The Architect's Wife

One- The Perfect Family

"Oh soot not again" Joanie fumbled with the silk fabric on her sewing machine. It was almost 12:00 am and her client would arrive to pick up her mermaid dress at eight the next morning. Joanie was only halfway there and she just kept making silly little mistakes. Joanie realized how tired she was and so she got up to make herself a cup of coffee. Paul, Joanie's husband suddenly stepped into her sewing room. 

"Joanie, could you get to bed please." Joanie looked at him dazed in her own thought she was hoping that he was being a normal worried husband but of course at the rate their marriage was going she it as too good to be true. 

"Ill get there soon" she said "but this dress is for tomorrow and I got so cut up at school I lost track of time I-" 

"Alright" he snorted at her with an annoyed look "all that's great but um.. your running up the light bill Joanie; do you even know how much I had to pay last month?" Paul informed unsympathetically and trying to keep his voice down. Joanie felt her anger bubbling she felt as tired as a mule and her was her ungrateful husbands schooling her on bills. 

"This is so typical of you Paul" She said trying not to yell at the top of her lungs. Paul stood here emotionless. Joanie shoved him aside and turned off the light and left him there all alone in her little sewing room. 

"Ill just call my client tomorrow and explain to her that she will have to come pick up her dress later in the week. Good night Paul." 

That was the life of Joanie Jules, she was only 34 and the grey hairs had already invaded her head and she was not surprised one bit. She had two kids, She worked two jobs one as a high school teacher and the other as a seamstress both very hectic jobs. And of course there was her husband Paul Jules. At first he was everything that Joanie had wanted in a man he was literally tall dark and handsome and to her he fit her really well she was half Indian with long silky black hair but her mother did not approve of Paul she never did and never would. Joanie was expected to marry someone of her own kind but to her Paul was the perfect description of a husband in fact she could not have seen herself happy with anyone else. He was an architect for a well know firm in the town and he was paid well.  

To many the Jules family was just picture perfect two adorable kids and the perfect couple and Joanie intended to keep it that way. 

At first when Joanie and Paul go married everything was great she truly could not pinpoint what went wrong. When Joanie was first pregnant with her daughter Shantel, Paul was ecstatic he was on top of the world but when Dylon came around Paul had no time to be excited he was studying in Canada for further knowledge on architecture. Joanie was alone throughout the pregnancy since Paul was away and when he returned for good he was a completely different man. 

"Have I done something wrong?" Joanie had asked Paul one night after they made love. 

"What do you mean, didn't you enjoy it?" 

"Well yea" Joanie had lied. She had more fun with her vibrator her sister had bought for her when Paul had went away, she had to put to good use over the years but she thought she would never have use for it after Paul retuned but that was just another lie that Joanie let herself believe.  

"But?" Paul asked in an annoyed tone, bring Joanie back to the present. 

"But it was so fast, I mean I didn't even.... You know" 

"No I don't know, now stop complaining and be grateful. I could be in someone else's bed." 

That was the first time Joanie suspected that maybe Paul was having an affair. "What do you mean?" Joanie asked, trying to touch Paul he shrugged her off and turned in the opposite direction. 

"Good night Joanie."  

Joanie thought back at that night and how insecure she felt and now she was there in bed crying herself to sleep while her two kids lay next to her. Paul had come up with the excuse that he needed to work in the master bedroom so Joanie had to sleep with the kids in one bed; well that's what they told the kids. Dylan was only five so he was thrilled that his mom was next to him at nights but Shantel however was fifteen and she knew that her parents were not as happy as everyone thought they were. And as she lay in bed pretending to be asleep she could hear her mother sniffling as the many nights before. She simply closed her eyes and prayed as she did every night that her parents did not get a divorce.