Page 6

I f that kiss was a match I'd lit, then what came next was a grenade: one that I'd pulled the pin on. It had been over a week since Sloane and I had spent any real time together. The tension between us was thick and stifling, as if it was competing with the humid June evening.

One thing to understand is that Sloane and I both had ravenous sex drives. This was a compatibility that had once been our superpower and, incidentally, the reason Liam arrived during our reckless, hormone-fueled early twenties after being high school sweethearts.

As we got older, we rarely went more than a day without touching, without grinding ourselves against each other. Sometimes it was a quickie in the shower, other times a stolen “lunch break” that had nothing to do with food. It wasn’t glamorous, but it worked.

But that week, the rhythm had faltered. Life had gotten in the way with work schedules, kids’ activities, bills, and noise. The distance grew slowly, and when we finally found ourselves alone, the pressure we hadn’t spoken about all week detonated .

In hindsight, knowing what I now know, it's easy to see that most of our fights were foreplay masquerading as warfare; attraction hidden behind masks of anger.

This fight, however, was not that.

There was no artifice for our animosity, as our wounded prides escalated our heated words to cruelty.

We were both too sharp, too stubborn. I recall how sick I was of Sloane always being right about everything.

I remember how I desperately wanted help, but I didn't know how to ask for it without sounding weak.

On this particular evening, Sloane didn't even look up from her phone when I walked in.

Dishes were piled in the sink, the kids were half-dressed watching TV, and she was slumped at the kitchen table with a mug of something gone cold.

She didn't even say "hi." I was already wound too tight: long day, long week, long month.

Old Me, being the insensitive and self-centered prick that he was, snapped. "You could at least pretend to be happy to see me."

She looked up, slow and exhausted. I saw in her eyes that I was simply another demand she had to meet. "I'm tired, Levi. Can we not do this today?"

"Right," I muttered, yanking open the fridge. "Tired. Always tired."

She sighed. "Because I am . I just got home from work, Liam needed help with his homework, and Violet made herself a sandwich with your whole wheat bread. We really should consider being a gluten free home, Levi."

"But gluten free bread is gross," I said as I searched the fridge for a beer. "That's why I buy the good bread."

"I am too tired to have this argument right now. "

I slammed the fridge shut. "You're always too tired. Too tired for dates. Too tired for sex. Hell Sloane, it feels like it's been weeks. It's like I'm invisible unless something breaks."

Her eyes flared, and I knew I'd crossed a line, but I didn't stop. I couldn't. The resentment was burning holes in my chest.

I asked, "When's the last time you even touched me like you wanted to? I get a pat on the back and a grocery list. That's it." I was grasping at straws, throwing out anything to get a reaction, anything to spark a fight, maybe even shout ourselves into some reckless, hot makeup sex.

She rose slowly. Her messy braids framed her face in wild loops and strands, a halo of chaos around a woman on the brink. Whatever angel she once was had long since handed the reins to something far more primal. I had summoned this version of her and now I was about to reap what I’d sown.

I saw the storm mounting in her eyes, fury rolling in with every breath. "You think I want this distance between us? You think I don't miss us too?"

"Then why won't you try? Why does it always feel like I'm begging for scraps of attention? Your sex toys get more action than I do most days."

"Because I'm drowning, Levi!" Her voice cracked.

"I work, I parent, I clean, I schedule, I manage everything.

Then you waltz in acting like sex is going to fix what's wrong with us, but you barely contribute to this household much less our marriage .

" She slammed her phone down, the sharp crack of the screen startling Rufus from his nap.

"How is it that I'm failing you when I'm too exhausted to pretend I'm not broken anymore?

" Her chest was heaving now, the tears in her eyes threatening to fall.

I opened my mouth to say something, anything, but nothing came .

She shook her head, her voice lower now, but no less cutting.

"We're not young anymore. I get it. I'm not your fantasy, Levi.

I can't climb into bed and pretend everything's fine.

Not when I'm barely holding myself together and you're too wrapped up in your own bullshit to see that I need help, that I can't do this alone. "

"Sloane, I do help," I said. My voice rose, getting defensive.

She blinked at me, then laughed, "Only when I beg, Levi." Her voice was brittle. "When I’m drowning in the mess and text you non stop, then you show up."

I opened my mouth, but she wasn’t finished.

Her eyes locked onto mine with sharp clarity.

“You want to know why I don’t want to have sex?

” she asked. Her voice was cold and steady now.

“It’s because I already feel like I have a third child.

And newsflash Levi, having a man-child isn’t exactly a turn-on. ”

That one landed square in the chest. A clean, merciless blow as she turned and walked away, her shoulders heavy with the kind of surrender that only follows trying too hard for too long.

I stood there in the kitchen, hands clenched, jaw locked, wanting to scream but mostly feeling completely, irreparably alone. The first thought that flashed through me like lightning, fast and furious was, "How dare she treat me like this?"

