The Between Years

me get ready.”

    He smiled, nodded, and led the way. This time, he seemed to be so mild-mannered about it that I probably could have told him that I was too tired and he wouldn't have kicked up a fuss. But I didn't. By that point, I had regained much of the sexual appetite I'd lost, and I was looking forward to the intimacy. I gave him my hand, but he scooped me up in his arms, carried me to our bedroom, and rested me on the bed.

    The lights turned off, he switched on the lamp by the nightstand and pulled his shirt off over his head. When he unstrapped his belt and unbuttoned his pants, I rolled off the bed and reminded him that I needed to freshen up, and he seemed not to have lost an ounce of patience with me. I slipped into the bathroom, ran the taps and opened the cupboard beneath the sink.

    I moved the bottles of Pledge, Febreeze and Murphy's Oil Soap as carefully as chess pieces so I could see the birth control pills I've lodged in a crack in the back of the cupboard. First, I blamed the darkness that shadowed the back of the cupboard, and figured that I simply couldn't see them, so I shifted back to let some light seep in. Finally, I saw the back of the cupboard. A giant void filled the spot where my pills once hid.

    My chest felt hot and tingly and I swore I'd never begun to sweat as rapidly as I had at that moment. I pictured Randy in the next room, stripping down to nothing, wondering what the hell was taking me so long. I wanted to cook up a believable excuse and I knew I couldn't just say I had a headache or an upset stomach. I longed for anything that would relieve me of this.

    But why the hell should I have cared? I wonder even to this day. Those pills didn't just grow legs and trot out of the bathroom on their own. Randy had taken them (and probably disposed of them). And if he had, that meant that he had to have been snooping around for them. Chances were mighty slim that he stumbled upon them by accident.

    The ordeal reminded me vividly of being a teenager living in my parents' house. I had no birth control pills in those days, or anything else worth finding, but I knew they had both inspected my room thoroughly. What else were they looking for? The usual stuff I supposed, drugs, tobacco and booze included. I only knew that they'd been searching through my room when I saw that some of my magazines and books hadn't been returned to their proper position.

    I hated my parents' constant suspicion and despised the same behavior from my husband even more. As an adult, I should be able to leave those things behind, and not be forced to relive the inspections of my youth. But, like my parents, Randy would not own up to having invaded my privacy.

    I wish I could have been strong enough to tell Randy no, right then and there, but when I opened the bathroom door, I felt like I was being marched to an execution site. In the bedroom, Randy laid naked on the bed, wielding a full erection as I'd come to expect. The mere sight of him reminded me of how brutally he'd disrespected me and it made my stomach turn. Any desire to make love dissipated.

    Randy patted the vacant spot beside him on the mattress, which I found unflattering given that it looked like the way someone would invite a dog to hop up on the couch with them. I stomped over to the bed and laid down right next to him, but I remained fully clothed and made no move towards him. Fuck him, I thought. If he wanted to make love, he can undress me his damn self. And if that didn't work, he had a perfectly capable right hand.

    As if I'd directly communicated that idea, Randy unbuttoned my shirt, but boy did I make him work to remove it. The same drill went for the bra; he looked like a fisherman unable to control his line when he unhooked it. He cupped my bare breasts and then planted a trail of kisses down my stomach until he hit my belt buckle. Then he pulled my pants down but I made sure to make him bear all my weight. I wanted to make him feel like he was undressing a corpse.

    But Randy had become a pro by this point. I think he knew that I was putting up significant resistance, but he wouldn't allow me to see his frustration. Call it one of the major rules of owning your spouse.

    After he'd slid my panties down, he began performing cunnilingus, which I will admit did provide me with a great deal of pleasure, no matter how hard I tried not to show it. Normally, I combed my fingers through his blonde hair and sucked all the pleasure into my chest