Illicit affairs....

He sneaks out early again, a quick goodbye, a kiss on the head, he seems so cold compared to how hot he was last night. He tells her he’s running late, for work he says, but she knows the truth: he has to get back to her, his wife, her best friend.

The guilt isn’t enough to keep them apart, it’s like some magnetic force keeps drawing them together, they’re in love. Well she is, there’s no doubt in her mind, he on the other hand? He’s never been more unsure. Caught between a rock and a hard place. Can something started in anger, revenge and lust ever go deeper? can you really be in love with two people at the same time?

The sex is different, more passionate, clothes flung all over the room, the hotel room. It all feels so cheap, so dirty, so meaningless. At home the sex is safe, caring, gentle and it doesn’t come with the complexities of the other woman. But it does come with arguments. He and his wife have lost the ability to see eye to eye. He doesn’t know which brand of complication he’d rather: the complication of having to hide or the complication of loving someone yet apparently not enough to stay and work on their issues.

She’s getting impatient, waiting for him to make a choice: “I just need more time”. He tells her. How much more time? She’s given him months! She’s getting desperate to tell someone, anyone. She wants to shout it from the rooftops, broadcast it all over the late night news. She’s begged him to come clean more times than she’d care to admit. Maybe one day she’ll force his hand, leave a piece of evidence in plain sight, maybe some underwear or her favourite perfume, the one she wears all the time. She wants it to be obvious, she wants to get caught. It used to matter to her that she’d hurt her best friend, but now? too much time has passed, she’s not sure she cares anymore, she just wants him all to herself.

She sits by the door, waiting for him to come home. He tells her he’s working late, but she knows the truth: she’s seen the texts, heard them whispering behind her back that night, at their mutual friend’s birthday party. She should confront him, kick him out, she should be stronger than this. But she just can’t bring herself to do it. She loves him too much to let go, she’s been with him so long she’s forgotten what it’s like without him, the thought tairs her apart, almost as much as the affair itself. So she acts oblivious, puts on a smile, who knows? Maybe in time he’ll get bored and stop all this before it’s too late.

How could she? Her best friend, a lying, cheating whore! Someone she shared so much with. She wants to kill her, oh how she wants to kill her: she has dreams about it every night, stabbing her right in the chest then carving her name in her blood. What they’ve done, it’s driving her crazy, they don’t realise the mess they’ve made, or how long it might take to clean up.

And that’s the thing about illicit affairs, you think it’s all fun and games: until someone gets hurt, or ends up with two little lines on a stick, until one of you gets in too deep and falls in love, and sometimes it turns into something way more sinister that none of you can ever undo. And so you’re left with the question, was it worth it?