Matrimony
Title: Matrimony
Author: Sara Ellison
Fandom: Supernatural
Pairing: Emmanuel/Daphne, implied Castiel/Dean
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers: 7x17 “The Born-Again Identity”
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Warnings: Closeted and married
Summary: Emmanuel is trying to be a good husband.
Author's notes: I just couldn't stand the idea of Cas losing his virginity to her.
The wedding is beautiful. Emmanuel lifts Daphne’s veil and kisses her in front of a crowd of her family and friends, because he has none of his own. Her lips are soft on his and she kisses him back until he’s smiling too much to keep kissing. He’s happy; he has a life, and a home, and a wife who loves him.
Emmanuel may not remember himself, but he remembers the world, and he knows how these things work. It was a fairy-tale white wedding, and he wants to give his wife all that she wants. He knows the wedding night comes after the wedding; it’s been on his mind ever since Daphne proposed, and he’s been planning for it nearly as long. Everything is going to be perfect. He’s got the candles, and the rose petals, and the playlist crammed with Barry White and Michael Bublé.
He doesn’t have the will. Daphne kisses him, and he turns his head away, hiding his face from her. Tears of humiliation prickle the inner corners of his eyes. His wife makes soothing noises, rubbing his back. “It’s okay, sweetie,” she whispers. “You’re just nervous. It’s okay. We can try again when you’re ready.” Her other hand strokes along his thigh, and he’s not sure if it’s meant to be soothing or titillating until it dips between his legs and he flinches away.
“I’m sorry, Daphne,” he chokes out. “I can’t. I’m sorry, I wanted this to be special for you.”
“Oh, baby, it’s all right! I know you tried, and the effort means a lot to me, it really does.” She takes her hands off him, and he breathes a sigh of relief. He bites back a remark about not being her baby.
They sleep next to each other that night, but not together, as they have since Daphne found him. Emmanuel wakes every few hours, wracked with guilt, and lies awake until nervous exhaustion drags him back under. Finally, close to dawn, he makes his escape to the bathroom, where he stands under the cold spray of the shower until he feels something like a human being again.
He cooks breakfast and brings it to his wife on a tray just as she’s waking up. The smile that spreads across her face when she sees him outshines the sun, and it’s infectious. He grins back at her, and starts to feel like maybe it’s going to be okay after all.
Cancun is beautiful. They spend their days on the beach and their nights drinking and dancing together until past midnight, when they stumble back to their hotel room, too full of music and tequila to do anything more than kiss and crawl under the sheets. The honeymoon is as perfect as the wedding, minus the sex, but neither of them can really manage to complain. It ends all too soon, and they head home with matching tans and a week’s worth of wonderful memories.
Married life is nearly everything it should be. Daphne works during the day, and Emmanuel does the housework. He teaches himself to be a reasonably good cook, and he and Daphne eat dinner together every night. On Saturdays, they go out to a restaurant and see a movie afterward, if there’s a good one showing, but the rest of the time, Emmanuel cooks for them. Afterward, they go to bed; Daphne curls up against him, and it’s comfortable and comforting to have her warm weight against his side.
Emmanuel tries to feel more for her. He tries to stoke the warmth into passion; he focuses on her soft curves against his skin, thinks about touching her under her clothes, even kissing her there, imagines himself making love to her. Nothing works. His body refuses to cooperate, and he falls asleep frustrated every night. Daphne is frustrated, too, he knows, and he hates that he can’t please her. She kisses him sometimes, desperately, thrusting her tongue into his mouth until her skin is flushed and her breath comes fast, then retreats to the shower where the sound of the water almost drowns out her moans.
His body isn’t broken; he wakes up hard, usually, but it always fades before he can do anything about it. That makes it worse, knowing that he can function like he should, but not when he wants to. He has no control, and he hates it. It’s a psychological problem, clearly, and he tries to research it, but he comes up with nothing useful. His investigation gets him no answers, only a bunch of obnoxious advertisements for pills once the algorithms catch onto his browsing history.