She acted as if I was some burden she had to carry, nothing more than dead weight on her tired back. Was she blind to how hard I had worked my ass off to get us where we were? Why did I have to beg for affection from my own wife? Why was I not good enough for her anymore?

Fuck… Old Me was such a petulant narcissist.

My phone was already in my hand before I knew what I was doing.

Wanna meet up ?

The second I hit send, my stomach soured but not enough to stop me. I wanted to be seen. To feel wanted even if it was the wrong person. I was so consumed by my pain that I was blind to Sloane's.

Angie's text came back quickly.

For you? Always.

That was all it took to hook me. Those three words gave me immediate and uncomplicated validation.

Not like at home, where every word felt as if I was walking a tightrope.

Not like Sloane, whose exhaustion had turned love into duty.

Angie's words offered warmth where there had been cold, attention where there had been absence.

I knew it was wrong. I knew this wasn't connection. It was escape. A shortcut. A hit of something cheap that would burn out fast and leave me emptier than before.

But in that moment, I didn't care. I needed to feel something that wasn't rejection or inadequacy. I needed to feel wanted .

I'd told Sloane I needed to "get gas and clear my head." I didn't even bother with eye contact. She didn't argue. She was too tired. She didn't even kiss me goodbye. I got in the truck and drove.

The park I picked was nearly deserted, a few stray kids chasing the last of the fireflies and a couple joggers punishing their bodies in the heavy air. The late summer air was humid, oppressive, and stagnant.

Angie was already there, leaning against the restroom wall in cutoff shorts and a tank top damp with sweat. Her lipstick was a little too red for the hour, her grin a little too sharp.

"You're late," she said without looking at me.

"It's ninety degrees. You want me to rush through Hell?"

She smiled. "With what we are about to do, Hell is where you belong. "

I almost laughed.

The sun was going down, bleeding orange across the sky. Shadows grew long between the trees. Crickets screamed from the tall grass. The tennis courts were deserted and the public bathroom stood isolated; a forgotten bunker in the heat-swollen stillness.

She took my hand without asking and I followed her inside.

The air reeked of piss and bleach. The cramped bathroom was dimly lit by a dying fluorescent bulb.

The fan overhead hummed but did nothing to move the heat.

There were scribbles on the stall walls, declarations of teenage heartbreak and crass symbols.

A cracked mirror above the sink showed me a version of myself I hated.

She locked the door behind us and what followed wasn't affection. Hell, it wasn't even lust. It was something dangerous and sinister, fueled by self-loathing and delusion.

She touched me like she owned me and I let her because I didn't know who I was anymore without that attention, without someone pretending I was still worth something.

Our mouths crashed together in desperation. A sick transaction. Her hands were bruising on my back, mine on her waist as we ripped each other's clothes off. No trust, no intimacy.

Just raw need, sharpened to a knife's edge by guilt and narcissism.

"You think she'd cry," Angie hissed in my ear, nails raking down my spine, "if she knew what you let me do to you here?"

I flinched but I didn't stop. Cock and balls so heavy as I thrust into her so violently she had to cover her mouth to stop the screams.

I threw her on the sink as I rammed into her. I relished in the way her cunt squeezed around me before quickening to her release as I relentlessly pounded. It was everything my fantasy had fed me, and my orgasm hit me so hard, so overwhelming, I nearly collapsed .

Between the first lie and this moment, I had turned into a person I didn't recognize. Someone who breathed deception like it was oxygen. Someone who let himself be dragged into the dark and called it warmth.

When it was over, I sat on the toilet lid, elbows on knees, face in my hands. The stench of piss and bleach now mingled with sweat and sex. My chest heaved like I'd just escaped Hell. The truth was that my Hell had only begun.

Angie stood in front of the cracked mirror, painting her mouth red again like nothing had happened, like it hadn't meant anything.

Fuck, maybe to her it didn't. But to me? It was everything in me broken, rolled into a singular moment of regret disguised as validation.

The Old Me was abhorrent.

"This doesn't end when you say it does," she said, her voice low and deliberate. "Not when the chemistry between us is this fucking undeniable."

"I don't want this to end," I said. I was drunk on the attention, drunk on the idea that I was wanted. The way Angie looked at me? Like she couldn't get enough, like I was everything. I needed this lie. I needed something to cling to, so I could justify what I'd done.

She turned, brow cocked, a cruel little smirk tugging at her lips. "Who said it has to end? Move in with me."

I stared at the cracked tile behind her. If I looked at her, I would have have said yes in that moment.

She gave me a suggestive look and her smirk grew wider. She unlocked the door and walked out first, her laugh echoing down the corridor. I waited five more minutes before I left, knowing full well that the damage was done .

The devil had both my number and my soul, and I was too far gone to do anything about it.