Midnight Sommelier - Anne Malcom Page 0,3

when David had always dreamed of more. We’d gotten tested after a year of trying for our second. Of course, David’s sperm were in excellent condition. My womb was not. The doctor gave us a small chance of conceiving naturally.

Ever the optimist—back then at least—I thought we’d prove him wrong, forgoing any kind of IVF that David suggested.

The first year after that was full of natural supplements, special diets, more optimism.

The second year was full of frustration, of sadness and anger.

Then the years after that were just grim acceptance and trying to be the best mother I could be.

Then came Jax. He took his time. It took a lot to create him, and he was one of kind.

It wasn’t as hard as before. I didn’t have as many projects. Social media was blowing up.

Whatever it was, I got bored, started a blog. It caught on. I got caught up in it.

I took the perfect photos of my smiling baby, captured skillfully in the five minutes of the day he wasn’t screaming his head off, shitting his pants, or staining every single item of clothing I had.

I’d talk about how you could lose the baby weight healthily while I starved myself for six months and ran every morning before sunrise.

David had, at first, made all the right noises and comments about the blog, but had not at all been paying attention. Then I started getting paid partnerships. More followers. Started earning as much money as him.

Then more.

He took notice then. Took over as my photographer, managed the business side of it all while still working full time at the office.

He might’ve been a little threatened at the fact his wife’s flight of fancy was earning more than his lawyer’s salary, but he didn’t let it poison him. He was proud of me. His star rose at the firm, he made partner. We fought more and I saw him less. Though you’d never know from my social media or the way we interacted at the various parties and dinners we attended.

It wasn’t faking, per se. We still loved each other. Were still committed. But we had moments during those years where we just didn’t like each other that much.

And that was marriage. The truth of it. One, of course, I never wrote about on the blog.

People thought they wanted ‘real.’ Something to connect to. But in reality, they wanted something to aspire to. They wanted me in perfect outfits, with my perfect husband, perfect house, perfect baby. I wanted it too. I needed to scroll through all those posts while I was covered in vomit or tearstained and drunk after some fight with David.

We got through those years. Neither of us was raised to quit. And divorce in my eyes was quitting. David’s too. So we worked on our marriage. Gritted our teeth through the tough times and savored the good.

There were bad years, the worst year being my parents dying in a car crash. It rocked both our worlds. Unlike me, David was close with his in-laws. They were the kind of parents he never got. Warm, goofy, hardworking, generous. They lived two hours away and visited regularly. They were the best grandparents to our boys. Jax only got two years with them, didn’t get any memories.

Their death broke me in different ways. It put a hole in my world. But it repaired cracks in my marriage, brought David and me back together. We were a team again.

I got pregnant with Jax when Ryder was ten. A big age difference. Something that most people thought would’ve rocked David and me. But it didn’t. Jax did what he was born to do. Made the world lighter. Happier.

Ryder adored his little brother. Took his job as protector seriously. Our family was perfect, or as close to it as we could get.

Then David walked out the door to grab some beer. He needed to cool off because we had been in a fight. Not even a bad one. It was stupid, really. I’d been pissed he was late for dinner. He was pissed that he’d come home to a bitchy wife after working a fifty-hour week.

So he went to cool off.

And never came home.

Perfect blew up in my face.

“Have a good day, sweetie,” I said to Ryder, not kissing him on the cheek because I knew I was pushing it with the ‘sweetie’ comment in the drop-off section of the Black Mountain High School.

It didn’t look like a regular high school, of course. Its