Sex after children

She didn’t know how long she sat like that on the cold tiles until her tears dried up on their own, leaving only emptiness and a headache. Getting up, she avoided looking at both the stain on the floor and her reflection. She washed her face with icy water, hoping it would bring her back to reality, but reality was exactly this – shattered and uncomfortable.

Leaving the bathroom, she almost mechanically began tidying the bedroom, moving stacks of baby clothes from place to place, trying to occupy herself with anything just to avoid thinking. She reached to adjust a photo frame on his nightstand – their joint wedding photo – and knocked over another one standing behind it.

The frame fell flat on the carpet with a dull thud. Anna flinched and picked it up.

And froze, as if struck by lightning.

It was their old photo. Taken hastily, with a point-and-shoot camera, during a vacation in Crimea three years ago. There were no perfect poses or professional lighting. They stood on the seashore, bathed in the sunset. The sea behind them blazed orange and gold. Alex, tanned, his eyes sparkling with laughter, was carrying her in his arms, while she, struggling playfully, was dissolved in happy, carefree laughter. Her hair, wet from seawater, flew in the wind. She wore only a short sundress, clinging to her body, and her bare feet were covered in sand. She was tanned, slender, full of unbridled, wild energy and life. Her eyes shone with such happiness, such confidence in herself and in him, that it was painful to look at now.

Anna slowly ran her finger over the glass, over her laughing face. The girl from the photo looked back at her with challenge and carefree ease. She didn’t know about stretch marks, sleepless nights, or guilt. She didn’t know that her body, which she carried so lightly and joyfully across the beach, would one day become a source of shame and alienation for her. She loved, was loved, and was nothing but desire and possibility.

What had happened to that girl? Where had her strength gone? Her sexuality? Her light, almost animalistic joy in her own body?

The comparison was so cruel that Anna gasped aloud, as if from physical pain. She convulsively, almost throwing it, put the frame back in place, turning it to face the wall. She couldn’t look at it anymore. It was like looking at a photo of a dead person.

She turned away and stared out the window. It was a gloomy, gray day outside. Rain was about to start. A longing, heavy and sticky like tar, filled her completely, without a trace. She walked to the dresser, to the top drawer where her underwear was. Once, this drawer had been full of lace, silk, bright colors – scarlet, purple, black. Now, she pushed aside a few plain, practical nursing bras and felt for what she was looking for.

Deep in the corner, forgotten and crumpled, lay one of those very “early” lingerie sets – black, made of the finest French lace, almost weightless. She used to adore it. Alex did too.

She took it out and spread it on the dresser. The lace looked fragile and absurd against the rough wood, like an artifact from a civilization that no longer existed. Anna slowly, almost ritualistically, took off her cotton robe and house dress. She stood before the mirror, flooded with the cold light of the gray day, and looked at her reflection wearing only this luxurious, meaningless lingerie.

The sight was depressing and pathetic. The flip side of a glossy magazine. The treacherous lace didn’t hide but emphasized the flabby skin of her stomach, her sagging breasts, the stretch marks. It hung on her like a sack, screaming of incongruity. This lingerie was created for seduction, for play, for a body that knew its worth and knew how to enjoy itself. Not for this tired, exhausted body of a mother, smelling of milk and baby cream.

She stood like that for several minutes, feeling tears stream down her cheeks again – quiet, soundless, desperate. She tried to summon a drop of her former confidence, a spark of that fire that had once made her blush with anticipation when she put this on for him. Nothing. Only icy cold and an aching sense of shame.

She tore off the lace as if it were burning her skin and threw it back into the drawer, into the farthest corner. Then she pulled on her old, stretched-out sweatpants – her uniform, her armor. Only in them did she feel somewhat protected now.

A grunting sound came from the bedroom – Sofia was starting to wake up. The maternal instinct kicked in instantly, drowning out the personal drama. Anna wiped her face, took a deep breath, and went to her daughter. Her face took on its usual, loving, calm expression.

But inside, something had finally broken. The crack hadn’t only formed between her and Alex. Now it ran through herself, splitting her into two parts foreign to each other – the one that was before, and the one that was now. And she didn’t know if they could ever become one whole again.

