I Don't Have to Live With Him

Watching the elegant nightmare abandon every shred of restraint and bellow, I felt the corner of my mouth lift of its own accord. I regarded her with an easy expression and spoke. The tension had not entirely left me, though. The fingers locked around the arm of my chair trembled in a fine, constant shiver.

"If you keep coming at me like this, Mother, we're going to have a problem."

"That's my line. A rolling stone trying to pry loose the stone already set in the ground—I never imagined you would be brazen enough to make such an outrageous demand. Do you honestly believe that makes any sense?"

And what part of it, exactly, failed to make sense? I turned to the butler.

"Butler. Give some thought to which of us you'll be living with longer in this ducal house."

"Butler!"

At my words the elegant nightmare called for him again, louder still. The butler drew out a handkerchief and dabbed at the sweat beading on his brow.

Yes. You'll be weighing it too.

Of course he would. I was only twenty. The elegant nightmare was staring down fifty. Death kept no particular order, but the odds that I would outlive her were considerably better.

Which meant that if he took her side in this moment, his life would grow very hard indeed once she was gone.

Even so, coming over to my side outright would be awkward for him.

I was twenty, a fledgling who had yet to prove I could actually do the work. If he backed me blindly and earned the elegant nightmare's grudge, he might well be left holding the bag later on.

I did not expect him to choose me on the spot. I also did not expect him to throw the whole of his weight behind her.

What I wanted was a reasonable compromise. Life, however, refused to follow the prediction even on the second time through.

"This matter…"

The butler hesitated, then let his gaze fall to the floor and answered.

"I will ask the master."

And who in this house could be called master?

The true head of the family, out on the battlefield: Duke James Parnel. The moment that name took the field, the vulgar nightmare swelled with triumph, slammed a fist down on the table, and shouted.

"You mean to pester my son with a letter while he's busy fighting for the country? Over a trifle like this?"

A trifle? Was the duchy's treasury a trifle?

I stared at the vulgar nightmare with open contempt. She caught my look and was just loading another mouthful of filth too foul to repeat when the butler put an end to our quarrel. With impeccable composure, he set out his view once more.

"I believe that would be for the best."

"Yes. I suppose it would."

It was the elegant nightmare who nodded and added her agreement. She recovered her poise, turned an elegant smile on me, and I could guess well enough where that confidence came from.

She's certain James will take her side. Obviously.

And that certainty was not entirely wrong.

In my previous life, my husband had lived up to his title as everyone else's champion and taken every side but mine. That I never truly held the reins of the household until the elegant nightmare died owed a great deal to him.

I can't let it happen again.

The moment I reached my room, I went straight to the desk and took out paper and an envelope.

You think you're the only ones who can write letters? I can write one too.

In my last life I had not known what kind of man my husband was. This life was different. I set the situation before him without softening a single word.

It had taken me five years to seize real authority, and the elegant nightmare's endless schemes to wrest it back again had cost the family dearly. Even James, returning victorious from the war, had been hamstrung by the depleted coffers.

But I know the future.

I already knew where the gold vein would break and which ventures would strike it rich. Doubling the fortune was no empty boast.

And as for the peace of the household…

From long ago, James had cooed about peace, peace, peace, until anyone watching might have wondered whether a dove had been reborn in his skin. But peace in a house did not come from blindly obeying one's elders.

He shouldn't be listening to them. He should be listening to me.

Peace in a household came from a proper chain of command. A husband who led tens of thousands understood at once when a situation was put to him in the language of an army, which was precisely why I had worked that comparison into the letter.

If you want the peace you keep wishing for, put the real power in my hands.

Even a blockhead ought to understand if I spelled it out that far. So thinking, I brought the letter to a close, pleasantly certain that all I had to do now was await the reply and enjoy the sight of the elegant nightmare's face crumpling.

How very innocent of me.

A month passed. The reply that came back from my husband after that month said this, and nothing more. It was too brief to misread.

"…Y-you bastard!"

The instant I read it, I tore the letter to pieces.

And so the fledgling duchess's rebellion was reduced to nothing by a single letter from the duke. The price of a failed revolt was steep. Better, by far, never to have rebelled at all.

"Damn it."

