Chapter 1: Chapter 1: High Horse
The tissue disintegrated in Joan’s fist, a damp wad of shredded pulp. Outside Dr. Vance’s window, the setting sun bled orange across the rooftops, mocking the grey chill settling deep in Joan’s bones. Fifty-two felt less like an age and more like a slowly deflating balloon. The scent of old paper and dust, usually comforting in the library, here in the therapist’s office smelled like decay.
"He said it’s the quarterly reports," Joan whispered, her voice scraped raw from hours of silent crying before the appointment. "Every time. Tuesday, Thursday, sometimes Saturday. The reports." She tried to laugh, but it caught, becoming a wet cough. "Do reports require… shower gel? A different kind than we use?"
Dr. Eleanor Vance shifted slightly in her plush armchair. The soft shhhk of her stockings against the leather as she crossed her legs was the loudest sound in the room. Her gaze, usually attentive, seemed to linger for a fraction too long on the ornate clock ticking steadily on the bookshelf beside her. Its rhythm echoed the frantic pulse Joan felt hammering in her own throat.
"He comes home smelling… clean," Joan continued, picking at a loose thread on the knee of her sensible trousers. "Too clean. Like cheap motel soap. Overpowering." She pressed the ruined tissue to her lips, stifling another wave of tears. "And tired. He’s always so tired afterwards. Not from work. From… something else."
Dr. Vance uncapped her pen. Not the sleek, clinical one she usually used for notes. This one was older, brass-plated, slightly chewed at the end. Joan caught a faint, acrid whiff – musky, unpleasantly intimate – as the therapist poised it over her notepad. Joan thought nothing of it. Therapists had quirks.
"Tell me about the tiredness, Joan," Dr. Vance prompted, her voice soothing honey poured over ice. "How does it make you feel?"
"Empty," Joan breathed. The word felt too small for the yawning chasm inside her. "Like I’m… furniture. Background noise. Replaceable." She stared at her own hands, pale and slightly age-spotted against the dark fabric of her lap. "Is it wrong… to wonder? To need to know?" Her voice dropped to a threadbare whisper. "He used to… want me. Now… he barely sees me. Not unless I put on that awful red lipstick he bought as a joke." She touched her lips, bare now. "Do I need to be… someone else? Someone… younger?"
Dr. Vance looked up, her expression smooth, professional concern perfectly in place. "These intrusive thoughts about his fidelity, Joan," she said calmly, setting the notepad down casually, the damning doodle hidden once more. "The constant checking, the obsessive wondering… it’s escalating your anxiety significantly. Paranoia, even. The insomnia, the lack of appetite…"
The words hung there, sharp as scalpels. Paranoia. Even. They confirmed Joan’s deepest fear: she wasn’t just sad, she was losing it. The grey chill in her bones deepened.
Dr. Vance leaned forward slightly, the worn leather of her armchair sighing. "Joan," she said, her voice a gentle counterpoint to the accusation hanging in the air, "the human mind, under stress, often seeks complex, dramatic explanations. It’s a survival mechanism. But the simplest explanation, the one requiring the fewest assumptions? That’s often the truth." She paused, letting the concept of Occam’s Razor settle over Joan like a too-heavy blanket. "Sean has demanding work commitments. He tells you it’s quarterly reports. Stress can manifest in many ways – the fatigue, perhaps even the change in personal habits like soap. Attributing it instantly to infidelity..." Dr. Vance gave a small, sympathetic shrug. "It creates an exhausting labyrinth in your own mind. And right now, your mind needs rest, not labyrinths."
Joan stared at the therapist’s sensible low heels, the nubby texture of the rug beneath them. It made a terrible, logical kind of sense. Her mind was exhausted. Constantly spinning scenarios, replaying snippets of conversation, sniffing collars. The thought of it just being... work... felt almost anticlimactic. Pathetic, even. Was she that woman? The one who imagined betrayal because she was bored? Because she felt invisible? The shame burned hotter than the tears.
"You're right," Joan murmured, the fight seeping out of her. "It's... it's probably just work. Stress. Like you said." The words tasted like ash. "It just feels... so different now. So lonely."
"Of course it does," Dr. Vance soothed, opening a different folder, her expression one of calm professionalism. "We need to address the physiological impact of this prolonged anxiety, Joan. The insomnia is worsening your cognitive distortions – making the labyrinths feel more real. The lack of appetite is depleting your resources. I think a slight adjustment to your medication is prudent. Just a small boost to help regulate your sleep and mood more effectively. Give you a clearer headspace to navigate these feelings without the extra burden of exhaustion."
