For Christmas two years before, Matt had a Jacuzzi hot tub installed in the backyard. At first Marie had hated it—the stupid thing was an eyesore, and when the motor turned on twice a day to cycle the water it always startled her, and it was costly to maintain. But mostly she hated it because it was another one of those things Matt had done himself, without discussing it with her—like the time he’d flown in that woodworker from New Mexico, a hippie who smelled like patchouli and BO, and paid him an obscene amount of money to carve a desk from reclaimed wood.
“What does it matter to you?” Matt had said after she’d blown up about the desk. “It doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
“It’s our money, Matt. It has everything to do with me.”
“You can’t keep me under your thumb for the rest of your life,” he said, and then he’d shut himself in the bathroom. It was the only room in the house he could have peace, he’d say. I’ll take laxatives all day long for a few moments alone.
Maybe she had been keeping Matt under her thumb—it was for the best, wasn’t it? But over the last few years he’d been flexing his independence, doing whatever it was that came into his head. Like the damn hot tub.
“If I want to get in hot water I’ll take a bath,” she’d said, although Matt and the girls enjoyed it plenty. They’d usually go in at night, when the air had turned crisp and cool and the stars were out, and she’d hear the bubbles start up and the sound of her family’s talking and laughter, but she still didn’t join them. She was trying to make a point, and planned on sticking to it until the end.
But she woke up one morning with a kink in her neck and a sore back from sleeping in an awkward position, and Matt convinced her to get in the hot tub.
“The jets will help,” he said. “You’ll see.”
Aspirin and a heating pad didn’t help with the pain, so she gave in. Put on her swimsuit and climbed in. Matt came in with her, and rubbed her feet while she closed her eyes and put her neck and shoulders in the bubbles.
“You were right,” she said after a while. She’d almost fallen asleep in the hot water, her muscles gone slack and relaxed. “This is just what I needed.”
Matt let go of her feet and slid his hands under her body, one under her neck while the other looped behind her thighs, the way a person might cradle a baby, and lifted her off the seat so she was floating in his arms. She leaned against his chest, his chin resting on top of her head. She’d been wrong to complain so much about the hot tub, she thought. She’d tell him after they got out and dried off. Apologize for being such a bitch about it.
Matt’s chin lifted away and his mouth dropped onto her head. A kiss, she thought at first, but she felt his lips move, and she thought he said good-bye, but she’d never be sure.
“What was th—” she started to say, but then she was plunged under the water. And held there. She struggled, flailing and fighting desperately, needing to get her head clear of the hot water that’d felt so good only a moment before and now seemed like a nightmare, going up her nose and down her throat when she sucked in a breath. Matt’s arms had turned to vises around her, kept her from breaking the surface, and through the water she could see the vague, blurry image of the man she’d married so many years before. He was watching her, she realized. He was drowning her, and maybe it was a trick of the water distortion or her own mind, but he seemed to be smiling.
How long did Matt hold her under the water? She didn’t know, but it felt like an eternity. And when he finally let her go and she surfaced, sputtering and gasping in big whooping cries, he was already stepping out of the tub and reaching for the towel he’d brought out.
“What the fuck kind of game are you playing?” she screamed once she caught her breath.
“What’re you talking about?” he asked, briskly drying his hair. “Are you okay?”
But she’d seen Matt’s face. His awful, smiling face.