Sometimes you felt that your husband was too old for you.
He’s like a gentleman from the 1800s: calling you “beloved” instead of something less spine-tingly like “sweetheart,” singing Frank Sinatra word for word as if he had listened to it on the radio as often as you listened to Taylor Swift, and correcting historical accounts and ending debates with a surety that only someone who had actually been there would have.
“She totally meant to do it,” you insisted, pausing the History Channel recording.
“And I’m telling you she didn’t,” he said, amusement painted all over his face. “She was facing execution after being accused of things she thought she had a clear conscience of. Especially a charge from her son, accusing her of incest.”
“It’s the people who know they will die that do the most ridiculous things. Like a big, final ‘fuck you’ to the world,” you pointed out.
“And it’s also the people who know they will die who speak the truth. She wrote a letter to explain that she had done nothing she thought was wrong, and that God's will was by her side.”
“Psh, people on their deathbeds can still lie. Concubines would lie to the emperor in their last moments if it meant their son could inherit the throne.”
“Ah but we’re talking about the old world here, where religion and virtue were held in high regard because faith in God was strong.”
You had to give him that one. The Roman Empire used faith to wage wars, so it wasn’t like faith in god was an absolute thing for the clergy who led the processions, but the knights of templar, the followers—those believers were the real deal. If they weren’t devout, then they were fanatics, and if not that, then they were dead.
“But still! Her last words were ‘oh sorry I stepped on your foot.’ Of all the things she could’ve apologized for, it had to be for stepping on the foot of her executioner,” you said in disbelief, launching him a look full of doubt. “You can’t tell me she really didn’t mean to step on the foot of her killer and really meant her apology.”
“Not everybody is spiteful like you are,” he said with a chuckle, the arm around your shoulder and a kiss on your forehead making the accusation more lighthearted than it should be.
You felt the offense die in your throat, replaced with a warm, gooey feeling.
“It’s like you know I’ll hurt you for saying these things to me but you still do it.” You scoffed. “Just like Marie Antoinette, knowing the suffering of her people and still going off to throw money at other countries.”
“It was a turbulent time. Who knew what she was thinking? Maybe she thought she was defending her country.”
“With genocide?” You raised a powerfully skeptical eyebrow.
“People do bad things for good reason.”
“Now you just sound like a villain.”
“Your villain,” he grinned, wrapping his other arm around you in a full hug. Charmed, you put your arms around him too, relishing in the warmth he gave off.
“Alright villain, go cook dinner. I’m starving and you promised chicken alfredo with the good parm.”
“Only if you give me a few more kisses.”
The definition of ‘a few’ was always loose with him. It could mean a few, or it could mean a few minutes of kissing.
You laid one on his forehead, a repeat of what he had done, one on each cheek, and a peck on the lips before he was satisfied.
Which was good because if he wasn’t satisfied with that last kiss, you would’ve bitten him or something. You were hungry.
“Should we pair it with a red wine? I bought a new bottle of cabernet the other day,” he said as he began to get up and walk to the kitchen.
“Sounds good!”
While he cooked dinner, you moved to clean up the attic. Your mother was visiting soon, insisting that she must see the state of your independence and cohabitation with your spouse before going on her first retirement vacation. You and your husband had been cleaning the place from top to bottom for the past week.
It wasn’t as if the house was particularly filthy, but it was your husband’s family home, and he’s lived in it since he was a child. That meant that he’s gotten used to the little gray lines in the grout of the bathroom tiles, the water stains on the stainless steel kitchen faucet, and the dust bunnies underneath the living room couch.
Only the attic was left now, and you thought to air it out, or vacuum a bit so no dust fell if your mom decided to be a little tyrant and pull down the ladder.
You carefully pulled the vacuum up the ladder before pushing it through the opening of the attic, using it to offset any cobwebs before you walked in on them and got that gross feeling of cobwebs on your skin.
When you got up there, it was less dusty than you thought it’d be.
Still, it wouldn’t hurt to clean it up before it became a dust bunny colony.
WIth the plug in hand, you went to find an outlet, and bumped a box on your way there. It crashed onto the floor before you could save it, and you heard your husband call out worriedly.
“Is everything alright?”
“Yeah!” you shouted back. “Just bumped into something!”
You heard him say something along the lines of being careful as he probably went back to cooking, and you crouched down to pick up the spilled box. The tape was so old that the impact to the floor had made it burst open, spilling out a plethora of photo albums.
Curiously, you flipped through them and their thick, outdated casings, and found black-and-white photographs. Almost like antiques.