She scribbled swiftly on a prescription pad – sharp, decisive strokes. The pen scraped audibly. Joan watched the hand move, mesmerized by the efficiency, the certainty. This was help. Medical help. Proof she wasn't just making it up, that her suffering was real enough to require chemical intervention. Dr. Vance tore off the slip and held it out. The paper seemed to glow faintly in the dimming light.
"Take this to the pharmacy. Same as before, just half a tablet more at night. It should help quiet the noise." Her smile was warm, reassuring.
Joan took the slip, folding it carefully and tucking it into the worn leather purse on her lap. The weight of it felt like surrender. Or maybe just relief. A chemical pause button for the pain. She managed a weak smile back. "Thank you, Dr. Vance. I... I don't know what I'd do..."
"Nonsense," Dr. Vance waved a dismissive hand, leaning back. "You're doing the work, Joan. That's the hardest part." She glanced at the ornate clock. "We have a few minutes. How's Sean otherwise? Outside the... work stress?"
The question, so casual, so normal, punctured the heavy atmosphere. Joan grasped at it like a lifeline. Normal. Talk about normal things. She let out a shaky breath that was almost a laugh. "Oh, you know Sean. He’s obsessed with that new electric razor he bought. Claims it’s ‘revolutionary’. Spends ten minutes every morning trying to coax those last six hairs on his crown into some semblance of coverage." She rolled her eyes, the gesture feeling strangely liberating after the tears. "It’s like watching a man herd cats. Bald cats."
Dr. Vance chuckled, a soft, genuine sound that seemed to vibrate in the quiet room. "The battle against the inevitable."
"Exactly!" Joan said, a flicker of genuine amusement breaking through. "And his birthday’s next week. Fifty-five. The big one. I asked him what he wanted, and do you know what he said? ‘World peace and a nap.’" She shook her head, a wry smile playing on her lips. "Helpful, right? World peace I can’t manage. The nap, maybe, but he’d probably just complain about the couch giving him a crick in his neck. Honestly, men. What do you even get the man who claims to need nothing but a nap?" She looked at Dr. Vance, momentarily forgetting the prescription slip burning a hole in her purse, forgetting the scent of cheap motel soap, forgetting the labyrinth. Just two women sharing a moment of exasperated fondness about the baffling creatures that were their men.
Dr. Vance’s smile remained perfectly in place, her eyes crinkling at the corners. "Ah, the eternal birthday conundrum. Perhaps a very comfortable neck pillow?"
Joan actually laughed then, a short, surprised sound. "Maybe! Maybe that’s it." She glanced at the clock herself. The session was nearly over. The brief moment of levity felt fragile, perched on the edge of the chasm. She gathered her purse, the prescription slip crackling softly inside. "Thank you again, Dr. Vance. For... everything."
"Anytime, Joan." Dr. Vance rose smoothly, the movement elegant. "Take the prescription. Focus on rest. And don't be too hard on Sean about those six hairs. Or the nap request." Her tone was light, conspiratorial.
Joan nodded, offering a final, tentative smile before turning towards the door. As she stepped out into the slightly cooler hallway of the medical building, the folded slip of paper pressed against her fingers inside her purse felt less like an offer of help and more like a sentence. The image of Sean, earnestly battling his bald spot with a buzzing razor, warred violently in her mind with the phantom scent of cheap soap and the cool, assessing gaze of her therapist. She touched the prescription again, her knuckles white. What do you get the man who has everything he needs?
The bus doors hissed shut behind Joan, sealing her into the thick, slightly sour air. Exhaust fumes, stale perfume, and the faint, clinging sweetness of old chewing gum. She found a seat near the back, the vinyl cool through her thin trousers despite the lingering warmth of the day outside. The prescription slip crackled sharply in her clenched fist as she sat down.
Outside the grimy window, the city blurred past in streaks of fading light and neon. Stop after stop flickered by. Then, at a crowded corner, a young woman boarded, wrestling a stroller up the steep steps with practiced, weary determination. A toddler peered over the stroller’s edge, cheeks flushed, clutching a half-eaten banana. Behind them, a man juggled a diaper bag and a wriggling infant strapped to his chest.
Joan looked away, pressing her forehead against the cool glass. But the images burned onto her retinas. The soft curve of the baby’s head against the man’s shoulder. The toddler’s sticky fingers. The mother’s exhausted, fiercely protective stance as she adjusted the stroller brakes.
