“Look Philip, it’s over!”
She tried to glare at me defiantly but her lips began to tremble, making her just look sad. It would never be over for us. Like the moon overhead pulling at the tides, we were drawn towards one another on a cycle beyond our control or comprehension. I crawled over to her then, getting sand in the cuffs of my pants, and she stretched out her arms while warm tears rolled down her face.
Her lips were like strawberry satin and I drank from them madly, stretching my muscles in an attempt to enfold her completely in myself so that the painful separation would only be a cotton-wrapped memory in that attic of my mind.
Suddenly she tore herself away.
“Damn you!” she said, then repeated it twice more. “Do you expect me to throw away my life because you’re all of a sudden ready for us?”
I had no answer to that, so for many moments we lay alongside one another in the sand next to the hissing fire and the gossiping sea. My heart raced as it always had done after touching her. I felt guilty, not because we had lied to our spouses to meet, but because I had not had the simple sense to recognize the strength of our passion and formally entwine my life with hers through marriage vows. God knows I’ve had the chance. She deserved better than to be a mistress, and she knew it. She had pledged her life to another because she knew all about my empty promises. Now the circle of lies had widened and our destructive orbits were once again careening out of control.
The impact would be devastating…