Chapter 4: A Silent Scene

The silence that had settled between them after the evening in the living room was a special kind of torture. It wasn’t empty; it was densely populated by the ghosts of unspoken words, glances that were immediately averted, and sighs that got stuck in throats. They had learned to masterfully avoid each other within their own apartment, their movements honed to automaticity, like prisoners long accustomed to prison ritual.

Alex drowned himself in work. Anna drowned herself in Sofia. Their worlds, so recently united and indivisible, now orbited separately, only occasionally and tragically colliding.

A few more days passed. It was the weekend. A nasty autumn drizzle fell outside, forcing them to remain indoors, within walls that seemed to grow tighter with each passing hour. Sofia, as if sensing the general nervousness, was fussier than usual, and by evening Anna felt like a wrung-out lemon – exhausted, on edge, ready to burst into tears at any wrong look.

Alex had spent the day fiddling with his laptop in the kitchen, but Anna could see – he wasn’t working. He was just staring at the screen, aimlessly scrolling through pages, his fingers drumming on the table. He was like a lion in a cage, and his silent tension hung in the air, mixing with her own fatigue, creating a volatile, explosive mixture.

By nine in the evening, Sofia finally gave up and sank into a deep, serene sleep. An indecent, oppressive silence fell over the apartment, broken only by the steady ticking of the clock and the mournful patter of rain against the glass.

Anna, dead on her feet, shuffled out of the bedroom and headed to the kitchen to pour herself some tea. Alex was sitting at the table, staring into space. He looked up at her. His eyes were dark, tired, holding the same drained emptiness that was in hers.

“Asleep?” he asked, and his voice sounded hoarse from long silence.

“Asleep,” she nodded, turning toward the kettle so she wouldn’t have to see his face.

She felt his gaze on her back. It was heavy, physically palpable. She knew what he was thinking. About the same thing she was thinking but was afraid to admit to herself. That now was that very “convenient moment.” That they were alone. That the child was asleep. That it was time… to talk? To hug? To try?

Fear, cold and clammy, tightened her throat. She didn’t want conversations or attempts. She wanted to be left alone. For this night to be over and morning to come, bringing with it the familiar routine that didn’t require emotional strength.

The kettle whistled and clicked off. The sound seemed deafeningly loud in the kitchen’s silence. She poured boiling water into a mug, watching the tea leaves stain the water a dark, pungent color.

A chair scraped behind her. She flinched without turning around. She heard him approach. His breath was close. He stopped a step away from her, not daring to touch her.

“Anna,” he said quietly, and that one word held a whole universe of longing, pain, and bewilderment. “We can’t go on like this.”

She froze with the mug in her hands, feeling its heat burn her palms. She didn’t answer. Couldn’t. The words were stuck somewhere deep inside, buried under layers of apathy and fear.

“I can’t live like this,” he continued, and his voice trembled. “We live like neighbors. As if a glass wall has been put up between us. I look at you, you look right through me. We only talk about the child, about everyday things. We… we don’t even sleep in the same bed. We sleep on opposite edges of it.”

She remained silent, staring into the dark depths of her tea. Every phrase of his was a needle piercing the very heart of her guilt. He was right. Absolutely right. But her silence wasn’t stubbornness. It was paralysis. She was like a rabbit before a boa constrictor, hypnotized by her own helplessness.

“Say something!” desperation broke through in his voice. He grabbed her shoulder and forced her to turn around to face him.

His touch, sudden and rough, was the trigger. All her accumulated fatigue, fear, irritation, and pain burst out in a single, blind impulse. She jerked sharply, broke free, and the hot tea from the mug splashed onto his hand and onto the floor.

“Don’t touch me!” she shouted, and her own voice sounded foreign, wild, hysterical to her. “Don’t touch me, do you hear?!”

They froze, looking at each other with identical expressions of shock. On his face, the pain from the burn mixed with the pain from her scream. On hers – horror at what she had done and a wild, animal fear.

“My God, Anna,” he whispered, looking at the reddened skin on his hand. “I wasn’t going to hit you. I just… I just wanted to get through to you.”

He was telling the truth. He would never raise a hand to her. His touch hadn’t been a blow. It had been a plea. But her nervous system, worn down to nothing, had reacted precisely as if it were a threat.

“I can’t,” she babbled, retreating from him toward the wall as if seeking protection. “I can’t when you… when you touch me like that. I feel like I’ll suffocate. I feel like I’m going crazy.”

