The husband

My husband's an okay guy. Actually, he's very nice. He's just doing the best he can. Infertility is his cross to bear too, at least while he's married to me. I know I try to push him away. I cast shadows on things he does, I doubt his sincerity, I make it look like he's to blame. But he's not. He's really more sensitive than most. It's me who's the problem. I've told him this. I've even said that maybe he should go find some fertile, younger, happier woman with the ability to balance a checkbook and bear babies. But he sticks around. For now.

I see clouds pass over his face when we're around children. He's really good with children, and they love him right back. He's charming, and entertaining, and knows how to communicate with kids. Together, they romp and yell and throw things, and I see his cares fall away from him as he enters their moments...time-stand-still moments when anything is possible. Then the clouds pass over when he realizes that it was just pretend, that he's not a dad. Or maybe he was, for one soft moment, but the moment is no more.

My husband is not perfect. He's cheated on me, at least virtually...I found pictures downloaded and uploaded, text of furtive sex acts, strange numbers on the cell phone bill. I don't think he's ever actually been with another woman. But he's not with me all that often. Not because I'm cold, or frigid...I still want. But maybe, in his inner self, he realizes that sex with me is just sex for pleasure...nothing more. Perhaps there is truth to the idea that there exists a primordial part of every man that wants to fuck simply for procreation. I keep waiting for the day when I get a phone call from some strange woman, telling me that my husband has gotten her pregnant, and that I ought to give him up because she can give him something I can't.

I don't know how long our marriage will last, because I don't know if I'm willing to keep him childless. I love him enough to want more for him than I can give. And our marriage is in a state of stasis. More to the point, it's in a state of waiting. For Godot.