Pillow Talk
As summer wore on, Abigail found herself slowly going mad.
A snake in the laundry sink, writhing among the suds. The neighbor woman peering through the blinds while they ate their dinner on the patio. The baby's incessant demands. No privacy, even inside one's head.
One night when she closed her eyes it came to her: not a grainy, ordinary daydream, but a photographically precise image of Lily's body at the bottom of the swimming pool. The gauzy halo of hair. The blue sparkle of the water; the hummingbird-red bathing suit. It was an image so brilliant it caused Abigail's throat to throb.
She sat up in bed. Overhead, the fan blades turned lazily.
"I keep seeing her at the bottom of the pool," she whispered. "I can't make the idea go away."
"It's normal," answered her husband. His voice was wakeful, as though he had been lying there waiting for her to speak exactly these words. Her emotions had risen that close to the surface.
"Try to relax." Was he humoring her? She stiffened against his advice, turning away.
Then, softer in her ear: "I see it: her little red bathing suit, the deep water. I see it, too."