Emmanuel is doing the grocery shopping when everything changes. The cashier is a new kid; Emmanuel has seen him before, but never gone through his line. He’s tall and gawky, with freckles, a big nose, and full lips. He’s not bad-looking, overall, but he’s nothing special; then he looks up at Emmanuel with a smile, and Emmanuel is suddenly lightheaded. The boy’s eyes are intensely green, brighter than Daphne’s, and there’s a twinge in Emmanuel’s groin like a sudden sharp ache. He’s hard, painful in its suddenness, and he clutches at the edge of the conveyor belt to keep from swaying from the dizziness. It’s the first time he’s gotten hard while awake. He drops his gaze quickly and swipes his credit card through the machine; his hand is shaking so much he can’t sign his name, and can only manage a scribble on the electronic pad. The boy cheerfully tells him to have a nice day, and Emmanuel ducks his head in acknowledgement and hurries out of the store.
He gets the groceries into the car with no concern for whether the eggs are under the milk. His breath is harsh in his own ears. He slams the driver-side door and fumbles trying to buckle his seatbelt; it slips from his hands and retracts, and he sits there, staring at nothing, trying to will his erection to go away so he can focus on normal things again. It’s uncomfortable in the confines of his jeans; he lets his knees fall open, slouching in his seat to give his swollen penis more room.
He can’t drive home like this. He can’t think about anything except this erection. He’s stuck in the parking lot of the supermarket with all the blood his brain needs filling his penis instead, and it hurts. He presses his hand to his crotch, instinctively, and moans aloud in relief. Even that dull touch feels fantastic, and before he knows what he’s doing he has his jeans unfastened, his underwear pushed down and his hand wrapped around his shaft.
The head is sticky with clear fluid, and as he rubs his thumb over it more leaks from his slit. His whole body shivers, and he thrusts his hips up, his length sliding through his grip. He bites his lip, a whimper escaping his throat. Nothing has ever felt this good. The muscles in his thighs are clenched tight. He strokes himself again, feeling his balls drawing up tight to his body, then again, and again, and his release hits him like a punch to the gut, knocking the breath from his lungs. He sees stars; it feels a little bit like Heaven. There are tears in his eyes and a name on his lips, but he doesn’t know anyone named Dean.
He gets home and puts away the groceries, moving on autopilot. He can’t think, he can’t make sense of what just happened. The eggs are miraculously unbroken, but some of the produce is bruised from being slung carelessly into the trunk of the car. He sets aside the bananas that have already developed brown spots, making vague plans for banana pancakes in the morning.
He’s quiet during dinner; he asks Daphne about her day, as always, and listens to her talk without interrupting or asking questions. Finally she sets down her fork and asks, with worry in her eyes and gentle concern in her voice, “Emmanuel, is everything all right?”
He clears his throat. “Something happened today,” he says, feeling awkward. It feels a little like confessing a secret. It’s not something he planned to keep from his wife, but it feels personal, and sharing it is scary.
“What is it? Tell me,” she says, reaching out to squeeze his hand. He squeezes back, giving her a small smile.
“I got an erection,” he tells her quietly, trying not to feel like a child boasting about a good grade in school.
“Oh, sweetie,” she says, smiling so widely there are tears in her eyes. Her grip on his hand is starting to hurt. “Did you--?”
“Yes,” he says. “I--I masturbated to completion.” It sounds so inconsequential, when he says it like that. It doesn’t sound at all like it felt. He clears his throat nervously.
“That’s wonderful,” Daphne says, her voice breaking. “Do you...do you know why...?”
He shakes his head. “No,” he lies. “I’m sorry.” He knows what she really wants to ask. Can you do it again? Can you finally make love to me? He doesn’t know the answer to that.
She nods. “Okay.” She releases his hand and stands, clearing away the remains of her dinner. “Well. We’ll just take it one step at a time, okay? I don’t want you to feel pressured. We’ll just do whatever you need to do, to--to...we’ll take it one step at a time.” She stands at the sink, scraping off her plate, seemingly unaware that she’s already scraped it clean.
