He is beautiful, he is insatiable, he wants her every night. His thrill at worshipping her body is never-ending, and he is so reverent as he kisses her mouth, her belly, between her legs. His hunger for her is an endless void that can’t be filled, deep enough to devastate a galaxy, and she feels swallowed whole by him.
Exhaustion owns her. She cannot hold space for them both, not Jude all day and then Bren all night. But this is everything she ever craved.
To be wanted with such ravenous, immeasurable intensity, to feed and be fed.
She is winning.
She is losing her goddamn mind.
On Sunday evening, she curls up in their huge four-poster bed with the intention of planning dinner, knowing full well she’s about to fall asleep and everyone will eat toast. A cold wind has leveled itself across Farrows, chipping its way into every hollow and gap in the house and settling in like an iced-over houseguest. It’s in bed with her right now,the cold, pressed to her spine and skittering fingers along the nape of her neck. She’d pull the duvet over her head, except Jude is in the way, setting up a thimble-size tea set and busying himself arranging them on the slight mound of her belly. It feels important to lie still, to let him play and hope this is his way of processing the new baby.
“Nine, ninety, nine flowers,” Jude is saying, some sort of gibberish song she hasn’t been paying attention to. “This one is coffee for Mama. Not for me. I’m not old enough.”
“How old are you?” Elodie’s eyes close, her energy flatlined, the tantalizing grayed edges of sleep almost in reach.
“Four,” he says without hesitation. “Maybe when I’m five I’ll have coffee.”
It worked. She’s so relieved she could cry.
“Maybe when you turn twenty-two,” she says.
“Then we’ll be the same age!”
Cold china presses to her lips and she cracks open an eye before taking a fake sip of imaginary coffee from the proffered cup. She does not feel like explaining to him that she, too, will get older, so she lets that one go.
He pauses to feed fake tea to his rabbit and then he bounces the stuffed toy a little too hard off her belly with a rocket-ship sound. His brother kicks beneath her skin in protest.
“Gentle,” she murmurs.
“Let’s play I Spy! Mama? Mama, did you heard me? I spy something that goes thump, thump.”
If she falls asleep now, it will be too late to give him a bath. If she gets up… Who is she kidding? She has already sunk deep into the cozy depths of this glorious mattress, her eyelids weighed down with sand, and she will never rise again. She just needs a little nap…
thump
thump
Her eyes snap open. She glances over to where Jude has nestled into the mound of duvets, cramming another teacup in his rabbit’s face. He must have banged his fist against the headboard, but he’s not close enough to—
thump
thump
It’s coming from inside the walls.
A cold, thick knot slides down her throat and hits her stomach, expanding like a water-soaked sponge, growing too wide to fit the space.
“Thump, thump,” Jude says, factual. “Are you playing spying? Guess what it is.”
“I think it’s just Bren working.” Her mouth feels tacky.
“No, it’s not!” He bounces on his knees. “You’re wrong! I win, you lose. Bren is downstairs.” He points to the wall. “Thump, thump!”
thump
thump
Elodie’s skin crawls and she is suddenly awake enough to push herself into a sitting position. The sound is definitely coming from the wall behind the bed, not downstairs, where she last saw Bren drilling holes in the dining room. A glance at the bedroom door shows it open a crack, darkness like black silt beyond.
