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"Wives kiss their husbands," Jud says one night while they're lying in bed. Laurey feels her heart catch.
"They do," she says evenly, her eyes flicking towards the door. She doesn't think Jud would hurt her, not like she used to, but she still doesn't want his hands on her longer than she has to.
He turns towards her. "So will you kiss me?" and oh Lord, she doesn't want to, but she'd told him she'd try to be a better wife, and good wives kiss their husbands.
Good wives let their husbands make love to them too, but the thought of that, with Jud, giving him permission to run his hands all over her, to let him press kisses wherever he likes, to have his heavy weight on top of her — it makes her all queasy.
Laurey nods quickly before she can lose her nerve, "Alright, Jud. You can kiss me if you —"
He cuts her off, kissing her like he's afraid she'll take it back if he lets her go on. It's unpleasant, like their first and second kiss were. His hands grip her face too tightly, his mouth is too moist, and his movements clumsy. She tries to kiss him back, but he clearly doesn't know how to move in tandem with her, and his teeth clack into hers. She pushes him back roughly without thinking.
Jud goes quickly, throwing himself to the other side of the bed. Most of his face is in shadow, only one gleaming eye revealed by the moonlight, and it's locked on her. He's breathing heavily, his huge shoulders heaving.
He looks like a wild animal, and fear makes her freeze.
There's a heavy silence in which they just stare at each other. Laurey's heart is racing like a rabbit's.
It's all well and good to make pretty promises about being a good wife to him, but he's still a wounded animal and the loss of a treat might cause him to bite.
"I hurt you," he states.
She swallows. "No."
"Then why'd you push me away like that?" There's a note of something dark in his tone; she wishes she could see his face.
"Jud, you didn't hurt me, it's just — ain't you ever kissed someone before?"
He hunches over. His whole face is in shadow now. "No woman ever let me before you."
Oh. So the kiss on their wedding day was his —
"Well, you just need more practice kissing, that's all. No shame in that," she says, more lightly than she feels.
"Practice kissing?" Jud repeats. He lurches forward, and she's suddenly acutely aware of how small the bed really is.
"You'd let me practice?" he asks, and his face in the moonlight makes her think of a begging dog.
"Well, I've got a mind to teach you, if you're inclined to it." He lunges forward again, and she stops him with a press to his chest. "But you have to do what I say."
He nods vigorously. The motion eases some of the tension in her throat.
"First, I get closer to you," she declares, and scoots closer to the side of him, "Second, you can't just grab me like that. I'm not a hog; I ain't going to run away."
She takes his questing hands, wavering on whether to put them on her face or her waist. She decides on the waist. His hands settle on her, the weight of them strange, though not uncomfortable. He looks like he's been struck dumb; his fingers flex in and out around her.
"And then?" he ventures finally, his voice softer than she's ever heard it.
"And then you kiss me, I suppose. Or I kiss you. I'll kiss you, this time."
On an impulse, she puts her hand on his face. He goes very still.
"Follow me, alright?"
She pulls him down and kisses him. She keeps her movements soft and light. For a moment he's still, but then she feels him hesitantly start to respond.
She breaks the kiss gently after a while. "Do you see how that's better?"
He swallows, and she's close enough to see his Adam's apple bob. "I do see."
He looks punch-drunk; his lips reddened and his cheeks flushed. She's only seen Curly in this state before; somehow seeing Jud like this feels more like a betrayal to Curly than marrying Jud had been.
"Can I kiss you again, Laurey?" Jud asks, his voice low and dark.
She barely gets the chance to nod before he's on her again, his hands cupping her face as gently as if she was a baby bird. The angle is a little awkward, but his lips move against hers much more comfortably than before.
She tilts her head and deepens the kiss. The gasp he lets out as she does so sends a twinge of something pleasurable up her spine.
Pleasurable. Kissing Jud Fry shouldn't be pleasurable, not in the way kissing Curly was. Not when she doesn't love him.
But kissing her husband should be pleasurable. She shouldn't cringe away anymore; she shouldn't be scared like a little girl. She has to grow up.
She's allowed to enjoy this, she thinks, and on a wicked impulse, she bites his lower lip and tangles her fingers in his hair.
It unhinges something in him; he moans loudly and grips her hips tightly. Before she has a chance to blink, he shifts her so she's straddling him. She freezes.
She's always known Jud wanted her. Known it from the moment he started to stare out from under his brow at her, from the moment she went down to the smokehouse and saw all his nasty pictures, known it from the way he kissed her on their wedding day.
But knowing that he wants her, and feeling her husband buck his hips under her, being flush against him while he's hard and straining against her — well that’s very different.
It takes him a moment to notice she's stopped moving, and when he does, he breaks the kiss.
"Everything alright, Laurey?"
She takes a moment to study him before she answers. His cheeks are still flushed, his eyes blown dark with desire, his hair messy and hanging down on his forehead from her fingers. He's still hard beneath her; she fights the urge to rock into him.
"I'm fine, Jud. It's just —late, ain't it? We both have work to do tomorrow."
He nods slowly, and she sighs in relief. She reaches out and brushes his hair back from his brow. He leans into her touch like a dog, and it makes her feel faintly sick. He scoots her gently off him and retreats to his side of the bed.
"Laurey?" he says, tapping her shoulder from where he'd laid down, "Thank you."
And then he smiles, that foolish, open grin that always used to rankle her before all of this. Now it just makes the pit in her stomach feel even worse.
"You're welcome, Jud," she says, and it sounds so inadequate to her ears. It seems to satisfy Jud though, and he lies down and closes his eyes.
A good wife would have said she loved her husband: a good wife would have kept going when her husband made clear his need for her: a good wife wouldn't keep using her husband like this when she knows darn well she doesn't love him.
But Laurey's not a good wife, so she lies down with her back to Jud and presses a hand to her mouth to catch her sobs.
When Jud starts softly snoring and huddles close to her, she doesn't pull away like she usually does.
At least she can give him that.