We All Sleep in the Same Room Read Free Page A

familiar, muted hum of taxis whirring around Union Square and the cry of ambulances rushing victims to St. Vincent’s.
    I wonder what Doreen’s doing at this moment. Maybe she’s alone right now. At home in Coney Island in some shitty flat with cheap furniture.
    Raina tiptoes into the living room, sits on the couch and sighs. I listen to her breathe.
    She’s drowsy, or at least believes she is, and in another minute will start either to vent her frustrations with work or with her mother or with Cal’s latest flame, or pass out on my shoulder.
    I kiss her.
    Then, taking her under her arms, I lean her across the couch. I unbutton her jeans and tug them down her legs, over her ankles. Raina’s hands instinctively shield her crotch. Her thighs quiver from the sudden exposure to the air. A few days’ hair growth on her legs doesn’t faze me anymore.
    â€œTom,” she says softly. “I’m not…” But she doesn’t finish, and I kiss her.
    I grasp her wrists, lift her arms over her head and attempt to warm her by covering her with my clothed body. She moans upon impact. I hold her wrists with one of my hands and push my free hand, fingers out, between her legs until she’s ready. Then I undress.
    I brush her hair back from her face. Her complacency makes me go harder until she starts breathing audibly loud and quick. It’s been a while and I feel good. I go faster and harder. When Raina gets too loud, I put my finger gently to her lips. She bites it. She digs her nails into my hips.
    â€œStop.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œMommy?”
    Ben is standing timorously at the other end of the room, lips pouted, chin over chest, milk-distended belly out against outer space pajamas.
    â€œBen,” I say.
    â€œHi, my love,” Raina says.
    My reaction is to lie deeper into Raina and wrap my arms around her to conceal myself and show Ben that his parents are hugging. But Raina pushes me off.
    She hurries to Ben and picks him up, naked legs and all. “Were you having trouble sleeping?” They disappear into the bedroom.
    In the bathroom, I run a cool shower, finish myself off, and brush my teeth. I enter the bedroom as Raina’s leaving.
    â€œBen is going to sleep.”
    â€œOkay,” I say. “Me too.”
    I kiss Ben and slide into my bed.
    â€œIs that you, Daddy?”
    â€œYup.”
    â€œAre you going to sleep now with me?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œIs Mommy coming to bed?”
    â€œSoon.”
    â€œI love you, good night.”
    â€œI love you too. Sweet dreams.”

2
    I wake to stripes of gray-blue light that bleed filtered and dulled through the slatted shade by our bed. Raina sleeps on the other side of me, closer to Ben.
    It’s early, but not so early that it will be long before Ben is up and tugging on Raina’s weary body, wanting first to be held, then craving a minute later cartoons and toys, all the while requiring cereal and fresh clothes before nursery school.
    To ensure that I have no part in disrupting Raina’s rest, I carefully shimmy down the length of our bed, as I often do, and slink past Ben’s low-lying, perpendicular bed. Ben, a sizable pool of drool on his pillow, is asleep on his stomach holding Elmo with one arm.
    Toys congest the living-room floor. Raina and I make a point to tidy the apartment every Sunday, but by Friday, inevitably, something’s getting in my way. Train tracks snake along the carpet. Matchbox cars and a fire engine are parked in front of the couch. I imagine stepping on one of Ben’s favorite toys, perhaps splintering the plastic rooftop of the fire engine with my heel. They’d hate me for it.
    With my face lathered and white, I bring the razor to my cheek. Doreen’s bony, troubled face flickers for a moment in the steamed glass. The razor catches on my skin, just below my jaw. A trickle of red.
    * * *
    N train to Times Square: the station is alive,