What if?
The question, old and worn thin but still sharp as a shard of glass, pierced through the fog of Dr. Vance’s calm words and the chemical promise in her purse. What if her body hadn’t been a locked room? What if the endless rounds of temperature charts, invasive tests, the cloying scent of antiseptic in sterile rooms, the crushing weight of ‘unexplained infertility’… what if none of it had happened?
Would the scent of cheap motel soap cling to Sean then? Or would a child’s laughter echoing in a messy house have filled the spaces now occupied by silence and suspicion? Would the tiredness in his eyes have been from midnight feedings, not… whatever else drained him now?
She saw, not the family on the bus, but a ghost life. Herself, younger, softer, her own face reflecting the mother’s weariness but also a fierce, undeniable light she couldn’t conjure now. Sean, perhaps less preoccupied with vanishing hair and quarterly reports, wrestling a giggling child on a rug littered with toys. Arguments about sleep deprivation, yes, but not this… this silent erosion. A constant, sticky presence demanding attention, filling the house with noise and mess and life, leaving no room for secrets or motel soap.
The ghost kicks she sometimes still felt, twenty years too late, fluttered low in her belly – phantom limbs of the children she’d never hold. The longing was an old bruise, easily prodded into fresh pain. It had shaped her, this absence. Made her quieter, smaller. Defined her as much as her librarian’s cardigan and sensible shoes. Had it made her easier to overlook? Easier to… replace?
The bus lurched around a corner, throwing her slightly against the window. The toddler on the bus let out a thin wail. The mother shushed automatically, rummaging in the overloaded diaper bag. Joan watched the efficient, intimate dance – the quick wipe of a nose, the murmured reassurance, the way the mother’s body instinctively curved around the child. A profound, ordinary intimacy Joan had been forever barred from.
The bus rumbled on, carrying her towards a quiet house and a husband who wanted world peace and a nap. What do you get the man who has everything he needs? The question echoed in the sudden, hollow quiet of the bus, unanswered. And the only answer that whispered back, cold and unwelcome, was: Apparently, not me.
The bus shuddered to a stop two blocks from her neat, silent cul-de-sac. The walk home was a trudge, each step echoing the prescription slip crumpling tighter in her coat pocket. The family’s ghostly laughter had faded, leaving only the crunch of gravel under her sensible flats and the hollow ache behind her ribs. Not me.
The house wasn't dark. Light spilled from the front window, painting yellow stripes on the manicured lawn. Sean’s car sat in the driveway. And Rob’s beat-up pickup. And Marty’s sleek sedan. Poker night. Or beer night. Same difference.
She paused at the front door, hand hovering over the cool brass knob. Inside, the low thrum of male voices, punctuated by bursts of laughter, rolled out like smoke. She took a deep breath, bracing herself against the inevitable tide of boozy bonhomie and stale cigar smoke that would cling to the curtains for days. Normal. Be normal.
The scent hit her first – hops, fried onions, and that underlying musk of too many bodies in a warm room. She slipped in quietly, hanging her coat in the entryway closet. The voices from the den were clearer now.
"...looked like she raided a nun’s rummage sale from, like, 1987, Seany-boy!" Rob’s voice, always a decibel too loud after a few beers, boomed. "Seriously, that sweater she had on Tuesday? Beige. Like, aggressively beige. Matched the wallpaper. Blended right into the fucking wall!"
Joan froze, her hand still clutching the sleeve of her own oatmeal-colored cardigan. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic bird trapped in a cage suddenly grown too small.
Sean’s voice, sluggish, followed. "Ah, leave off, Rob. Joan’s... comfortable." There was a pause, the muffled sound of a beer can opening. "Comfortable" landed like a sack of wet sand – not a defense, just a weary statement of fact. A dismissal.
"Comfortable?" Marty’s smoother, more insidious chuckle joined in. "Yeah, comfortable like a pair of worn-out slippers, mate. You ever wish she’d... y'know... put a bit of effort in? Like the old days?"
Joan pressed her back against the cool wall of the hallway, near the kitchen doorway. She could see a sliver of the den through the archway. Sean slouched in his worn recliner, a can dangling from his fingers. Rob was leaning forward, gesturing with enthusiasm. Marty nursed a bottle, smirking.
Sean just grunted. "Old days are old days." He took a long pull from his beer. "She’s fine."
