The Approaching Affair

There's a stirring within me and a sense of anticipation. It's both thrilling and terrifying. I see the outline of seduction on the horizon. It seems small against the backdrop of my 26 years but it looms over all my life now. It is him. He belongs to another woman but somehow our paths are drawing us toward the forbidden.

I think of him often and tuck away my reservations as carefully as I would fold away my grandmother’s quilt. My apartment is silent except for the soft breathing of my child, unaware of the turmoil in her mother's heart.

I find myself whispering justifications into the stillness as I touch myself, crafting excuses as though they might cushion the inevitable. I tell myself that marriages are broken all the time like the bones of our bodies. Bonds must break when promises fail as certainly as seasons must change.