Her skirt clings to the imitation leather seat as she stands to approach the door. Hot days do that to clothes. Make them grip. Hug. Cling. Every time the muscles in her body move she gives me some new captivating pose to revel in. These things I notice, she has no command or awareness of them. It�s the simple crinkling of her forehead, the confused nibble of a pencil eraser, the content smile after an infectious yawn. To her, these things are character flaws or physical imperfections she�d like a surgeon to remove. To me, these things are more reasons not to come home to you and our three children tonight.

My eye wanders down the intricate trail of her necklace and follows it to the pit of the �v� in the cut of her blouse. It urges me to wonder what lies beneath, and why the necklace stopped there, not making the trek to seemingly uncharted territory. Like a deep mountain chasm begging to give away all its secrets if you would just explore it. While these features are not unfamiliar to me on other women, my curiosity wants me to believe that there is something new and extraordinary about this particular one. That she holds something that will break me away from my physical self and transcend me to a new plane of existence just by braving the trip the necklace could not. Imagination is the opiate of the weak willed.

I can feel the tight and yearning grasp of her hands on my back while she would feel the cold concrete wall on her back. The warmth we make and the sweat from our brows as a result from a struggle to remove our clothes. Her fingers diving again and again through every stimulating strand of hair on my head. I speculate if you have ever felt the same about people you meet. I suddenly shudder at the thought that you have had these same thoughts about someone other than me, your husband.

If someone told me that I would be having these thoughts about this woman before me seven years ago, I would have sued for slander. I expected our sharing of vows to be our commencement, not the beginning of the end. I wanted every untouched moment with you that this ring would privilege us with. In the beginning it was different. We had each other, no more, no less. Lower tax rates, the chance to share the bills, the security of not dying alone. These were none of our concern. You needed me. I needed you. Not some theory who would fill my doubts about my own self worth by being a trophy to stand next to. I didn�t need that reassurance; I needed you and everything that makes you unique. I wanted your faults, your imperfections, and your limitations. I wanted the entire package, not the custom job some people are only satisfied with. What we had was true, unwavering and steadfast. Now this, this compromising of morals has degraded and smudged whatever standards I thought I once possessed.

As her porcelain hand reaches for the doorknob, she extends an invitation for drinks at her secluded apartment. My breath shortens and heart quickens, the moment of truth has fallen upon me. There is no mystery behind this �cordial� invitation. Her vision cuts me down to size and makes me feel as if she were trying to steal lunch money from my third grade pocket. I know in my heart I am not the only person who has had to make a choice such as this. But for now, I feel like the last remaining active soul in my universe. This is a loneliness that cannot be cured by a kind word or a reassurance of my personality traits. A loneliness that consumes all facets of one�s being. The struggle and sadness you feel when trying you�re damnedest to fall asleep in an empty silent house, quantified to an infinite degree. No one knows or has ever felt the way I do now.

You told me that you would fix this loneliness for me whenever I needed you to. That till my eyelids shut for the last time, you would fill that void in my chest like the puzzle piece that you find under a mess of couch cushions among loose change. Now I ponder compromising this security of love for a cheap thrill of the senses. I told you that you were all I ever needed in this world, why am I now looking for a substitute? Is there some sort of a horrendous mix up in my chemical balancing that makes my body crave more than it deserves? Why does my greed flourish like a lethal plague throughout me? I decline her offer of drinks and inform her of my duties at home. She replies with what she thinks is understanding but as I notice her barren left ring finger, I realize she has no idea.

I pack my work items in my car and begin the odyssey back home. I stare down the fading skyline while I trudge through an ocean of sluggish machinery. The exhaust from in the air stings my eyes as I futilely squint to see our home through my mind. The cries of our children will surround us and make it impossible to remember that there was once a thing called tranquility. You will understandably be exhausted by another day of selfless running around and chores. By the end of the night, both of us too fatigued to even share the day�s events, we slip into unconsciousness on opposite sides of the bed just to awake and begin again. When our lives are cloaked in chaos, we pray for stability and ritual. When we obtain the comfort of routine, why do we crave chaos more than ever?

You catch my presence out of the corner of your eye as I slip in through the back door. Your lips taste of the stream from the broccoli that cooks before you. On my way through the house, the children confirm my stereotypes by allowing me clean up the soil that has been grinded into the once white carpet in the foyer. I shed my office skin and descend the stairs in loose pants and a hole-ridden t-shirt commemorating Van Halen�s �last� tour. The unavoidable scent of this night�s meal fills the high ceilings and reminds me of where else I could be at this moment. She would have taken me to a dimly lit apartment overlooking a picturesque profile of our grand city. Vacantly discussing minor gossip from the office, casually sipping wine and postponing the inevitable.

We clear and clean the table just to repeat the same task after the next meal. The hour becomes late and we decide to put our children underneath their protective sheets for another uninterrupted night of bliss. As I subdue them with yet another epic tale of the man in the yellow hat and his curious primate companion, I gaze into their eyes that borrow from mine and can�t help but feel a vice clamping down on my heart. How could I fathom pawning away what does not hold a price? These moments assault the emotions more than any hollow conversation and a stiff drink ever could. Regret is not the word.

I come to you and I am taken back when you come with a kiss of toothpaste to me moist and girlish and quick. Suddenly I become familiar again with my surroundings and why I have chosen them. You make my blood boil with a small bite of your bottom lip and a smile that beckons me to our dream throne. You the queen, and I your king, we exchange a gift that only we could give.