Fine. The word echoed Dr. Vance’s paranoia, even. Another word for invisible. For expendable.
The hollow ache flared into a sharp, sickening burn in her stomach. Cheap motel soap. She pushed herself off the wall, forcing her legs to carry her into the bright fluorescence of the kitchen. The counter was littered with empties, a bowl of stale chips, the greasy remnants of pizza in a box. The air was thick with the smell.
She moved on autopilot, her librarian’s need for order kicking in against the tide of chaos. Gather the empties. Find the bin. Wipe the counter. Ignore the voices. The men quieted slightly as she entered their line of sight, a collective, brief pause in their revelry, like crows spotting a potential disturbance.
"Joan!" Rob boomed, overly hearty. "Just talking about you!"
"Were you?" Her voice sounded thin, reedy, even to her own ears. She didn't turn around, focusing on stacking the cans with precise, trembling hands. The prescription slip crackled accusingly in her pocket.
Sean shifted in his chair, the leather sighing. "Just shooting the shit, hon. Grab us some more napkins, would ya? And maybe those pretzels?" No eye contact. Just a request. A demand disguised as casual.
She opened the pantry, the familiar scent of dried herbs and cereal offering no comfort. She found the pretzels, a fresh bag. Napkins. Her hands were cold. She arranged them on a small tray – plates, napkins, pretzels poured into a clean bowl. A performance. The accommodating wife. Fine.
As she turned, the tray held before her like a shield, Rob leaned towards Sean, waggling his eyebrows, his voice lowered but deliberately loud enough to carry. "Hey, birthday boy... speaking of effort... Joan should get you that PremiumPass subscription for the big Five-Five. Ultimate gift! Year's access. Endless... options." He chuckled, a wet, unpleasant sound. "Get your motor running again, eh?"
Marty snorted into his beer. "PremiumPass? Classy, Rob. Though Joan might learn a thing or two watching the tutorials." His smirk was a razor cut.
The tray wobbled in Joan’s hands. The pretzel bowl rattled. The air in the room seemed to vanish, replaced by a vacuum that pulled at her skin. She looked at Sean. His face was slightly flushed from the beer. He waved a dismissive hand, avoiding her gaze, focusing intently on peeling the label off his fresh can.
"Ah, piss off, you animals," he muttered, but there was no heat in it. No disgust. No defense of her. Just a lazy deflection. He didn't say no. He didn't refuse the idea. He didn't tell them it was disgusting to suggest such a thing to his wife. He just... peeled the label.
The silence stretched, thick and suffocating. Rob and Marty exchanged a look, their grins fading slightly under the weight of Joan’s utter stillness, the only sound the tiny rattle of the pretzel bowl on the tray. She could feel their eyes on her back as she mechanically walked forward, placed the tray on the crowded coffee table with exaggerated care, right next to the overflowing ashtray Sean insisted he needed for his rare cigars.
"There you go," she whispered, her voice barely audible over the thudding of her own pulse in her ears. She didn't look at any of them. Especially not Sean, who finally glanced up, his expression unreadable – a flicker of something that might have been discomfort quickly submerged beneath a layer of beer-induced fog.She turned and walked back towards the kitchen, the muscles in her neck corded tight. The crumpled prescription slip felt like a burning coal in her pocket. Paranoia, even. Increase the dosage. Quiet the noise. The scent of cheap motel soap seemed to coil in the air again, mixed with stale beer and male sweat. As she reached the counter, her hand brushed the handle of the cheese knife she’d left out earlier – a small, sharp blade with a worn wooden handle. Her fingers closed over the cool wood. She didn't pick it up. She just stood there, staring at the faint reflection of the harsh kitchen light in the stainless steel blade, her knuckles white. The laughter from the den started up again, lower now, conspiratorial. Sean’s voice joined them, a low murmur lost beneath the sound. The knife's edge gleamed, a thin, cold line in the warm, cluttered kitchen.
The knife's edge gleamed, a thin, cold line in the warm, cluttered kitchen. Joan released the wooden handle as if it had burned her. The laughter from the den rumbled low and thick, a physical pressure against her skin. PremiumPass. The word bounced inside her skull like a trapped wasp. She couldn’t breathe in here.
She fled down the hallway, past the framed photos of landscapes Sean had never wanted to visit, into the sanctuary of the downstairs bathroom. She locked the door, the click echoing sharply in the small, tiled space. The overhead light buzzed, casting a harsh, unforgiving glare on the peach-colored walls and the spotless vanity. She leaned back against the cool wood, eyes closed, trying to swallow past the lump of humiliation and rage lodged in her throat. Comfortable. Like worn-out slippers. Fine.
