Erika
I wake up from a nightmare feeling like I can’t breathe.
I don’t remember all the details from the nightmare. But I remember being in a deep pit in the ground. And somebody throwing dirt on me, burying me alive. And as they bury me, they laugh. A laugh that echoes throughout the shallow grave.
My heart is still pounding at the thought of it. I have to take deep breaths, trying to calm myself down.
I turn my head to look at Jason, who is sound asleep beside me. He’s snoring softly like he always does when he sleeps on his back. His pale eyelashes flutter slightly, but he doesn’t stir. Jason has always been a deep sleeper, and he rarely suffers from insomnia. A long time ago, before we had Liam, I could have woken him up to tell him about my nightmare. He wouldn’t have been mad. He would have put his arm around me, pulled me close to him, and made me feel like everything was all right again.
But Jason doesn’t have the ability to make me feel that way anymore. Nothing can. And he has to wake up early in the morning and commute into the city. I can’t wake him up. It wouldn’t be fair to him.
It was so simple back when we were young. I met Jason over twenty years ago. I was writing an article on the tech startup company he had helped found that was quickly becoming very successful. His red-tinged brown hair, that our daughter later would inherit, was in need of a haircut and he was also in need of a shave, but he looked adorable. As he explained what the company did, his blue eyes progressively getting wider and more excited, I blurted out, “I have to tell you, I think you’re the smartest guy I’ve ever met.”
Jason stopped mid-sentence and blinked at me. “Is that a good thing?” I didn’t hesitate. “Yes.”
“Good. Because I think you’re the prettiest girl I’ve ever met.”
We were inseparable for a long time after that. We even spent a summer traveling through Europe in style after Jason sold his company for
a bundle of money. It was on the Eiffel tower that he got down on one knee and proposed to me. Maybe it was cliché, but it was one of the most romantic things I could imagine.
I love Jason even more than I did that day, but admittedly, the romance isn’t what it used to be. I hate that he has to travel so far to get to work every day. And I hate the not infrequent business trips he has to take. And I’ve hated it even more since an incident that happened two years ago.
Jason told me he had a late dinner meeting at work with an investor. This is something that happens from time to time, and I didn’t think much of it. But then when he came home, he was grinning ear to ear and reeking of an unfamiliar perfume. I smelled it the second he kissed me hello. And right after that, he made a beeline for the shower.
He spent the next few weeks being particularly attentive to me. Flowers, expensive dinners out—even some diamond earrings he had caught me admiring on my computer. I couldn’t help but think that Jason was filling out every checkbox for signs of a cheating husband.
I considered confronting him about it, but in my heart, I didn’t believe my husband was a cheater. I imagined how hurt he would be if I even suggested it. I finally decided I must have imagined the perfume. Or maybe he had dinner with an investor that had particularly strong-smelling perfume and the scent clung to him. It’s like when you go out to a bar and come home reeking of smoke, even if you haven’t had a cigarette.
And after that night, I never smelled it again. So even if it did happen, it never happened again.
But there’s still that worry in the back of my head. Especially now that Jason has gotten “hot.” I wish his hours weren’t so long. I wish waitresses didn’t flirt with him when we go to restaurants, even if he doesn’t flirt back. Ultimately, I do trust him though. I don’t think he would ever cheat on me
—not really.
After all, it’s not worrying about my husband that keeps me up at night.
“Jason,” I whisper. I don’t want to wake him up, but if he happens to be up, then I wouldn’t be at fault.
He snores.
Fine. He isn’t waking up. And I’m not going to fall asleep again so fast. May as well get up and make myself some tea.
I slide my feet into my slippers and grab my fluffy blue housecoat from the dresser where I throw it every morning. I yawn and pad out into the hallway. I start for the staircase, but something stops me.
The door to Liam’s bedroom is ajar.
Liam never leaves the door to his bedroom open at night. Ever. Not even when he was five years old. He always wants the door closed tight. The sight of that door slightly open is as terrifying to me as my nightmare. When it comes to Liam, unexpected is always bad.
I walk over to the bedroom door and push it the rest of the way open. I squint into the darkness of my son’s room.
It’s empty.
I race down to the living room, my heart pounding. Maybe I’ll find Liam on the couch, watching television. Like me, he often has difficulty sleeping. Even though I make him go to bed at ten, I know he’s up far later. He told me once that he only needs five hours of sleep.
