"Why isn't your husband doing this?" he snarked.
I bit back a less than daughterly reply. "Because he's at work. I'm perfectly capable of doing this, Dad."
I got the impression my father looked down his nose at my husband for some things. Not that he didn't like my husband, because my parents adored him, especially after I spent years with a real jerk.
But he always seemed to think my husband should do it all.
"You can't wait to do this until he gets home?"
I didn't want to admit my husband was clueless about home electrical systems. I would sooner lick a porcupine than let my husband touch wiring. "Dad, please, just answer my question."
His tone turned gruff. "Listen to me, young lady—"
Only my parents could get away with calling a nearly forty year-old woman that. "Dad, you are the one who taught me how to change my own oil and tires, right? Why the heck can't you help me do this, too? My husband works very hard at a good job that pays pretty damn well and allows me to work from home and do what I love. I'd think you'd be happy for me."
Low blow, and I knew it, but it worked. I could almost hear him backtracking.
He sighed the big, put-upon I know she's right but I'm still her father sigh. "How many wires did you say you have?"
I finished an hour later. I turned on the breaker for the living room circuit and watched as my new ceiling fan lazily spun to life.
When my husband returned home later that evening, he wrapped his arms around my waist and kissed the back of my neck. "It looks great, sweetheart. Why didn't you wait for me?
I would have helped you."
I shrugged as I leaned against him, feeling calm and settled with him home. "No big deal. I don't mind." That was the irony. I didn't mind, per se. It was nice knowing I wasn't one of those weakling, wussie women who couldn't even use a pair of jumper cables properly. I felt a little pride—okay, a lot of pride—that I had done it by myself. Well, with my Dad's advice, but mostly by myself.
No matter what kind of pretzel I'd contorted myself into, my ex had rarely paid me complements about my accomplishments. Usually he found fault and picked my doings apart, all under the guise of constructive criticism.
Not my husband.
He kissed the top of my head. "You're so good at this stuff.
I'm so proud of you."
I hugged his arms tighter around me, wrapping me in a cocoon of strength and security. No, I wouldn't trade a thousand handymen for my husband. Not on your life.
Men are no more born with a fix-it chromosome than women are born with a shopping gene. My husband and I were two living proof examples of that. How perfect that we'd found each other.
And yet ... there were still traditional roles that we filled.
When he had to have his gall bladder out I sat alone in the waiting room, near panic, feeling stupid that I was crying and looking like a moron. One of the hospital chaplains saw me and must have thought my husband was dying until I admitted he was only in for a routine gall bladder removal.
Hell, he was supposed to go home with me that afternoon as long as there were no complications.
by Tymber Dalton
I'll never forget how the chaplain sat back and looked at me like I'd grown a third eyeball.
He's my angel, my husband is. How do you explain to someone? Who cares if I can rebuild a car engine, the thought of ever losing my husband terrifies the crap out of me. When he leaves the house every day, a piece of me leaves with him, worry always in the back of my mind until I see his sweet face walk through the door again that night.
I had never felt more relief than I did when the nurse called me back to recovery and I could hold his hand and reassure myself that he was okay.
He came back to me.
He always came back to me.
Thank God!
Later that night, after I'd got him settled in our bed and his pain medicine had taken him securely off to dreamland, I curled next to him with my ear pressed against his chest and listened to his strong and steady heartbeat.
I needed him. I'd spent so many years in a mental and emotional wasteland before him that to lose him, I knew, would be a pain I could never bear. I would do anything for him. With the exception of my child, I'd never loved anyone as much as I loved my husband.
He always made me feel safe and secure. Cherished.
Loved. I knew he would die for me to protect me if ever put into the position.
I couldn't say the same about my ex, that's for damn sure.
So what if he couldn't remember which was the master cylinder and which was the power steering pump when checking the fluids? Who the fuck cared?
He loved me.
And I loved him.
Chapter 2
him
I love making love to my wife. She's always said she enjoys it, and when I've felt less-than, it never fails to raise my spirits ... among other things.
I truly don't see her imperfections. What kind of hypocrite would I be to poke fun at a woman who lights my world when I don't have a perfect body? When she is apparently blind to my shortcomings?
Never.
As far as I'm concerned, she's the most beautiful woman in the world, and she always will be.
There were times I'd chafe when she'd take control of something in our lives, my male pride bristling that there was yet another thing I couldn't do well. Whether it was changing out a part in the toilet so it didn't run up the damn water bill, to changing out the power steering pump on the car.
Yes, she did that. All of that. She's an amazing woman and I'm fucking lucky to have her.
I'll be the first to admit I'm not good at that kind of stuff and she is, from training and instinct. At first I think we both danced around things in the early years. I would watch her literally pull herself up during a discussion, the wheels practically turning in her head as she stopped short and either yes-deared me or simply changed subject, not wanting to bruise my ego.
Another thing I loved her for.
Men are supposed to fix the car and the roof and the fucking toilet. I'm not a moron, but I'm book smart and I know it, not good with my hands at all. Men aren't supposed to be standing on the ground holding the ladder while their wife is up on the roof applying a tar patch around a vent pipe to keep water from leaking in.
She never rubbed it in.
Ever.
I'm more likely to get yelled at for a stupid computer question that she's answered for me a dozen or more times, or for not locking the keypad on my cell phone and texting her a bunch of blank messages while my phone is in my pocket.
When the first fantasies started, mild hints and nudges from her in bed to take control, I tried. I really did. I wanted to do that for her. But there's some things, no matter how much you love someone, that you can't admit.
How could I admit to her that I wanted those same things
... from her? She already did so much. Was I supposed to dump one more thing on her? Here, do it all, honey. Take control of it all.
That wasn't fair to her even though the thought made me harder than fucking granite.
I spent a lot of time alternately resentful and hating myself for it. Not resentful of her, of the situation.
One night we were making love. As I fucked her, she reached behind me and stroked my balls. Damn, I love when she does that. And as her hand rested on my ass, I bit back the urge to say, "Just a little more, baby. You're almost there."
She'd been through so much before we were together. I'd seen her at her worst and knew there were things she never wanted to revisit. Would it make me any better than her ex to ask those kinds of things of her? Was the context that much different despite us being together over a decade?