He looked at her, and the shock in his eyes slowly, inexorably gave way to something else. Something cold and frightening. Not anger. Disappointment. Final and irrevocable.

“When I ‘like that’? ” he repeated quietly, almost in a whisper. His hand slowly lowered. “‘Like what,’ Anna? Like your husband? Like a man who loves you? Or are you disgusted by that alone? Disgusted that I touch you? Disgusted that I’m near you?”

He wasn’t shouting. He spoke in an even, dead voice, and that was a thousand times worse than any scream. Every word hit its mark, tearing her apart.

“No…” she tried to deny it, but it sounded weak and false. Because in a way, he was right. She was disgusted. Not by him, but by the situation itself. By his touches that expected something from her. By his closeness, which she didn’t have to give. She was disgusted by the constant feeling of guilt that he inadvertently provoked just by his presence.

“Then what?!” his patience finally snapped. He didn’t shout, but his voice thundered in the small kitchen, filling every molecule of air. “What is happening to you? You won’t let me near the child? No! You’re the perfect mother! You smile and chat nicely with everyone else? Yes! With me? With me, you’re like a hedgehog! You look at me like I’m a rapist! I can’t compliment you, I can’t offer help, I can’t touch you! What did I do wrong? Tell me! Do I need to apologize for something? Am I to blame for something?”

She stood silent, pressed against the wall, tears streaming down her face, not even trying to wipe them away. She just looked at him, at his face distorted by pain and anger, and couldn’t utter a word. All her explanations – about fatigue, hormones, her body – seemed so pathetic, so insignificant in the face of his real, genuine agony.

Her silence was the last straw. He recoiled from her as if from a leper. His shoulders slumped. All the anger drained out of him at once, leaving behind only emptiness and a soul-chilling clarity.

“I see,” he said in a flat, lifeless tone. “You don’t know. Or you don’t want to know. Or you can’t say. It doesn’t matter.”

He slowly shook his head, looking somewhere past her, at the wall.

“I’m so tired, Anna. I’m tired of banging my head against a wall. I’m tired of waking up every day hoping that today will be better. I’m tired of catching your eye and seeing only fear and rejection. I… I’m drowning.”

He turned and walked out of the kitchen. She heard him go into the hallway. Heard him open the closet. There was the scrape of a hanger, the rustle of a jacket.

Her heart sank. Where? Was he leaving? Now? At night? In the rain?

She wanted to run after him, fall to her knees before him, beg him to stay, scream that she loved him, that it was just temporary, that she was losing her mind. But her legs wouldn’t obey. They were rooted to the floor by fear and that same paralyzing guilt that had bound her tongue.

She heard the lock on the front door click.

The silence that filled the apartment after that click was deafening. It was heavier than all the previous silences combined. It was the silence of devastation. The silence after a battle where there were no winners, only ruins.

Anna slowly slid down the wall onto the floor, onto the tiles where the dark stain of spilled tea was spreading. She wrapped her arms around her knees and rocked back and forth, moaning quietly like a wounded animal. She sat like that for maybe a minute, maybe an hour. She couldn’t think. Couldn’t feel. Only aware: he was gone. She had driven him away.

Then a sound reached her. Not from outside. From the bedroom. First a quiet grunting sound, then an insistent whimper. Sofia. Woke up. Scared of the thunder? Hungry? The maternal instinct, that ancient, immutable law, worked again, rebooting her system.

She got up from the floor. Wiped her face with her robe sleeve. Took a deep, ragged breath. And trudged to the bedroom, to her daughter. To the only being who demanded nothing from her now except her milk and her arms. To the only one she hadn’t yet failed.

She picked up Sofia, held her close, feeling the warmth of the little body spreading over her icy skin. The girl calmed down almost instantly, burying her nose in her neck.

Anna stood in the middle of the dark bedroom, rocking the child, and looked out the window into the black, impenetrable mirror of the night, which reflected her tear-stained face and lonely figure. The rain beat against the glass, as if begging to be let in, to share her loneliness with her.

She was completely alone. And for the first time since becoming a mother, her embrace could warm no one but the child herself. She herself was freezing from the inside, and she heard, somewhere deep down, at the very foundation of her world, another support crashing down with a roar.