But Liam isn’t in the living room. And he’s not in the kitchen. Or either of the bathrooms—downstairs or upstairs. I comb the entire house and even look out on the porch and in the backyard before I race back up the stairs to my bedroom.
“Jason!”
So much for not waking him up. But our son is missing. I can’t not say anything to him. What am I supposed to do now? Go back to sleep after Liam vanished from his room in the middle of the night?
Jason’s eyes crack open. He rubs at them with the back of his fists like he’s two years old. “Erika?”
“Liam’s gone!” I wring my hands together. “He’s not in the house. He went somewhere.”
I stare at Jason, waiting for him to get as upset as I am. He rubs his eyes again. Yawns. Honestly, I’m not feeling his fear right now.
“Jason,” I try again. “I can’t find Liam and it’s two in the morning.” “Okay, relax. He’s not a baby.” He yawns again. “Did you try calling
his phone?”
I can’t believe that somehow I did not think to do that. I’m amazed by my husband’s ability to think rationally in any situation.
I snatch my phone off the nightstand, where it is charging. I select Liam’s number from my list of favorites. I press his name, holding my
breath, praying he’ll pick up. “Hello?”
I feel a rush of relief at the sound of Liam’s voice. Jason mouths: Told you so. “Liam! Where are you?”
“Oh.” He’s quiet for a moment. “I couldn’t sleep. So I went out and took a walk.”
“At two in the morning? I was worried sick!”
“Dad said I could walk around the block if I couldn’t sleep.”
I look at Jason accusingly. “Did you tell him he could go outside and walk around the block in the middle of the night?”
Jason taps his chin. “Uh…”
I’ll deal with him later. I turn my attention back to the phone. “Liam, I want you to come home right now.”
“Now?”
“Yes. Now.”
He’s quiet again. “Okay. I’ll come right home.”
We hang up, and now I’m free to yell at my husband. Apparently he has absolutely no common sense. “You told him it was okay to wander the neighborhood in the middle of the night? Seriously?”
Jason sits up straighter in bed. “Okay, look, I know you’re mad. But this neighborhood is really safe. It’s not like he’s a little kid. He’s as tall as I am. He’s an athlete. He can defend himself.”
“Not against a knife. Or a gun.”
“You really think somebody is prowling our neighborhood with a knife or a gun?”
“It’s just not a good idea.”
“Come on, Erika. He’s almost an adult. You really think something is going to happen to him?”
No. If I’m being honest with myself, I don’t think anything is going to happen to Liam. I don’t think he’s going to get mugged or attacked. Liam can take care of himself. I’m not at all worried about that.
What I’m worried about is Liam happening to somebody else. Because my first thought when his bedroom was empty was: what does he want to do that he can only do at two in the morning?
What if he’s with Olivia Reynolds?
My breaths are coming in quick gasps. I’m hyperventilating. Jason’s eyes widen as he realizes what’s happening to me. He sprints into the bathroom and I hear him fumbling around the medicine cabinet. When he returns, he’s holding a bottle of pills. He fiddles with the childproof cap and finally shakes one out.
“Take it,” he says.
I haven’t had to swallow one of my Xanax in two months. I had been so proud of myself. But that progress is down the drain. I scoop the pill from his open palm and pop it in my mouth. I swallow it without water. Jason watches me, his brows knitted together. He used to only get a crease there when he was frowning, but now there’s a crease there all the time.
“Are you okay?” he asks in a soft voice like I’m some kind of mental patient.
I’m already feeling calmer from the Xanax, even though it’s probably a placebo effect. It couldn’t work that quickly.
“Listen,” Jason says in that same overly calm voice. “Why don’t you lie down?”
“Not until Liam is back,” I manage.
“What if I go downstairs to wait for Liam? I’ll talk to him about not going out in the middle of the night anymore, okay?”
I try to protest, but I feel dizzy and weak. That’s what hyperventilating always does to me. And the Xanax probably isn’t doing me any favors. “Okay. Thank you.”
I lie down in the bed, and even though Jason said he was going downstairs, he lies down next to me and strokes my hair. “You need to relax more, Erika. Everything is fine. The kids are doing fine. You worry much too much.”
I wish I lived in Jason’s universe. Where the kids are doing fine and my biggest problem is our substantial mortgage. But unfortunately, nothing in my life is that simple.
It’s my last thought as I drift off to sleep. I have no idea that my entire world is about to fall apart.
