Between Then and Now (4 page)

How different their lives would be if he
hadn’t come between her legs. If she hadn’t had to tell him a month
later, on their fourth date, that she was pregnant, and there was
no doubt it was his.

She hadn’t even wanted to date him, not
really. He was cute, and when he was looking at her, she felt it in
a tingly way down to her very core. But they were too different,
and she just didn’t see them getting serious.

That was a secret she’d take to her grave,
because when she lost the baby two weeks after their courthouse
wedding, he’d held her. When she found out. In the shower. In their
bed, which was so newly theirs she still thought of it as hers. In
the shower again, as she sobbed at the blood swirling down the
drain. He hadn't known what to say, but somehow had known exactly
what to do, and in doing so, everything that had been hers became
theirs. A few months later, in an uncharacteristic moment of
emotional vulnerability, Ian asked her if she wanted a divorce.
She’d been able to honestly tell him that she didn’t. That she
wanted a future. Wanted his children.

She’d taken him to bed, and Kaylie was
conceived.

She shivered. It would be a different thing,
now, if she ended up pregnant again. She’d find love in her heart
for a third child. Put off her secret dream of opening a bakery or
bed and breakfast. It would be okay.

But it wasn’t a coincidence that she was
rehashing the beginning of their relationship this week. Their
little oops—are unprotected sex mistakes ever little?—had been on
her mind. Ian would be thrilled. Another secret she’d have to
keep.

Carrie shook her head. It was
probably going to be a non-issue. It hadn’t been the right time in
her cycle, and she knew her body a lot better now than she had
eight years previously. But she’d still be relieved when her period
arrived. But right now, she had cake supplies to buy. The shop in
Essex offered a discount for cash purchases, for reasons she’d
rather not think too hard about, so she pulled into the drive-thru
teller machine at the Essex branch of their bank and withdrew
enough money for her shopping and incidentals for the rest of the
week. Ian liked to do a cash budget at the beginning of the month,
but he also left enough money in their joint chequing account to
avoid bank charges, and just in case of extra shopping, like this
trip for a last minute cake request for one of the preschool
teachers.

She almost didn’t look at the receipt when it
spit out of the machine. Almost crumpled it up and tucked it into
the provided slot for recycling.

Instead, she grabbed it and tossed it onto the
passenger seat, where it slipped under her purse. So it wasn’t
until she parked in front of Mary’s Cakes and More baking supply
store that the numbers on the slip caught her attention.

The lack of numbers, that was.

With the three hundred dollars she’d just
taken from their account, there was less than fifty dollars
left.

Cold fear slithered down her face and across
her chest. It didn’t make any sense. She reached for her phone to
call Ian.

Ian.

When was the last time she’d looked at the
bank balance? A few weeks earlier, probably. She hadn’t told him
she’d be taking money out today. She usually used her cake money
envelope for these trips. They were usually budgeted
for.

Usually.

Where was all their money? She blinked hard,
straining to remember what the balance usually was. At least three
thousand dollars, to avoid monthly bank charges. And a bit more for
incidental spending. She looked down at the phone in her hand. She
should call him. Or the bank.

Yes. She’d call the bank. Her hands
shook as she flipped over the bank card and dialed the toll-free
number on the back. Tapped in her card number and access code.
Listened to Muzak. Her hands were still shaking when a guy who
called himself Ryan greeted her by name, and when she responded,
she realized that her voice was shaking too. Fantastic.

Ryan assured her that there hadn’t been any
suspicious activity on the account and asked if she’d talked to the
other person on the account. No. Ryan didn’t ask her why. She asked
that of herself, afraid to hear the answer. Herself didn’t say
anything, still numb with shock. Probably for the best.

She darted into Mary’s, and came out with what
she needed. She was vaguely aware of paying at the till and being
pleasant, enquiring about the time, and begging off a long chat
about the latest trends in icing colours because she had to pick up
Drew from preschool.

The drive home wasn’t filled with memories
like the drive in. This time, raw emotion, too big to be named,
flooded her being and spilled into the truck around her.

There was a good explanation. Of
course there would be. She just needed to call him and ask.
Why did you secretly drain our accounts today,
honey?

She couldn’t call him if that was how the
question would come out.

If she waited until he got home, she probably
wouldn’t need to formulate a question. He didn’t always address it,
but he knew when she was upset. Would he know that this time
talking wasn’t optional? Maybe she should go and find
him.

After picking up Drew, she headed home, but
instead of turning into their driveway, she kept going.

“
Mama missed it! The house!
Mama!”

She shot Drew a tremulous smile in the
rearview mirror. “I know, baby. I’m taking you to Grandma’s house
instead, okay?”

Drew chattered about cookies and
saying hi to cows as they travelled the three concession blocks to
the farm. She braced herself to be circumspect if Ian’s bike was
parked beside the house, but it wasn’t.
Where was he?

Eleanor Nixon was hanging laundry on the line,
and Drew raced to help her. Carrie took a deep breath and slowly
followed. “Hey, Ellie.”

“
Carrie! This is a pleasant
surprise. Ian’s gone into town to pick up a new drill bit. They’ve
broken three already this morning.”

“
What are they doing?”

“
Some sort of make-work project in
the implement shed while they wait for the fields to dry out.” Her
mother-in-law shrugged. “Do you want to come in for
tea?”

Two cookies and a cup of tea later, Carrie was
feeling both better and silly at the same time. There would be a
reasonable explanation, and she didn’t need to interrupt Ian’s work
day to get it. She stood, ready to say goodbye, when Eleanor waved
her over to the computer in the corner of the living
room.

“
Come and look at the custom labels
I found online for Kaylie’s school supplies.”

Carrie grinned. Eleanor’s credit card was
getting a workout since she’d discovered online shopping. “A
sharpie and fabric tape has worked just fine so far,
Ellie.”