Chapter 5: The Mask of Normalcy

The click of the lock behind Alex echoed in Anna with a deafening roar that seemed like it would sound within her forever. The night spent alone was the longest of her life. She didn’t sleep a wink, listening to every rustle outside the window, to the creak of the elevator in the stairwell, hopelessly hoping that the door would open and he would return. But the door remained silent, as did her phone, onto which she had desperately sent a single message: “I’m sorry. Please come back.”

There was no reply.

By morning, exhausted to the limit, she finally fell into a short, troubled sleep, full of fragments of nightmares where she ran after him down an endless corridor but couldn’t catch up, and her voice disappeared in her throat, unable to make a sound.

She was woken by Sofia’s insistent crying. Her heart, accustomed over these weeks to beating in rhythm with her daughter’s needs, forced her to get up, despite the leaden heaviness in her limbs and the emptiness in her soul. Mechanically, on autopilot, she fed the child, changed her, cleaned the apartment, washing the traces of yesterday’s tea from the tiles – a silent witness to her breakdown. Every movement was rehearsed, devoid of meaning. She was a mannequin, playing the role of a happy mother and wife.

The role of a wife… Her throat tightened at the thought. Where was he? Was he asleep? Was he just as unhappy?

Around noon, the doorbell rang. Anna’s heart leaped into her throat, and forgetting everything, she rushed to open it, already preparing to throw herself on his neck, sob, and ask for forgiveness.

But it wasn’t him at the door.

“Surprise!” cheerfully shouted Katya, her best friend, holding out a bouquet of bright autumn chrysanthemums. Next to her stood her boyfriend, Denis, with a bottle of expensive wine in his hand.

“We decided to drop by unannounced! To see our goddaughter and you, the new parents!” Katya, radiant, well-groomed, in a stylish coat and with perfect makeup, was already reaching out for Sofia.

Anna froze in the doorway, feeling a wave of panic wash over her. They weren’t supposed to see her like this. Weren’t supposed to see this empty apartment, her tear-swollen eyes, her loneliness.

“Come in,” she finally forced out, stepping back and stretching a weak, strained smile across her face. “What an unexpected… and pleasant surprise.”

She took the flowers, frantically thinking where to put them. Her hands were shaking.

“And where’s Alex? At work?” inquired Denis, walking into the living room and looking around with approval. “So clean, so cozy. Respect, Anya. Didn’t expect such order with a little one.”

“Yes… at work,” Anna lied, and it seemed to her that goosebumps would run down her skin from this lie. “Swamped. New project.”

“Well, of course,” Katya was already sitting on the sofa, rocking an interested Sofia in her arms. “Daddy has to work triple shifts now! And how are you? You look… tired.”

The last word held a slight, care-disguised criticism. Katya had always been the standard against which Anna involuntarily measured herself. And always came up short.

“Lack of sleep,” Anna brushed it off, hurrying to the kitchen to hide, collect her thoughts, figure out how to play this role further. “Tea? Coffee?”

“Coffee, of course!” Katya called out. “You know I can’t function without it.”

Anna started making coffee, listening to Denis’s laughter and Katya’s chirping from the living room. They were the perfect couple. Young, beautiful, free. They slept in, went to concerts, took last-minute trips. Their love was easy, unburdened. They could afford passion.

A few minutes later, Denis came into the kitchen.

“Need any help?”

“No-no, it’s all ready.”

He leaned against the doorframe, watching her. His gaze was warm, friendly.

“You guys are doing great. Seriously. I look at you and can’t even imagine what it’s like to be parents. Seems like it completely changes your life.”

Anna gave a fake laugh.

“Well, not completely. It just adds new… colors.”

She felt herself blushing under his gaze. It seemed like he could see right through her. See her lie, her despair.

“Colors are good,” he smiled. Then his gaze fell on her hand, which was nervously fiddling with the edge of her apron. “Are you okay, Anna? You look pale.”

His sudden, sincere concern nearly undid her. One more word like that – and she would sob on his shoulder, spill the whole truth about her husband leaving, her loneliness, the body she hated.

“It’s all good,” she said again, turning back to the coffee machine. “Just not sleeping much.”

When they returned to the living room with a tray, Katya was already playing with Sofia, tickling her and eliciting happy baby laughter. The picture was idyllic. Guests were smiling, the child was laughing. All that was missing was the absent lead actor on stage.

