Dust by Eva Everson (epub e reader .TXT) 📕

I couldn’t begin to remember the last time I’d been playful in the bedroom. Westley kept me at arm’s length, unable to physically love me but clearly able to purchase and ride a new motorcycle and certainly capable of skiing—both on snow and water, despite the frigid temperature. Why, he’d just wear a wetsuit and stay toasty and dry, he said.

But it was more than the trip to Boone or the days on the lake or his driving the Harley much too fast for my liking. And it was more than the lack of passion or even conversation in our bedroom. It was every room. Sure, he was kind. Polite. And he doted on Michelle as he’d always done. But there was a difference in the air around us. Something I couldn’t put my finger on—I felt sure it wasn’t another woman—but something I felt all the same. Something separating us. Worse still, it was something I couldn’t identify enough to discuss with Miss Justine or Julie or even my mother. I’d almost said something to Marilyn once, but before I could find the words, she began telling me of a trip she and Trev were taking. By the time the itinerary had been covered I was too emotionally drained to say, “Oh, by the way, I think Westley and I are heading for a divorce.”

Okay. Maybe not a divorce. But there were certainly moments when I feared the only thing holding us together was Michelle … and now … now I wondered if Cindie wasn’t about to tell him she wanted Michelle back. Full time. She had graduated from college. She had a good job according to what she told Westley. And, according to Michelle, a “cool apartment in a really cool complex where some other really cool kids lived.”

No. Cindie wasn’t the same girl she’d been when I first married Westley, that much was for sure. She had made a difference in her life and now, through her job, she made a difference in the lives of others while I recorded numbers for Miss Justine and made the perfect home for Westley and a life for Michelle.

The door to the garage opened and I turned, startled to see Westley enter, a strange mix of amusement and bewilderment drawn across his face. Somehow, in my angst, I’d not heard the car as it rolled up the driveway.

“What?” I asked, stopping long enough to wring my hands.

He tossed his keys on the countertop. “Do I smell coffee?” he asked.

I glanced at the Mr. Coffee that stood empty and gleaming in the corner near the sinks. “No,” I answered, stupefied. “Do you want coffee?”

“Please,” he said, then plopped into the nearest chair at the kitchen table with a deep sigh.

I set about to make a pot, my heart hammering. “Oh, gosh, Westley. Just tell me. Is she going to fight us for custody of Michelle? Because a fight is what she’ll get if she thinks she can just—”

“She got married.”

I spun around, the carafe in my hand, poised beneath a spray of water from the tap. “What?”

“She married Kyle.”

I shut off the water. “The old roommate?”

“Yep.”

I placed the pot on the counter. Opened the cabinet that housed the coffee and filters. Brought them out. Set them next to the carafe. “Wow.”

“She is Mrs. Kyle Lewis now. You know, for the next time you send her a copy of Michelle’s report card.”

I turned to look at Westley, resting my hips against the counter’s edge. “Was he there? Did you meet him?”

“I did. And—I gotta say it, Ali—he’s a nice guy. I mean, a really nice guy. And he looks at Cindie like she’s the best thing since sliced bread.”

I finished preparing the coffee. Pressed “ON” and then went to sit in the chair nearest my husband. “Well, she is beautiful, Westley. I mean, even I can say that with absolute honesty.”

“I guess so.” He stood as if I’d gotten too close, walked to the cabinet of coffee mugs, and pulled one out.

“I wouldn’t mind a cup, too, please.”

He looked at me. Blinked. “Oh. Sorry,” he said, then pulled another mug from the cabinet. The news of his ex-lover’s nuptials had clearly rattled him. I frowned at my own thought. Ex-lover was too descriptive for a one-night stand.

I ran my tongue over dry lips. “Wes? Is she wanting—I mean, with the marriage—is she wanting Michelle back? You haven’t said.”

He shrugged as he stared at the coffeemaker, as though willing it to hurry up and fill the glass pot so he could drink his coffee and move on. But then he said, “I doubt it.”

Relief flooded me. Sent me on a cloud of happy I never wanted to return from until I reckoned that Cindie not wanting Michelle made little to no sense. Especially now. Didn’t she have it all? The education, the job, the husband? Wasn’t the only thing missing her daughter? “Why do you doubt it?”

The coffeemaker gurgled to announce the coffee ready, and Westley jerked it by the handle, pouring first one mug, then the other. I stood, went to the refrigerator for milk, and joined him. “Why?” I asked again.

“Because, Ali, for one thing, Michelle is eleven years old. She’s not going anywhere this late in the game. For another … Cindie is pregnant.”

“Oh.” I set the carton of milk on the counter next to him. We were close enough now that our arms brushed against each other—cotton on cotton. A chill ran through me, but I ignored it. “When is she due?”

“Ah—she didn’t say, actually. I’m assuming six, maybe seven, months from now by the looks of her.”

“So, she got pregnant before she was married.” Again. Probably unplanned, too. How was it that some women were able to just think about sex and find themselves pregnant, easily carrying that child to term, while others, like me, could think and do from now to kingdom come and no child would ever be pushed from her womb?

We didn’t speak again as