“
But these have ballerinas! Or
fairies.” Eleanor misread the look on Carrie’s face. “Or
firetrucks, if you want to be gender neutral.”

“
It’s not—”

“
Humour me, Carrie.”

“
Okay. Let me just call Ian and
tell him we stopped by, but we’re going home.” Carrie pulled her
cell phone out of her bag. “Darn. My battery died, I’ll just use
the house phone.”

“
Dial-up, sweetie. Use my cell.”
How Eleanor managed to function online with just a dial-up
connection, Carrie couldn’t understand. She spied her
mother-in-law’s phone on the kitchen counter and headed to the
other room to grab it.

Drew bumped into her as he shot like a missile
to investigate the pretty pictures his grandmother was looking at.
“Dwagons, Gramma?”

“
Sure thing, sweetpea.” The patter
of dragon talk faded as Carrie pushed her way out on to the sun
porch. She punched Ian’s number into the phone and held it up to
her ear.

He picked up after three rings but didn’t say
anything right away. She could hear muted conversation in the
background, then Ian quickly said, “Hang on, Mom.”

“
No, Ian, it’s—” But he was gone
again, resuming his muffled conversation, like he was holding the
phone to his shirt.

“
Sorry about that. I’ll be back
soon, okay? I just…nothing. Listen, before I forget, I’m going to
tell Carrie that I’m working late tonight, and I need you to back
me up on that, okay?”

What?

“
Mom?” A bell chimed in the
background, like Ian had walked through a door. “Hello?”

Her husband thought he had a dropped signal.
Her husband. Who was going to lie to her.

Maybe there’s a good
reason…
Twice in one day? What the hell was
going on?

“
Ian?”

“
Fuck. Carrie. What…” He let out a
heavy exhale.

She waited for him to say something, anything.
He didn’t.

“
Nevermind.” The word squeezed out,
compressed by fear and adrenaline. She let the phone tumble to the
bench beside her, her hands too heavy to hold on.

From the living room, Drew’s shriek
of delight stabbed through her haze of confusion, and she headed
back inside, willing herself to hold it together long enough to ask
her mother-in-law if she could pick Kaylie up from school and watch
the kids through dinner.

Eleanor wrinkled her brow, trying to figure
out what had changed in the last two minutes.

Everything. Maybe.

Carrie kissed Drew on the forehead and made it
to her SUV before the tears started to flow.

She
barely
had enough time to find a box of tissues before his bootsteps
pounded across the back deck. Her heart squeezed. She wasn’t ready
for this, whatever it was going to be. But then the screen door
slapped against the siding, heavy steps moved across the kitchen,
and she didn’t have a choice.

“
Carrie!” His voice carried enough
urgency that she felt a flicker of hope. “Where are
you?”

Not enough hope to answer, but it was
something. She sat perfectly still, cross-legged in the middle of
their bed. Where Drew had been conceived and borne. Where they’d
just started reconnecting. A wave of uncontrollable emotion rocked
through her. She knew she wasn’t thinking clearly, and it couldn’t
be stopped.

He loomed large in the doorway, his chest
lifting and flexing as he breathed—maybe in exertion, maybe in an
effort to calm down. His expression was unreadable, and fear
climbed back to the top of the hierarchy of her
emotions.

He repeated her name, this time as a question,
although she had no idea what the answer might be. “Babe, what you
heard…I don’t know why you’re reacting like this, but you’ve got it
all wrong.”

“
What do I have all wrong?” Her
words tumbled out in a whisper.

He scrubbed a hand over his face and rocked
back on his heels. Instead of answering, he narrowed his eyes, like
he was trying to guess what was in her head. “Do you trust
me?”

No. The answer was swift and harsh, even
though she didn’t voice it. She didn’t need to, he saw it on her
face, and swore under his breath.

“
Well, that’s a problem.” He
propped his hands on his hips and hung his head. A long silence
stretched between them, her racing, pounding heartbeat a painful
metronome, counting off each lost beat. All the unspoken words.
“Carrie…” He lifted his head up. “What’s going on?”

“
I don’t know.” It wasn’t much, but
it was the truth.

“
I’m sorry about tonight. It’s not
what you think.”

“
I don’t think…” she trailed off,
not wanting to even say the words. “I know you would never cheat on
me.”

“
Then what’s with the freakout? I
called my mom back, and she said you took off like a bat out of
hell.”

Carrie winced. “Sorry.”

“
Don’t be sorry. Just tell me
what’s going on.”

“
Did you…” She
trailed off, willing herself to find exactly the right words. This
was a conversation too important to fuck up.
Don’t make any assumptions, just be objective.
“I went to the bank this morning,” she
whispered.

“
What?” He pulled up slightly, and
she flinched at the recoil, but he looked more confused than
defensive. “Why?”

“
Not the…I mean, the bank machine.
I took cash out and saw the…there’s no money in our account,
Ian.”

Confusion faded to horror as comprehension
dawned on his face. “And then you called me.”

She nodded.

“
I move money around all the time,
Carrie.”

“
Never from our chequing account.
Always savings. And you tell me. You might not think I’m listening,
but I am. You didn’t tell me about this. And it wasn’t planned, or
you would have just used our savings account.”

He shifted in discomfort, and a heavy ache
settled in her chest.

“
What are you hiding from me,
Ian?”

He stepped back, swinging his arms out to his
side seemingly without purpose. He turned a half circle, then
twisted back toward her and stared. Obvious frustration rolled off
him in waves so tangible she would be surprised if she couldn’t
reach out and touch it. He held her gaze, his own hard and dark,
then dropped to one knee and undid his boot laces. His eye contact
didn’t break, even as he switched legs, and then he was up and
kicking off his boots as he strode toward the bed.