“Oh, look how she’s smiling at you!” Katya marveled. “She’s your spitting image, Anya! Alex must be crazy about her?”

“Yes,” Anna lied again, and the bitter taste of the lie filled her mouth. “So proud.”

She caught Denis’s look. He was watching her thoughtfully, squinting slightly, as if studying her. She hastily averted her eyes.

Suddenly, Katya looked up at her with a radiant expression.

“You know what we thought? We want to take you to Italy in the spring! We’ve already been looking at villas in Tuscany. Can you imagine? Sun, wine, olive groves… Will you be able to get away? Leave Sofia with your mom for a week?”

Anna pictured it. Her and Alex. Sunsets. Wine. A shared bed. His hands on her skin under the Italian sun. Before, that would have sent a burst of delight through her. Now – only an icy wave of panic. To be alone with him. Without the saving screen of everyday life and the child. A whole week.

“I… I don’t know,” she muttered in confusion. “It’s so far… Sofia’s still so little…”

“Well, she’ll be bigger by spring!” Katya persisted. “You guys need this! The sex alone after a vacation like that will be atomic!” She playfully winked at Denis, who chuckled sheepishly, but his eyes sparkled.

Anna felt goosebumps run down her spine. Sex. They talked about it so easily, so casually, as something taken for granted. Like good food or fine wine. For them, it was exactly that. For her, that word now sounded like a sentence.

“Yeah, we could use…” she tried to find the words, not giving herself away, “…a change of scenery.”

At that moment, her phone on the table vibrated. All three of them involuntarily looked at the screen.

The name “Alex” glowed.

Anna grabbed the phone like a drowning woman clutching a straw, with both relief and fear simultaneously. He had texted! He was alive. What would he say? “I’m filing for divorce”? “I’m not coming back”?

“Oh, excuse me,” she jumped up from the sofa and ran out onto the balcony, slamming the door behind her.

Her heart was pounding wildly. She unlocked the phone.

“Forgot my charger. Will stop by tonight to get it. Don’t wait up.”

The message was dry, impersonal, like a note to a concierge. Not a single extra word. No “hello,” no “how are you.” Just a statement of fact. He wasn’t coming to see her. He was coming for a charger.

Her hands trembled so much she nearly dropped the phone. She leaned her forehead against the cold glass of the balcony door, trying to suppress the rising tears. He would come in the evening. Briefly. Like a stranger.

Taking a deep breath and pulling the mask of normalcy back on, she returned to the living room.

“Everything okay?” Katya asked, looking at her curiously.

“Yes,” Anna forced herself to smile. “Working. Said he’d stop by for a bit tonight. Misses his little girl.”

She said this with such tenderness in her voice that she almost believed this fairy tale herself. Look, what a caring father I have. How he misses us. How we all love each other.

Katya smiled contentedly.

“So sweet. Well, we won’t stay long. Don’t want to be in the way.”

They finished their coffee, cuddled Sofia a bit more, filled the apartment with laughter and light, carefree chatter about travels, mutual friends, future plans. Anna automatically kept up the conversation, nodded, smiled. She was the perfect hostess. The perfect mother. The perfect actress.

Finally, they got ready to leave. Katya hugged her goodbye.

“Hang in there, sunshine. You’re doing great. And remember Italy!”

Denis shook her hand. His handshake was firm and warm.

“Take care of yourself, Anna. And say hi to Alex.”

She closed the door behind them and leaned against it with her back. The silence that rushed in after their departure was deafening. The mask instantly slid off her face, revealing fatigue, pain, and emptiness. She slowly slid down onto the floor in the hallway and sat there, hugging her knees, staring into emptiness.

The echo of their laughter still hung in the air, mixing with the scent of Katya’s expensive perfume. They had taken a piece of that light, carefree life that had once been hers too. They had come from the world of passion, travel, and atomic sex, briefly invaded her world of diapers, milk, and loneliness, and left, leaving behind a bitter aftertaste of inadequacy.

She remembered how Alex had looked at her when Katya handed him Sofia. His gaze had been so tender, so proud. He looked at her as the mother of his child. It was beautiful. It was touching.

But it wasn’t the look of a man at a woman. It was the look of a father at a mother. He loved the mother of Sofia in her. But he had stopped seeing Anna. The very Anna he might have wanted to embrace under the Tuscan sun.