This woman lying next to him is not his wife. She is a good mother to his son, but she is not his son's mother. She looks at him with his wife's eyes, kisses him with his wife's mouth, apologizes for the last ten years with his wife's voice, and loves him with his wife's body, but she is not his wife. She wears his wife's things, moves with his wife's aching knees and regal poise, and smiles his wife's perfect smile, but she is not his wife.

It revolts him, in a way. He knows she is not his wife; he knows who this woman is and what she did to his wife. He remembers what she used to look like, what she used to sound like, how he could never believe that she had destroyed his marriage. When he closes his eyes at night, he sees her as she truly is, but when he opens them in the morning, he sees her sleeping, her long straight hair sweeping the pillow, and he forgets for a moment that this is not his wife.

She expects him to take her as his wife, even though they both know where his wife is and what his wife has become. He understands that this is the woman she was trying to understand the woman she needed to become, trying to understand choices made by young and foolish high school sweethearts. There's also the matter of his son; she loves the boy more than his wife did, because no good mother would leave their child behind for a chance of fame. She stepped into the breach and took on the responsibility, and he has to admire her for that.

Theirs is a marriage of convenience, rebranded as a remarriage showing the triumph of true love. Even she buys into the story sometimes, when she is neither the woman she claims to be nor the woman she was. Most of the time, he knows better: this is for his son's sake, to raise his son in a stable family with two loving parents. Sometimes, though, when she's playing with his son, both of them shrieking with laughter, he forgets, and it's so easy to join in on the fun like things never changed at all, like this has been his wife all along and they've lived the fairytale life they talked about in high school.

He props himself up on his elbow and watches her sleep, her skin glowing in the early morning light. This woman lying next to him is not his wife, but she is beautiful, especially when her eyes are closed and the haughty mask is off her face. There are no conflicts in her mind. She sleeps and dreams, and it's not his business to wonder if he's holding her in her dreams, or if she holds his wife in her arms and loves her fiercely. And when she wakes, she will look at him with adoration in his wife's eyes, touch him just so with his wife's hands, and kiss him sweetly with his wife's mouth.

Sometimes, that's enough.