“Daphne,” Emmanuel says softly. She turns to look at him as though startled, her eyes wide. “I’m sorry,” he says again. There are too many things he’s sorry for, and he can’t seem to voice any of them. He’s sorry he hasn’t been able to make love to her. He’s sorry it’s taken him this long to find his libido, he’s sorry he had his first orgasm without her, he’s sorry he can’t make her any promises for the future.
“Oh, sweetie,” she says. She drops the plate in the sink and moves to his side, falling to her knees beside his chair. “You don’t have to be sorry. I love you, no matter what, baby. You know that, right?”
He nods, stands and pulls her to her feet and kisses her. He can taste her hope and desire in the way she kisses back, and he thinks, Why not? There’s no reason not to try. Her arms snake around his neck, one hand carding through his hair. She pulls him toward the bedroom, the rest of the dishes forgotten.
“Tell me what you want,” she says breathlessly. “What worked for you?”
“I don’t know,” he says miserably. “I don’t know what caused it.”
“Okay,” she says, “start small. One step at a time. Do you want the lights on or off?”
“Off,” he says; then, as she flips the light switch, “Wait.” He turns on the lamp on the nightstand; its glow fills half the room, leaving stark shadows. Daphne watches him, her green eyes shining, and he smiles and says, “You’re so beautiful,” because she is.
“My sweet Emmanuel,” she answers. She moves toward him; the bed is between them, and she toes off her shoes and kneels on its edge, legs folded under her. She reaches out to him, and he does likewise, pulling her toward him and kissing her.
“Tell me how you want me,” she murmurs. “Do you want me naked? Or you wanna just pull my pants down and do it quick and dirty?” She giggles, and Emmanuel realizes he’s not the only one feeling awkward about this.
“One step at a time,” he answers. He pulls her into his lap, kissing her, and she straddles his thighs. He kisses down the line of her jaw, her throat, his fingers moving ahead of his lips to deftly unbutton her blouse. She sighs his name, and he growls, “Don’t talk,” surprising them both, but it’s what he wants. He bites down, lightly, on her collarbone, and she gasps.
Her hands are under his shirt, soothing on his skin, and he lets her take the shirt off. He has his eyes closed, trying to focus on the sensation, the way it feels to have her body against his. It’s not working. It’s never worked before, and he knows he shouldn’t be surprised, he shouldn’t be frustrated, but Daphne was so hopeful. She’s rocking against him, minute gyrations of her pelvis against his. He grips her hips, stilling her, and opens his eyes.
In the dim light, or perhaps because of her lust, her green eyes look darker than usual, burning with need. A strange sort of thrill runs through him, and some instinctive impulse compels him to push her down on the bed, covering her body with his as he thrusts his tongue into her mouth. He’s hardening inside his jeans, and he fumbles for a moment with the button on her pants before he gets it open and tugs the zipper down. She helps pull them off, and he slips his hand inside her panties, pressing up between her legs. He’s expecting dampness but he finds her soaking wet, so slippery he can’t tell what he’s doing, but she cries out in pleasure when his fingers brush something, so he does it again.
Her hands are at his waist, opening his jeans and shoving them down along with his shorts. She stops, then, going still under him, and he pulls his hand out of her underwear instinctively. The look on her face isn’t so much disappointment as it is you just murdered my puppy. He glances down at himself, but he knows even without looking that he’s gone soft again. He’s failed her again. He moves off of her, cringing as though he can get away from himself, and pulls his pants back up.
“Emmanuel,” she says softly, and he senses her reaching for him, but she stops short of touching him.
“Damn it,” he snarls. He doesn’t swear, ever, but he’s so angry with himself he can’t see straight. He drives a fist into the pillow and the lightbulb in the lamp explodes.
Daphne stares at him in the darkness, her eyes huge and startled, and Emmanuel feels guilty for scaring her--but he didn’t do that, he couldn’t have, it was a freakishly-timed coincidence, right? “It must have been a power surge,” Daphne says, her voice shaking.
