Free Bellefleur by Joyce Carol Oates

his doubts about the wisdom of Gideon’s marriage to a cousin from across the lake.
    (It was not simply that Leah was a first cousin of Gideon’s, but that she was a “poor” relative; and not simply that her mother Della bitterly despised the rest of the family; but, decades ago, the entire family—headed at that time by Jeremiah and Elvira, her parents—united to oppose poor Della’s infatuation with Stanton Pym on the grounds that this upstart young bank clerk with his fashionable outfits and his imported automobile was a shameless, fantastic, ingenious fortune hunter, and any issue of their union was likely to be flawed—though strapping Leah did not appear to be flawed.)
    Nevertheless the marriage did take place, and Leah and Gideon obviously adored each other, and Leah quickly became pregnant—but not too quickly, for that would have disturbed the older Bellefleurs as much as it would have disturbed Della herself—and gave birth to twins after a lengthy but not inordinately fussy labor; and all was well. For a while. For several years. And then . . . Do you know what I wish, she whispered to Gideon, I wish we would have another baby, do you think I’m silly, do you think the twins are still too small . . . ? And she began to yearn for a baby, to daydream, to invent silly names; even to befriend her sister-in-law Lily, who had of course been living in the manor for years before Leah’s own arrival, and who was somewhat disdainful (ah, it’s mere jealousy! Gideon assured her) of Gideon’s bride. Competitive as a girl in her horseback riding and swimming and even in her schoolwork (though she had never been a really good student, her mind was too restless, her imagination too playful) she began to feel, to be, competitive as a woman. As a mother. As a would-be mother. She looked upon Lily with envy, though she did not envy Lily her husband, or her actual children (except for sloe-eyed Raphael with his shy good manners and his obvious admiration for her ); she coveted her sister-in-law’s easy pregnancies. Naturally she did not really want to be a brood mare (as she unforgivably said one night, in Cornelia’s presence, uncaring how her words offended her mother-in-law) but she would not have minded, no, she would not at all have minded, just one more baby. Even a girl.
    A fever of desire grew in her, and she and Gideon made love passionately, and frequently; sometimes one would feel the other staring, and turn, and see with a pang of desire so strong it was nearly convulsive (and this quite frequently in public, even at large social gatherings in neighbors’ homes) the other gazing so rawly, so openly that—that there was nothing to be done except the two of them must stammer excuses, and leave, and hurry away together. They were hardly able to wait until they were safe in the privacy of their suite of rooms before they tore at each other’s clothes, and kissed hungrily, and groaned aloud with the violence of their desire. Once they did not make it to the manor, but hurried into the old icehouse at the edge of the lake; another time, returning from a wedding party in Nautauga Falls, Gideon drove his car boldly off the road and across a hilly field until it came to rest, not quite hidden, in a stand of burnt-out hemlock.
    Gideon fell ever more deeply in love with his wife over the years. It was indeed like falling—he felt himself sinking, plunging, disappearing—being sucked into a passion for her, for her voracious appetite for him as well as for her glorious body itself, which he had never anticipated as a bridegroom. He fell more and more deeply in love with Leah, and at the same time he rather feared her. During their turbulent courtship he had been halfway fearful of her, but halfway amused as well—she was so defiantly virginal, so clear to give her young cousin to know that she disdained love and marriage and sex and above all men and their animal natures; but after their marriage, after the