it.'

'How did you fall out of the bed?' she asked, lifting up the handkerchief to see how the blood was flowing. Almost immediately, the blood seeped back to the surface and she pressed back down quickly.

'I didn't go to Zürich.'

Lisa froze, staring down at him. 'Yes you did. You left on a flight to Zürich and came back on a flight from Zürich.'

'I didn't stay there,' he said, nuzzling into her thigh more. 'I took a train to Genève after three days.'

'Genève?' she asked, turning over the word in her head. 'Geneva. Why Geneva?'

'I had to go to a funeral,' he replied, pressing his lips lightly against her thigh several times.

She frowned, looking at him as she placed her hand on his chest. 'Why didn't you tell me? Is that what's made you so far away the last few weeks?'

'She worked for my old boss,' he continued, completely ignoring her questions. 'They found her body on the shore of Lake Geneva near Montreux; she'd been shot point-blank in the forehead.'

Rubbing his hair awkwardly, she swallowed uncomfortably at the detachment apparent in his voice before speaking. 'What was her name?'

'Anaïs, like the author,' he replied. 'I talked to some of the people at the funeral and they said that ballistics showed she was killed by a Makarov.'

'Makarov?'

'An old Soviet handgun,' he said, turning his head to look at her face. 'None of us could think of someone in the Society who uses one though.'

'How do you know someone in your old company killed her?'

He just gave her a look like she'd just said something incredibly stupid before turning his head and pushing himself up into a sitting position. 'You can go get the first aid kit now.'