In one of them, your husband’s visage looks back at you, as if he hadn’t aged a day.
On the back of the photo, the date: Jan. 18, 1643.
There were more—sometimes it would be with multiple people, like a family photo. 1688, 1721, 1732, 1795, 1801…
As you slowly approached the modern day photos with outfits you were more familiar with instead of petticoats and cravats, and as color suffused the images with a definition that made you realize the man in the photo never once deviated from the likeness of your husband, you also realized that you were indeed, holding an antique.
The newest photo was 1943.
Quickly wiping your hands and closing the albums with careful touches, you packed them back into the box.
It was amazing to think that these photos survived in such good condition—it’d be a shame if something like your grubby, human oil hands and dead skin cells made it age. It really should belong behind some sanitized, air-tight glass case in a museum.
The chicken alfredo was delicious as always.
Usually, you loved watching your husband cook. It was like he’s done it a thousand times, and has perfected the art of cooking. He could probably even give Gordon Ramsay a run for his money.
“So I found some photo albums in the attic,” you said, scraping off the last of the melted parm.
“What photo albums?” he asked, polishing off his wine.
“The really old ones. Don’t know if you knew they existed but damn, your family genes are strong. Your however-many-great-grandpas all look like clones of you,” you joked, placing the fork down when the sauce had been eaten so cleanly, the only other thing you could do was lick the plate directly.
You were tempted to do so but paused when your husband choked on his wine.
“What?”
“Yeah, you have a bunch of antique photos up there. You really didn’t know?”
“I knew,” he said, clearing his throat as he wiped his mouth. “I just didn’t think you would find those old things. Or call my great…grandpas clones.”
“You ever thought about putting it in a museum or something? Could net you a ton of money.”
You proceeded to clean the plate of its last bits, watching as your husband got up to take it away with an exasperated sigh. Especially when you didn’t let go.
“Am I starving you?” he asked dryly.
“No, I can’t eat another bite. But it’s just so good.”
“I can give you something better if you give me the plate.”
You let go of the plate, and he clears the table, putting the dishes in the sink. The water runs for a bit before you hear the fridge door open, and the sound of cabinets and bowls come alive.
A minute later, he comes back with two bowls of vanilla ice cream.
“You DO love me!”
He placed the bowl in front of you, and smiled.
“Of course I do.” He sat down with his own bowl. “And I never thought about putting it in a museum. I don’t feel very comfortable just putting my family’s things out there for strangers to gawk at.”
You thought about it for a bit. If you had photos of your grandparents or great-great grandparents, would you feel the same about it?
But now add on the fact that your however-many-great-grandparent’s face looks exactly like yours…
Perhaps finding your own face in the museum would be awkward. Imagine someone walking in the streets and asking about you and your family because you have the same face.
“Makes sense,” you settled, and dug into your ice cream. “By the way, my mom’s vacation is in four days. After she visits, come with me to send her off at the airport?”
“Definitely. Can’t let my mother-in-law go enjoy herself without seeing the both of us happy and healthy, right?”
Your mom came and fussed, but no more than usual, and then she was off to the Carribeans to enjoy her first vacation alone, without the stress of husband and children.
You wished her well, but more than that, you were happy that she wasn’t hounding you about your cleanliness, your eating habits, and so on. Sure, you weren’t the most successful person, but you were satisfied with what you had.
Husband included.
He was weeding in the garden, and you thoughtfully poured a refreshing drink for him. Strawberry lemonade that he prepared the night before.
You added a few ice cubes, a sprig of mint, and met him outside.
“Here.” You thrust the glass in his face, and he blinked in surprise, then smiled.
“Thanks.”
“So how are the…” You looked down at the patch of the garden he was tending to. “The pumpkins?”
“They’ll be ready in October, as they do every year,” he said, taking a gulp of the lemonade and wiping some sweat away with the back of his arm.
“By the way, are you sure we can just…live off of your inheritance?” you asked hesitantly.
While you were satisfied with what you had, you knew that might not be the case with your husband.
“While I do want you to go out and do something, it’s less because of money and more because I want you to have a healthy mentality, beloved,” he said, rising from the dirt and giving you a light peck on the cheek.
And there he goes again, calling you beloved and giving you goosebumps, like taking a super warm shower after a night out in the snow.
“My mentality is plenty healthy,” you muttered.
“Staying at home all day to play games and remote jobs aren’t all life has to offer. You can choose to work part time, enjoy the atmosphere of a cafe or the rush of a restaurant…”
“We can do that on our dates,” you pointed out.