“Are you okay?” He means the glass shards; the emotional wounds he’s inflicted are a given.
She nods. “I think the lampshade caught most of the glass. You?”
He shrugs, standing up. He picks up his shirt and turns the overhead light back on. After a moment, Daphne begins to pull her own clothing back on, too. “I’m sorry,” he says again.
She’s facing away from him so he can’t read her expression, but he sees the tension in her shoulders. “Stop saying that,” she says, sounding tired. “I’m going to go finish up the dishes.” She walks past him without looking at him.
Emmanuel waits a couple hours for her to come back, reading. When he finished the book, he walks out into the living room and finds her watching TV. She doesn’t look up when he comes in, or when he clears his throat.
“Do you,” he says, and swallows. It’s hard to get the words out; they’re too heavy, and don’t want to leave his throat. “Do you want to divorce me?”
“I think it would be an annulment, since we never consummated our marriage,” she replies hollowly.
“Do you want that?”
She shakes her head, still looking at the screen. “Emmanuel, I love you no matter what. I married you without ever being intimate with you. There’s no reason why I should leave you now.”
There’s a commercial playing for those pills the internet ads were trying to sell him. “Talk to your doctor today!” enthuses a man, off-screen, while his wife beams at the camera.
“I could talk to a doctor,” Emmanuel says.
“No,” Daphne answers. “I appreciate the thought, but we both know that’s not what you really need.”
He isn’t sure what to say to that, so he says nothing. Daphne remains silent, as well, so Emmanuel retreats to their bedroom. He goes to sleep before Daphne comes back in.
He dreams that night of a man he knows but doesn’t remember. The man is tall and handsome, with full lips and a light dusting of freckles across his cheekbones. He stares accusingly at Emmanuel, his green eyes filled with hurt. “I will earn your forgiveness,” Emmanuel tells him, but the man just looks at him, and Emmanuel knows he doesn’t believe him.
Author: Sara Ellison
Fandom: Supernatural
Pairing: Emmanuel/Daphne, implied Castiel/Dean
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers: 7x17 “The Born-Again Identity”
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Warnings: Closeted and married
Summary: Emmanuel is trying to be a good husband.
Author's notes: I just couldn't stand the idea of Cas losing his virginity to her.
The wedding is beautiful. Emmanuel lifts Daphne’s veil and kisses her in front of a crowd of her family and friends, because he has none of his own. Her lips are soft on his and she kisses him back until he’s smiling too much to keep kissing. He’s happy; he has a life, and a home, and a wife who loves him.
Emmanuel may not remember himself, but he remembers the world, and he knows how these things work. It was a fairy-tale white wedding, and he wants to give his wife all that she wants. He knows the wedding night comes after the wedding; it’s been on his mind ever since Daphne proposed, and he’s been planning for it nearly as long. Everything is going to be perfect. He’s got the candles, and the rose petals, and the playlist crammed with Barry White and Michael Bublé.
He doesn’t have the will. Daphne kisses him, and he turns his head away, hiding his face from her. Tears of humiliation prickle the inner corners of his eyes. His wife makes soothing noises, rubbing his back. “It’s okay, sweetie,” she whispers. “You’re just nervous. It’s okay. We can try again when you’re ready.” Her other hand strokes along his thigh, and he’s not sure if it’s meant to be soothing or titillating until it dips between his legs and he flinches away.
“I’m sorry, Daphne,” he chokes out. “I can’t. I’m sorry, I wanted this to be special for you.”
“Oh, baby, it’s all right! I know you tried, and the effort means a lot to me, it really does.” She takes her hands off him, and he breathes a sigh of relief. He bites back a remark about not being her baby.
They sleep next to each other that night, but not together, as they have since Daphne found him. Emmanuel wakes every few hours, wracked with guilt, and lies awake until nervous exhaustion drags him back under. Finally, close to dawn, he makes his escape to the bathroom, where he stands under the cold spray of the shower until he feels something like a human being again.
