Oh, how I love Henry Jekyll, and how I hate him at the same time!

Were it not for the love I bear him, and the stunning brightness of our family when we are able to glow in his presence, our destinies would be clear and determined. The fact that I am drawn to him like a rare earth magnet clouds my judgement and obscures my purpose. Just yesterday I was happily considering a return to the home I shared with him and Henry Jr., imagining how joyful it would be to pursue the quality of times we have managed to have together since my leaving. Then I remember, "Oh, no, I can never go back. If ever I return, HE will appear, and will likely be more ferocious than ever."

His voice rings in my ears in the night, shaming me, accusing me of hideous emotional crimes against him and our son, criticizing me for ever wanting anything for myself, tearing down anything that I have built, that I have created, that I have imagined. He turns like a raging wild animal once thought to be tame and takes advantage of every newly-bared vulnerability. I am reduced to nothing more than an infant in the bite of his powerful jaws.

Last night I went home to my small, spare cottage. Alone. Quiet.

Bliss.

I can think clearly there. I can breathe easily there. The tension in my body leaves when I am there.

As much as I adore Dr. Jekyll, I cannot bring myself to commit to him again. As much as he would like to believe it, I know he is not yet in full control of himself.

 

The circumstances leading up to my moving away from home were anything but simple.

Most complicating is our style of living; being a scientist, Dr. Jekyll works from home, you see, and is the parent most often with the little child. He and the child have formed a very close relationship, and the little one depends on his presence at every given moment. Jekyll attends to the child's morning routines, takes the little one to and from school, oversees homework and after-school activities, and all of the other jobs involved with raising a child until I return home.

My own contribution to our family is as the breadwinner. Jekyll's experiments have never yielded financial gain, and I have continued pursuing a career since the child was a baby. I earn enough to fund our lives, Jekyll's scientific pursuits, and all of our attendant needs. When I return home, I spend all of my time with the little one until he goes to sleep, and then am at the whim of my husband.

And so, when I first decided that I could no longer live with Mr. Hyde, I insisted that he be the one to leave. He ranted and raved and raged about how he would simply abandon the little child and me, blaming me for taking his child from him, casting the whole thing in a dark light that reflected on my choice to break up our happy family. Certainly the happiness with Jekyll would be lost, but more important was that my misery of Hyde would finally cease. I stood fast by my decision and simply said that it was within his power to stay and continue to be a good father, and that if he fled it would be his choice to do so. Hyde would have none of it.

I suspected that since the threats and manipulations were not working this time that Hyde would likely change strategies, which he did very quickly. He decided rather suddenly that he was going to refuse to leave at all. But a life with Hyde and many failed attempts to escape his manipulations had prepared me for such an eventuality, and I had decided that should such a scenario play out, I would have to be willing to be the one to leave. And so I did.

This, as I have said, seemed to shock Hyde into submission, and Dr. Jekyll has returned. In the dark of night I wonder if Dr. Jekyll is, in fact, authentic, or if he is just another trick by Hyde. Is it within Hyde's power to restrain himself and show such human compassion as Dr. Jekyll in order to manipulate me? I have decided that it is impossible. Mr. Hyde is a spontaneous eruption, a burst of malevolent energy that once exposed is uncontainable by reason or rational thought. And so Dr. Jekyll's presence is a cruel irony that torments me as I ponder the decision I have made.

The worst of this is that the little child doesn't know why I've left. He cries in the night, and has outbursts during the day. While I know that Dr. Jekyll cares for him tenderly and comforts him, assuring him that I still love him and that it's not the child's fault that I've gone, the stress of the situation raises Hyde to the surface when he speaks to me of it. "Look what you've done!" Hyde says. "This is what you get for leaving!" Hyde says. "You've destroyed our family, and your child!" Hyde says.

The truth of this, of course, is that Mr. Hyde is the one who has destroyed. And yet he has trained my heart well to question whether the right decision would, in fact, be to stay and endure his madness for the benefit of the child.

Jekyll assures me that he understands my decision, and cries with sorrow that his darker side has brought such a fate upon our family. He still lets me see the child as much as I would otherwise, really, with the only exception being when I go home to my new house for sleeping. When my mind has the reigns, I am not fearful. When my heart gains control, however, I am terrified of losing my sanity and my willingness to simply stay alive.