Is that how it is spelled? Is that what is happening? It is. It is.
How did this happen? Close contact – virtual contact through a computer screen. Hashing out ideas, mixing thoughts, baking offerings of thoughtfulness and kindness to each other. You are smart and thoughtful and engaging and calm. You are funny and quick and sexy as fucking hell.
I am lost.
Suddenly, my world has turned upside down. I am a little girl, sprung with dopamine sparkles. Fully aware of the complexity and ridiculousness of my situation – and a probable unrequited one at that, which is the icing on the cake of this shit show.
Merde.
why.
You are married. I am married. We have children. Families, youthful and happy. Yours. My marriage is not happy. My husband and I don’t have the connection we used to. I was never in love with him in the same way. No sparkles. Just reassurance and safety and a net. But the net is an illusion.
We are all going to die.
Why do we play around?
Why do we not grab each other and start wildly kissing with abandon?
Because though we are racing towards our deaths, as insignificant as the mammoth dinosaur bones you were awestruck over at the museum… we still must participate in reason and the social construct of normalcy.
After all, this isn’t real either.
Or is it?
I highly doubt you have a thought of me in this way. But I did see you looking at me from across the room… you did put your arm around my waist and pull me in for a picture. And this was all surely for naught; for good nature and for happiness to see your friend, but not perchance your lover.
I am sick with illusion. Love sick.
Your wife is impossibly beautiful and thin. And you are happy and love her. My husband is fat and unhealthy and troubled. And I am so tired of living this way.
I am round and soft and old. My tummy hangs and my chin has lines. My eyes are hooded, my teeth crooked, and my thoughts drift wildly to you. I used to be beautiful.
You would never chose me. I live in a world of illusion and fantasy. It’s like trying on a dress that you think makes you look sexy, and then seeing a picture of yourself and realizing how out of shape you are. I’m trying on a man in my brain that is hotter than me. It will never be.
And even if I am wrong and he does think of me when he moans alone, tucking his hands in his warm crotch, his cock throbbing as his hands go up and down, back and forth as he thinks about sticking his tongue in my mouth…
Does that look like two divorces and a new marriage and a blending of broken families and a new life?
Of course not.
Not in my wildest dreams. Life just doesn’t happen that way.
It is far more likely that my illusion is just that – an illusion. Shaped by years of settling and forgoing the deep romance lying dormant in my bones and tissues and blood.
The world is cold and dark and lonely. I will learn the hard way, over and over again.
God knows I love you. So does my Grandma, up in heaven.
They look fondly down on us, at play in the fields of the Lord.
Except they are probably right in whispering to me that it’s just me playing.
And playing with unrequited fire.
So I will set down my sword of heart and spark and desire. I will uncurl my thoughts around your legs, looking into your eyes in my mind one last time.
I will turn and walk away, my black dress with flowers swaying in the breeze. My boots, half unzipped, trudging along the endless dusty city sidewalk.
I’m careful not to step on the cracks.
I turn the corner and I’m blinded by the sun.