He cooks breakfast and brings it to his wife on a tray just as she’s waking up. The smile that spreads across her face when she sees him outshines the sun, and it’s infectious. He grins back at her, and starts to feel like maybe it’s going to be okay after all.
Cancun is beautiful. They spend their days on the beach and their nights drinking and dancing together until past midnight, when they stumble back to their hotel room, too full of music and tequila to do anything more than kiss and crawl under the sheets. The honeymoon is as perfect as the wedding, minus the sex, but neither of them can really manage to complain. It ends all too soon, and they head home with matching tans and a week’s worth of wonderful memories.
Married life is nearly everything it should be. Daphne works during the day, and Emmanuel does the housework. He teaches himself to be a reasonably good cook, and he and Daphne eat dinner together every night. On Saturdays, they go out to a restaurant and see a movie afterward, if there’s a good one showing, but the rest of the time, Emmanuel cooks for them. Afterward, they go to bed; Daphne curls up against him, and it’s comfortable and comforting to have her warm weight against his side.
Emmanuel tries to feel more for her. He tries to stoke the warmth into passion; he focuses on her soft curves against his skin, thinks about touching her under her clothes, even kissing her there, imagines himself making love to her. Nothing works. His body refuses to cooperate, and he falls asleep frustrated every night. Daphne is frustrated, too, he knows, and he hates that he can’t please her. She kisses him sometimes, desperately, thrusting her tongue into his mouth until her skin is flushed and her breath comes fast, then retreats to the shower where the sound of the water almost drowns out her moans.
His body isn’t broken; he wakes up hard, usually, but it always fades before he can do anything about it. That makes it worse, knowing that he can function like he should, but not when he wants to. He has no control, and he hates it. It’s a psychological problem, clearly, and he tries to research it, but he comes up with nothing useful. His investigation gets him no answers, only a bunch of obnoxious advertisements for pills once the algorithms catch onto his browsing history.
Emmanuel is doing the grocery shopping when everything changes. The cashier is a new kid; Emmanuel has seen him before, but never gone through his line. He’s tall and gawky, with freckles, a big nose, and full lips. He’s not bad-looking, overall, but he’s nothing special; then he looks up at Emmanuel with a smile, and Emmanuel is suddenly lightheaded. The boy’s eyes are intensely green, brighter than Daphne’s, and there’s a twinge in Emmanuel’s groin like a sudden sharp ache. He’s hard, painful in its suddenness, and he clutches at the edge of the conveyor belt to keep from swaying from the dizziness. It’s the first time he’s gotten hard while awake. He drops his gaze quickly and swipes his credit card through the machine; his hand is shaking so much he can’t sign his name, and can only manage a scribble on the electronic pad. The boy cheerfully tells him to have a nice day, and Emmanuel ducks his head in acknowledgement and hurries out of the store.
He gets the groceries into the car with no concern for whether the eggs are under the milk. His breath is harsh in his own ears. He slams the driver-side door and fumbles trying to buckle his seatbelt; it slips from his hands and retracts, and he sits there, staring at nothing, trying to will his erection to go away so he can focus on normal things again. It’s uncomfortable in the confines of his jeans; he lets his knees fall open, slouching in his seat to give his swollen penis more room.
He can’t drive home like this. He can’t think about anything except this erection. He’s stuck in the parking lot of the supermarket with all the blood his brain needs filling his penis instead, and it hurts. He presses his hand to his crotch, instinctively, and moans aloud in relief. Even that dull touch feels fantastic, and before he knows what he’s doing he has his jeans unfastened, his underwear pushed down and his hand wrapped around his shaft.
The head is sticky with clear fluid, and as he rubs his thumb over it more leaks from his slit. His whole body shivers, and he thrusts his hips up, his length sliding through his grip. He bites his lip, a whimper escaping his throat. Nothing has ever felt this good. The muscles in his thighs are clenched tight. He strokes himself again, feeling his balls drawing up tight to his body, then again, and again, and his release hits him like a punch to the gut, knocking the breath from his lungs. He sees stars; it feels a little bit like Heaven. There are tears in his eyes and a name on his lips, but he doesn’t know anyone named Dean.