“True. Working and being a customer is different though. I’m not saying you have to either. You could participate in functions or conventions, fun things even, not just work—just, anything to learn and experience a bit more, right? There’s a lot to see in the world.”
You suppose it could be worse. Your mother always said customer service hell was all part of the rite of passage to becoming an adult, but that was a generation entrenched and set in the ways of ‘this has always been, and will always be,’ even if it wasn’t true. The truth was that the more the abused excused the abuse, the abusers will continue to abuse.
You didn’t go through college for this crap to continue.
And this was also the reason you married this husband of yours; he knew that mental health existed, so you decided to compromise. Functions did seem fun. It would be even better if you dragged him along, so you didn’t have to do all the talking and socializing. You could do some, if he asked nicely.
Or even better, the two of you could go do something you both never done before, and learn something together. He always seemed interested in everything and anything.
Instead of saying this compromise to his face, you brushed it off as if changing the subject.
“You sound like an old man.”
“And sometimes I wonder if I married a spouse or adopted a kid,” he retorted with a grin.
You punched him in the shoulder, hard enough to jolt the half-full lemonade glass, but not hard enough to actually spill it, and he yelped.
“Once again, you aggravate me like poking a wild bear. Do you never learn?”
“I think you’re a rather cute bear,” he said, nearly hugging you before you push him away.
“You stink of sweat and dirt. Go take a bath first!”
“Babe, what’s this?”
Your husband looked up from the book he was reading and his eyes widened.
“Oh. Uh, that’s one of my great-grandpa’s plague doctor masks.”
“He was a plague doctor? Like an actual plague doctor? Not a LARPer?” you giddily asked, skipping over to sit by him.
“Yes.” He reached out for the mask and you handed it over. You always found it fascinating how intact your husband’s family history was. Unbroken by war, unweathered by time—even though this place was far from Europe, there were still remnants of history from there.
“Tell me about it?” you prompted.
“Well, he was a plague doctor. That meant curing sick people, recording the wills of those he couldn’t save, burying the dead, and keeping himself healthy in the meantime.” His fingers drift over one of the glass lenses of the mask. “Want to try it on?”
“Is it safe?” you asked skeptically.
While you wanted to touch it, you were afraid there was some remnant of disease to it. As cool as history was, some of it wasn’t that cool.
“Don’t worry, he washed it very well, especially after every time he came back,” your husband reassured you. “Sanitation was a huge part of being a plague doctor. In fact, the beak of a plague doctor mask was to filter out disease-ridden air. It was filled with herbs and flowers that smelled nice too. I think he put roses in his.”
“Really?” You stuck your head closer to sniff it, and your husband put it over your head.
Everything fell dark, but you could see through the glass lenses—not clearly, as the lenses were scratched up quite a bit, but you’d think if you wore it for a few hours, those scratches would be ignorable.
And it really was as your husband said.
It smelled like roses.
The scent was faded, not quite as fresh as a spritz of rose perfume would be, but it must have had so many roses stuffed into it that it retained the smell even to now.
“It’s like a car freshener.”
He laughed.
“Yeah, it kinda was. There was a cane too, I think. Want to go find it?”
“Hell yes. Can I borrow it for a LARP or is that too disrespectful?”
“I don’t think my great-grandpa would mind.”
“Don’t you just feel like a graverobber sometimes? You’re, what, 300 years old?”
“Somewhere closer to 500, but it’s not like that.”
“Yeah, whatever. Here’s your papers. It’ll pass for when you get that marriage certificate of yours, if not heavy inspection, so don’t go doing crimes. Now give me my money.”
Money is counted and exchanged. “Your family’s always been reliable when I needed help. How’s your son?”
“He’s not in the business, but my daughter will be. You don’t have to worry about finding another contractor for fake IDs for another generation yet.”
“That’s good to hear.”
“Seriously though, you never answered my question. Don’t you feel like a graverobber?”
“And again, I say it’s not like that. It’s about companionship.”
“...uh-huh. We’ll see how long before this newest spouse of yours runs for the hills and calls for a witch hunt.”
“That won’t happen. There’s too much media these days about the supernatural for the youth to feel anything but fascination. At least, it’s true for my spouse.”
“...ugh. Get out of here, you walking geriatric. If I see you on the science news or you get kidnapped to Area 51, it’s not my problem.”
He bid his business partner farewell with a new set of identity papers, and went home.
When he opened the door, there you were, sitting in the living room with a new article of his past.
“Hun, is this a real claymore?!”
Despite your strength, you were holding the blade awkwardly, and he laughed.
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