I woke in the morning and let the curse out under my breath. With not so much as a stick of firewood granted to it, the room was as cold as the dead of winter. I rubbed the reddened tip of my nose and pulled the blanket up over my head.

"What a rotten lot."

Having lost the war for authority to the elegant nightmare in full, I was repaid with treatment more wretched still.

A freezing room where no one would light a fire. Bread so hard and dry it might have been left out for a week. Maids who would not come no matter how I called. The elegant nightmare's orders, without a doubt.

I bit my lip, shivering.

I was too complacent. He isn't called everyone else's side for nothing.

I had never imagined he would take the mothers' part even against the butler and against my letter. My fist clenched. If he had been standing in front of me, I would have struck him across the back.

The move had been reckless, and yet I felt wronged. The James I knew would have taken my side in a situation like this. I was grinding my teeth over the twenty-five-year-old James I had never met when a chilling thought occurred to me.

Don't tell me… that was all the improvement I got out of living with him?

No. That was simply too much. Even then, that man had been on everyone else's side!

He's hopeless. A truly hopeless man.

Was I supposed to take that hopeless man and reform him all over again? The years I had been given back suddenly seemed a cruelty.

I had barely molded him into something that resembled a human being, and now I was meant to make a human of him a second time? Flung backward through the years with no explanation at all?

God! This really isn't fair.

The injustice of it nearly brought me to tears. I was tearing at the pillow with hands frozen stiff when the door flew open without so much as a knock, and a harsh voice came pouring in.

"Where in all the world is there a daughter-in-law as lazy as this! The mothers-in-law are all up and about, and you're sprawled in bed?"

Who in this house would behave with so little breeding? Only one person. I pushed myself up from under the blanket, hair a mess, and answered.

"…Third Mother."

The vulgar nightmare herself.

Whatever she had eaten since dawn to be brimming with quite so much vigor, she roared until the room rang.

"Taking a woman into this family is a matter of the utmost importance, and then a thing like that walks in! A brazen creature like you will be thrown out the moment James returns, so pack your bags in advance!"

"What—!"

The sheer absurdity of it sent the blood rushing to my face. I was just about to shout back at the vulgar nightmare when I stopped.

Wait.

Something in what she had said struck me square across the head.

Thrown out? Immediately?

I really was slow. The thought I ought to have had from the very beginning was only now arriving. It felt as though the scales had dropped clean from my eyes. At the new understanding, I went still as ice.

That's right. Why should I have to live with that James in my second life either?

People lived only once, and so they stumbled forward without knowing what lay ahead, telling themselves this must be the best they could do.

But I'm not like that, am I?

Enlightened, I looked at the vulgar nightmare as if spellbound and said,

"Mother, you really are a genius."

"…What did you say?"

"I said you're a genius, Mother! Yes, yes. Thanks to you, I've realized something I was missing."

Yes. Remaking James and living with him had been hard enough. Was I truly meant to undertake that penance a second time?

And then there are the nightmares themselves.

I was steadier now, but in my younger years I had been bullied by them and cried more than my share. There had even been times I shook at the thought that James might truly cast me out when he came home.

I had forgotten all of it as the years went by.

That's right. One marriage was enough. What reason is there to do it twice? This life, I'm not living with James!

I had just clenched my fist on that vow when the vulgar nightmare tilted her head. She had clearly expected me to start screaming at her at any moment, and instead I was suddenly bright-eyed and singing her praises. It must have looked very strange.

"Are you in your right—"

I had nothing more to say to her. I cut her off cleanly and pushed her out of my room.

"I need to wash now. Thank you, Mother!"

The vulgar nightmare was not the sort to leave meekly just because I pushed, but she was so thoroughly flustered that she went. The door slammed shut. Leaning against it, I pressed my lips tight, afraid the wild hammering of my heart might escape as sound.

Excitement had left my eyes glittering.

That's right. I don't have to live in this house this life either, do I?

Looking back on my marriage to James, the painful days had far outnumbered the happy ones. It was not only that he sided endlessly with everyone else. It was everything about him.

How little he spoke. How little interest he had ever shown in me. And how often he had wanted me.

I had nearly died bringing our first child into the world. The labor had dragged on for a full twenty hours. Even when I clawed my way back from the edge of death, he had not been at my side. And yet, when fear of bearing another child made me shrink from the nights, he went on demanding that I lie with him all the same.