He gets home and puts away the groceries, moving on autopilot. He can’t think, he can’t make sense of what just happened. The eggs are miraculously unbroken, but some of the produce is bruised from being slung carelessly into the trunk of the car. He sets aside the bananas that have already developed brown spots, making vague plans for banana pancakes in the morning.
He’s quiet during dinner; he asks Daphne about her day, as always, and listens to her talk without interrupting or asking questions. Finally she sets down her fork and asks, with worry in her eyes and gentle concern in her voice, “Emmanuel, is everything all right?”
He clears his throat. “Something happened today,” he says, feeling awkward. It feels a little like confessing a secret. It’s not something he planned to keep from his wife, but it feels personal, and sharing it is scary.
“What is it? Tell me,” she says, reaching out to squeeze his hand. He squeezes back, giving her a small smile.
“I got an erection,” he tells her quietly, trying not to feel like a child boasting about a good grade in school.
“Oh, sweetie,” she says, smiling so widely there are tears in her eyes. Her grip on his hand is starting to hurt. “Did you--?”
“Yes,” he says. “I--I masturbated to completion.” It sounds so inconsequential, when he says it like that. It doesn’t sound at all like it felt. He clears his throat nervously.
“That’s wonderful,” Daphne says, her voice breaking. “Do you...do you know why...?”
He shakes his head. “No,” he lies. “I’m sorry.” He knows what she really wants to ask. Can you do it again? Can you finally make love to me? He doesn’t know the answer to that.
She nods. “Okay.” She releases his hand and stands, clearing away the remains of her dinner. “Well. We’ll just take it one step at a time, okay? I don’t want you to feel pressured. We’ll just do whatever you need to do, to--to...we’ll take it one step at a time.” She stands at the sink, scraping off her plate, seemingly unaware that she’s already scraped it clean.
“Daphne,” Emmanuel says softly. She turns to look at him as though startled, her eyes wide. “I’m sorry,” he says again. There are too many things he’s sorry for, and he can’t seem to voice any of them. He’s sorry he hasn’t been able to make love to her. He’s sorry it’s taken him this long to find his libido, he’s sorry he had his first orgasm without her, he’s sorry he can’t make her any promises for the future.
“Oh, sweetie,” she says. She drops the plate in the sink and moves to his side, falling to her knees beside his chair. “You don’t have to be sorry. I love you, no matter what, baby. You know that, right?”
He nods, stands and pulls her to her feet and kisses her. He can taste her hope and desire in the way she kisses back, and he thinks, Why not? There’s no reason not to try. Her arms snake around his neck, one hand carding through his hair. She pulls him toward the bedroom, the rest of the dishes forgotten.
“Tell me what you want,” she says breathlessly. “What worked for you?”
“I don’t know,” he says miserably. “I don’t know what caused it.”
“Okay,” she says, “start small. One step at a time. Do you want the lights on or off?”
“Off,” he says; then, as she flips the light switch, “Wait.” He turns on the lamp on the nightstand; its glow fills half the room, leaving stark shadows. Daphne watches him, her green eyes shining, and he smiles and says, “You’re so beautiful,” because she is.
“My sweet Emmanuel,” she answers. She moves toward him; the bed is between them, and she toes off her shoes and kneels on its edge, legs folded under her. She reaches out to him, and he does likewise, pulling her toward him and kissing her.
“Tell me how you want me,” she murmurs. “Do you want me naked? Or you wanna just pull my pants down and do it quick and dirty?” She giggles, and Emmanuel realizes he’s not the only one feeling awkward about this.