Occasionally I wander back to the days when this gift for both of us to share was more than just a semi-nightly ritual. Before those seven years, before our children crowded our lives with laughter and tears. Before we stopped growing into our bodies that we hoped we would somehow keep for the rest of our lives. There was a time when that distinct taste of mouthwash and baking soda at ten would only come to us in our wildest dreams. Never did we imagine the velocity of our feelings the first time we shared this gift that has brought us our children. Never did I imagine that I would look at you with our own flesh and blood surrounding us.

If we knew then what we know now, would we make the same choices that would have lead us in down this pathway? Me knowing the look of you with no cover to hide your morning face and the smell of your pillow breath? You knowing the look of the struggle in my muscles when I hoist our children in the air? Me knowing that we would both one day fall asleep unfulfilled because the other so was immersed in the memoirs of a loosing presidential candidate? As I look into your eyes now and see the same woman that I met those seven years prior, I can see the answer will never waver again.

As we lay here, the two of us staring into the night drenched highway tunnels of our eyes, we become lost. We lay as only the last two creatures on earth could lie. Calm. Quiet. Serene. Nothing else matters because there is nothing to matter. �Nothing should be this interesting.� I say. You concur with a giggle only you could deliver. For a moment, we choose to forget all the things in our lives that have made us forget about each other. We become our former selves of those fateful seven years before and rekindle everything that may have been lost. Our fingers intertwine followed by the embrace of our lips, both moist with friction. I extinguish the light and darkness floods the room like an army in an unoccupied city.

As my eyes readjust to the black space consuming us, I pick up on the small highlights that make up your figure. These small details, that only you possess, go unnoticed and uncherished so often they are forgotten by everyone but me. I wonder sometimes if you make these same small inspections of my frame and demeanor. If so, do you find them as fascinating as I do? On occasion, feeling like a modern day Christopher Columbus exploring uncharted land when I run the tips of my fingers down your spine. I question if Columbus felt the same satisfaction as my skin does.

My eyelids shut and only for a flash frame do you disappear, only to reappear again in my dreams. Thoughts of you race like a pack of hungry greyhounds chasing that oh so close hare begging to be taken off its pedestal. My unconscious swirls and blends scenario after scenario of the worlds last remaining lovers careening through time and space, stopping only to admire the ground below. We tango among the constellations. Slip and slide through asteroid belts. Discover galaxies that God himself neglects from time to time. We monitor the universe as if it were our young and guard it with the commitment of a martyr.

Unavoidably, my thoughts turn to the night�s earlier near escape from disaster. The siren screams from her necklace soar and could fill the ears of the deaf with their power. It persuades with the cunning of a serpent that the reward far exceeds the risk. That the journey is no more difficult than a walk on the softest and most consoling beach sand. But as the shore nears and the figures take shape, the edges become rough and the once sweet forbidden fruit turns sour.

As my eyes flicker, as does the outside light invading the room, I see you with your irreplaceable visage just as I had left you. You hair tickles my chest as you writhe to steer clear of the morning sun. Moments like this can hardly be captured in words, only in memories. Memories that burn eternal in my mind like an impression on steel. Again, my answer is yes. Yes to everything I have bought into. Yes to every time I felt passed over and let down. Yes to every unfulfilled desire to lead another existence. Moments like these can�t be replaced by regret or guilt of any measure.

After rolling my newly mended bones out of the sheets where you still lay, my morning activities commence yet again. At the sturdy breakfast table, you in the same uniform that has graced the kitchen for as long as I can remember. The tiny holes and imperfections in the robe make its impact felt more than it should. This article of clothing could speak volumes if it was given the chance. It has seen more than you or I will ever know.

As you tend to our offspring with enough freshly cooked eggs and bacon to feed a pack of malnourished lions, I am reminded of the time when breakfast for two was commonplace. Bound together by the warm glow of the space heater in our dimly lit one room, high rise hell pit. At the time, we could think of nothing but leaving for something else. Bigger. Nicer. Better. We could not step back and relish in the fact that we had all that was needed. The solitary notion of there being more outside that room for the taking corrupted our minds into thinking we needed more than each other.

I do not regret or lament over our children being a dominating force in our lives. I enjoy having my way but could never be so selfish as to contain my natural human instinct to procreate. That is the way of the world. Evolve. Transpose. Gap the generations. I also do not think of our children as a simple legacy for me to leave behind, to pass on my name and a small piece of my wisdom to the unwise. I love them unconditionally and without hesitation. They fill me with the same joy as the human they were bore from.

I look at them now and try to fathom the powder keg of life that awaits them. They too will one day meet the one other being that sets their hearts ablaze and sends their imagination and self worth to heights they never thought possible. Right now they have no understanding of the opposite sex, the physical and mental intricacies of a man or a woman. Right now their purpose and goal in life is to finish their breakfast. Right now the only perfect couple relevant to them is eggs and bacon.

As you complete your task of mother for a split second to enjoy the meal you prepared, your face takes on a shape that is all to familiar to me now. You tell me that you love me with the same burning passion and exhilaration that I possess for you. You tell me that you wish we could return to our little one room again, if only for a flicker in time to enjoy the rapture of silence. You tell me this loneliness that seizes me from time to time is merely a phantom trying to scare me into forgetting this look. You tell me how many more years this passion will last and how the number can only be recognized by a horizontal figure eight. The look that is meant for me and only me, tells me everything I want and need to know in the simplicity of a glance and the complexity of a sigh.