Parasite in The Nursery

Cheating is common. Benign. Easier to explain than the nagging feeling that’s been biting at the small of your neck ever since he was released from the hospital. Ever since you laid your eyes on him and knew without a doubt that the man before you wasn’t the one you married ten years ago.

A part of him feels a swell of pride at how closely you analyze him. He should feel a prick of panic run down his spine at the threat of you discovering him, but when your eyes roam over his shoulders- too broad to belong to the once relaxed if not soft physique of the man you married- to the smile he flashes you is tight and closed.

No, he gets excited.

Perhaps it's a sense of pride. Knowing in this universe, his wife is sharp as a whip and just as fast. That he values strong characteristics, determination, intelligence, kindness all found within you. That he’s a family man within his own right and can’t help but approve of the traits found within wife and babygirl.

Maybe Miguel was just severely fucked up in the head. One would have to be to play house with a would-be widow and her darling little girl.

Your mother had called it a miracle.

A guardian angel on his shoulder. An extra sprinkle of luck on his head or some cosmic debt a stranger owed him- each phrase sung to you by your loved ones when you shared the state of Miguel’s well being after he was discharged from the hospital.

Normal people don’t survive head on collisions with a truck twice the size of their car. Their skin is torn open by the shards of class, bones snap and broken under the bending steel meant to keep them safe, effectively trapping them until the paramedics arrived if they were unfortunate to not die on impact, forcing their final moments to be nothing but sheer panic and confusion as their ears ring and blink out of consciousness.

But the man in your home, who falls asleep with both arms around your waist and kisses the crown of your daughter’s head, nuzzling the little curls she has as he lays her to sleep in her crib is nothing but normal.

You don’t say any of it out loud. God knows how ridiculous you’d sound- lamenting the fact that the love of your life, the father of your baby, survived what should have been a fatal car crash when countless others had somebody dear to them ripped from their lives in the same fashion. Nobody would console you or your growing concerns that something adjacent to a B-rated sci-fi horror film was happening within your home.

Miguel doesn’t poke the concerns nor try to nullify them. He’s far too busy treating your daughter, sweet little Gabriela, like she was the sun and the stars. Every waking moment had been dedicated to her in some way if he wasn’t stuck at work (which is happening less and less lately, despite the fact that before his accident, you distinctly remember countless mornings where your poor husband dragged himself away from you with a kiss to your swollen belly at the crack of dawn and shuffled into his shirt and tie before you got out of bed.

You watch from the doorway of her nursery as he gently rocks her in his arms, leaning down to press his nose to the side of her face. Despite the fear that churns your stomach each time you look at him, you can’t help but smile as Gabriela’s laughter fills the air.

The thing wearing your husband’s face treats your daughter like royalty, you surmised that there were worse things in the world than that.

He knows you can tell something is wrong. You're smart. Analytical. He can feel your eyes cut into him as he spoon feeds Gabi in the morning when you busy yourself with the pantry.

Miguel’s airplane noises are different. Not that it matters. Rather than his nasally impression of an airplane's sputtering engine, threatening to give out as he moves the plastic spoon of mango puree to your daughter’s mouth, he makes a low rhythmic whooshing sound like that of a UFO.

“My mom was thinking about taking Gabi this Friday afternoon.”

“Oh?”

You haven't turned to face him. Instead you busy yourself with moving the spices within the pantry with trembling fingers.

“Is there a reason?”

“I thought we could try that new Italian place on Fifth. The one that replaced that sandwich shop.”

That sandwich shop had been his favorite. Miguel had stopped there damn near every morning to grab his lunch before work, even waiting in a winding line to the door even if it meant slipping into the Alchemax lobby twenty minutes late. Had you ever mentioned the mere suggestion of it shutting down, your poor husband would have burst a blood vessel on the spot.

The man sitting at your dining table merely shrugs his hard-cut shoulders.

“I’m alright, tell her maybe next week.”

Miguel hears you give a shaking breath. Your engagement ring- a sensible princess cut he saved up for months to buy- glints beneath the kitchen light as your hand curls around a glass container of minced garlic.

He’s given the wrong answer.

“Are you alright honey?”

You let out a noise. A high pitched titter as your shoulders start to shake he can’t tell if you’ve begun to laugh or cry.

His fangs worry the inside of his cheek. You were smart, smarter than he gave you credit for it would seem. Maybe he had been all too distracted with staring at the wedding photos on the mantle and playing house to realize how much of you truly saw.

Gabi whines as his hand lowers the spoon before she can take a bite.

You turn your head to meet his gaze and smile.