“One step at a time,” he answers. He pulls her into his lap, kissing her, and she straddles his thighs. He kisses down the line of her jaw, her throat, his fingers moving ahead of his lips to deftly unbutton her blouse. She sighs his name, and he growls, “Don’t talk,” surprising them both, but it’s what he wants. He bites down, lightly, on her collarbone, and she gasps.
Her hands are under his shirt, soothing on his skin, and he lets her take the shirt off. He has his eyes closed, trying to focus on the sensation, the way it feels to have her body against his. It’s not working. It’s never worked before, and he knows he shouldn’t be surprised, he shouldn’t be frustrated, but Daphne was so hopeful. She’s rocking against him, minute gyrations of her pelvis against his. He grips her hips, stilling her, and opens his eyes.
In the dim light, or perhaps because of her lust, her green eyes look darker than usual, burning with need. A strange sort of thrill runs through him, and some instinctive impulse compels him to push her down on the bed, covering her body with his as he thrusts his tongue into her mouth. He’s hardening inside his jeans, and he fumbles for a moment with the button on her pants before he gets it open and tugs the zipper down. She helps pull them off, and he slips his hand inside her panties, pressing up between her legs. He’s expecting dampness but he finds her soaking wet, so slippery he can’t tell what he’s doing, but she cries out in pleasure when his fingers brush something, so he does it again.
Her hands are at his waist, opening his jeans and shoving them down along with his shorts. She stops, then, going still under him, and he pulls his hand out of her underwear instinctively. The look on her face isn’t so much disappointment as it is you just murdered my puppy. He glances down at himself, but he knows even without looking that he’s gone soft again. He’s failed her again. He moves off of her, cringing as though he can get away from himself, and pulls his pants back up.
“Emmanuel,” she says softly, and he senses her reaching for him, but she stops short of touching him.
“Damn it,” he snarls. He doesn’t swear, ever, but he’s so angry with himself he can’t see straight. He drives a fist into the pillow and the lightbulb in the lamp explodes.
Daphne stares at him in the darkness, her eyes huge and startled, and Emmanuel feels guilty for scaring her--but he didn’t do that, he couldn’t have, it was a freakishly-timed coincidence, right? “It must have been a power surge,” Daphne says, her voice shaking.
“Are you okay?” He means the glass shards; the emotional wounds he’s inflicted are a given.
She nods. “I think the lampshade caught most of the glass. You?”
He shrugs, standing up. He picks up his shirt and turns the overhead light back on. After a moment, Daphne begins to pull her own clothing back on, too. “I’m sorry,” he says again.
She’s facing away from him so he can’t read her expression, but he sees the tension in her shoulders. “Stop saying that,” she says, sounding tired. “I’m going to go finish up the dishes.” She walks past him without looking at him.
Emmanuel waits a couple hours for her to come back, reading. When he finished the book, he walks out into the living room and finds her watching TV. She doesn’t look up when he comes in, or when he clears his throat.
“Do you,” he says, and swallows. It’s hard to get the words out; they’re too heavy, and don’t want to leave his throat. “Do you want to divorce me?”
“I think it would be an annulment, since we never consummated our marriage,” she replies hollowly.
“Do you want that?”
She shakes her head, still looking at the screen. “Emmanuel, I love you no matter what. I married you without ever being intimate with you. There’s no reason why I should leave you now.”
There’s a commercial playing for those pills the internet ads were trying to sell him. “Talk to your doctor today!” enthuses a man, off-screen, while his wife beams at the camera.
“I could talk to a doctor,” Emmanuel says.
“No,” Daphne answers. “I appreciate the thought, but we both know that’s not what you really need.”
He isn’t sure what to say to that, so he says nothing. Daphne remains silent, as well, so Emmanuel retreats to their bedroom. He goes to sleep before Daphne comes back in.
He dreams that night of a man he knows but doesn’t remember. The man is tall and handsome, with full lips and a light dusting of freckles across his cheekbones. He stares accusingly at Emmanuel, his green eyes filled with hurt. “I will earn your forgiveness,” Emmanuel tells him, but the man just looks at him, and Emmanuel knows he doesn’t believe him.