Her nightly ritual. The small plastic organizer sat next to the sink, each compartment labeled with a day. Wednesday. She popped the lid. The familiar array: the white one for cholesterol, the little blue one for blood pressure, the larger peach oval – the antidepressant.Dr. Vance’s new prescription slip, crumpled and damp from her clenched hand, crackled in her pocket. Increase the dosage. Quiet the noise. She shook the peach oval into her palm, then hesitated. Her fingers found the slip. Half a tablet more at night. She stared at the peach pill. One wasn’t enough? She needed more to be fine? To be comfortable?
Her other hand fumbled for her phone in her cardigan pocket. The screen glowed bright, a stark rectangle of light in the too-bright room. Her thumbs, trembling slightly, stabbed at the virtual keyboard.
PremiumPass subscription
She hit search.
The results loaded instantly. Images. Thumbnails. Explicit. Aggressive. A garish red and black logo dominated the top links. PREMIUMPASS - Unlimited Access. HD. Exclusive Content. Your Fantasy, Unleashed. Phrases like "Real Amateurs," "Hardcore," "MILF," "Teen," "Barely Legal" jumped out, the words feeling like physical blows. Subscription tiers: Bronze. Silver. Gold. Yearly access. Ultimate gift. Rob’s wet chuckle echoed. Get your motor running again, eh?
A wave of nausea rolled through her, hot and sour. She dropped the phone onto the vanity counter with a clatter, the screen still displaying the garish promises. She gripped the edge of the sink, knuckles white, staring at her own reflection. Fifty-two. Oatmeal cardigan. Hair pulled back in its practical, unremarkable clip. Eyes wide with a shock that felt ancient. Aggressively beige.
The scent of cheap motel soap seemed to bloom in the small room, overwhelming the artificial floral air freshener. It mixed with the phantom odors of the den – beer, sweat, cigar smoke – and the sterile, cloying perfume Dr. Vance sometimes wore. Take the prescription. Focus on rest.
Then, cutting through the sensory assault, came the voices. Not just tonight’s, but years of them. Overheard snippets from countless gatherings, barbecues, poker nights, Sean’s own tired pronouncements floating through their quiet, childless house.
Rob, years ago, gesturing expansively: "It’s biology, man! Wired into the DNA. We see something appealing, the blood flows south. Simple as that."
Marty, nodding sagely over a beer: "Females? They hit menopause, switch off like a light. Men? Engine just keeps running. Needs fuel. Regular maintenance, know what I mean?"
Sean himself, shrugging one evening after watching a movie with a scantily clad actress, his tone weary, resigned: "What can you do? It’s just how men are built. The urge doesn’t magically vanish because you hit fifty. Doesn't mean anything."
Just how men are built. The words solidified in the air, cold and hard as the bathroom tiles under her feet. A natural need. Rob’s suggestion wasn't grotesque cruelty; it was practicality. A solution. A gift certificate for maintenance. Because Sean’s engine needed fuel hers couldn’t provide. Because biology was an unassailable truth, a force of nature stronger than vows, stronger than decades spent building a life that apparently blended into the wallpaper.
Paranoia, even.
She looked down. The peach antidepressant pill lay in her damp palm. The new prescription slip peeked from her pocket. Quiet the noise. The noise of her inconvenient feelings. Her unreasonable hurt. Her unnatural expectation that desire might be tied to something deeper than biology, something that recognized her.
With a shaking hand, Joan reached for the glass on the vanity. She filled it with cold water. She placed the single peach pill on her tongue – the old dose, the fine dose. Then, slowly, deliberately, she dug the prescription slip out. Half a tablet more. She fumbled with the pill organizer, found Wednesday night’s compartment again, and shook out another half of the peach oval. It looked jagged, broken. Like her.
She put the broken half on her tongue with the whole one. The chalky taste filled her mouth. She raised the glass. The water felt like swallowing shards of ice. A natural need. The cold spread down her throat, into her chest, settling into that hollow space where the ghost children’s laughter had died years ago. She leaned her forehead against the cool mirror, her reflection blurring, the garish PremiumPass logo burning on the phone screen beside her. The pills were a heavy, inert weight in her stomach, the only solid thing left. Just how men are built. It echoed, a dark mantra settling over the silence.