There is no fear in your eyes. No hatred. No tears running down your face as the terror finally sinks in. That this man, this thing that sleeps in your bed and lays your daughter to bed each night in her crib is not the man you have loved for fifteen years.

There is nothing.

“Just a bit tired, Miggy. That’s all.”

The name sends flashes through his mind. Gabriel’s voice in a taunting  lull when they were children rang through his ears. Xina’s frustrated pleading for the truth. Everything began to swirl and twist until he could feel the pressure building in the back of his head. He brings his hands to his temples, squeezing his eyes shut in some attempt to alleviate the pain that threatens to split his skull.

“Miguel?” Your voice just barely cuts through the fog.  “Are you alright?” Your voice is slow and apprehensive, not coming from a place of genuine concern for his well-being but instead out of fear of what follows next.

Gabriela wriggles in her highchair. Her lip begins to quiver at the lack of attention from both her parents.

“I’m alright.” He insists through gritted teeth. “Just a mild headache.”

“Maybe you should go lay down then. Sleep it off.”

Miguel looks up and catches your eye in the reflection of the mirror hanging on the wall. Rust colored eyes narrow as he tilts his head and speaks slowly and clearly for the first time since he came home.

“I said.” He pushes out, you watch as his lip curls and you see pointed teeth slipping from his mouth. “I’m fine.”

Silence falls over husband and wife, neither of you daring to break the trance.

It was then that little Gabriela, in a desperate attempt for food or attention from her parents or perhaps both, threw her head back and began to wail.

You crossed the kitchen in fast strides before he had the chance to get up. Frantic hands tugging her free from her highchair and close to your chest where she cried into your shirt.

His chair scrapes along the kitchen floor as he walks toward you, each step he takes forward is matched by your own trailing away until your back comes in contact with the wall.

“I’ve got her, it’s alright.” You manage a shaking smile to try and placate him as he reaches out to you. “Why don’t you go wash up and I'll finish feeding her?”

“Let me-”

“Don’t.”

Your voice cuts through the room. Not pleading but demanding. Stronger and angrier than he had ever heard it before. The polite but cautious wife that he woke up to each morning was gone as you stared up at him with defiance. 

Red eyes watch you with an emotion you can’t quite name as your hand gently cradles the back of your daughter’s head and pulls her closer to your chest.

He brings his hand back and nods.

“Yeah, that’s a good idea.”

You don’t move until his shadow is gone from your vision and you hear the bathroom door shut. Over the sound of the shower raining down on him, droplets of water pat-pat-pattering against the tile floor he can hear you whispering comforts to Gabriela in the kitchen.

“It’s okay, babygirl, mama’s got you right here.”

Something gnaws at his stomach as he thinks of the look in your eyes as he stood over you and the way you pulled her closer to your chest when he reached out.

Miguel stands in the shower, letting the hot water burn his skin raw as he listens to you walk around the house with a now docile Gabriella in your arms. You sing a song about field mice and wolves while changing her diaper and whisper a gentle “sweet dreams, babygirl” before settling her in the crib your husband had insisted on putting together himself when you first found out you were pregnant.

He has the decency to wait until you're in bed to join you. Steam curling off his shoulders as he walks into your bedroom to find it shrouded in darkness. His eyes settle on your form where you sit on the edge of the bed, waiting for him in the night.

You stare at him. The Stranger with red eyes like dried blood that cut through the darkness like a coyote in the bushes. The more you look at him the more you realize he doesn’t look like your Miguel at all. Perhaps it was your own grief followed by the pure elation of learning your husband was alive that let these details slip through the cracks but now you can’t deny it. You don’t know this man and you’ve let him into your home.

“Did you kill him?”

His eyes go wide at your accusation. There’s a brief moment of refusal, where his hands go up in defense and he opens his mouth to speak to you slowly, cautiously like you’re a cornered animal.

You snap before he has the chance to speak.

“Don't-” You hiss to the man twice your size. “Don’t fucking lie to me.”

Part of you wonders if he’ll kill you. You’ve seen the scars on his body, the curve of muscle where your husband was soft and domesticated, you don’t doubt that he has the strength for it.

His shoulder’s drop, freed from the weight of the facade.

“I didn’t kill him” Miguel has the decency to look ashamed as he tells you the truth. “He was already dead.”

You don’t know this man. You don’t know the truth of his life, his desires or his actual reason for slipping into your life like an invasive species right under your nose. You don’t even know if his real name is Miguel. But as tears begin to fall down your cheeks, as you finally get to grieve the death of your husband; you allow the stranger to wrap his arms around you in a poor imitation of sympathy.