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The End of The Affair “The trouble is I went and married him.” She said, “which means I can’t justup and leave. I did choose him.”Her lover looked at her “but you can choose to stop being married to him. Youcan choose us instead. You know, laughter, fun, passion.”The real trouble was, of course, that she didn’t want to leave her husband.She really did like him and the sex was fine and they did have fun. She was just a bit…she searched for the word in her head. Bored and lonely weren’tright. She just liked the excitement. A bit of fun on the fly. Something thatwas all hers. Something she didn’t share with her husband or her family or her friends. A little pearl of pleasure that she polished once a week at asomewhat sleazy hotel in another town where no one knew them. She likedrunning out on a Monday to buy something silky for her lover and hiding it athome until she could wear it on Tuesday. She liked the texts that she readand immediately deleted. She loved getting e-mails at work that really werenot work related and the flutter of pleasure she felt when she greedily readthese before deleting them. That was how she saw this. A little bit of delectable, deletable pleasure scattered here and there in her week. Like asecret box of chocolates she could take out and dust off when she was alone.It was intoxicating to have a secret that would shock anyone that knew her.Everyone saw her as a good wife and a good mother, really most people’sdefinition of a good woman. She had wanted a turn at being a bad woman, soshe had sought out an affair deliberately. She had thought the whole thingthrough from the beginning, it hadn’t just happened. She woke up on morningand decided to have an affair. When the local paper came she had looked inthe classified section for someone seeking a bit of daytime fun with a boredhousewife. There were plenty of them, she noted a couple of the numbersand had contacted them from work the next day. It had been that simple.Three had replied and she had picked the one that sounded most normal andleast likely to murder her and leave her in a ditch.They had arranged to meet at the beginning of the following week and meetthey had. She had been delighted at the thought of her intrigue until the nightbefore when she was suddenly terrified. It had been a very long time sinceshe had had sex with anyone that wasn’t her husband and she worried thatshe might not be good enough or exciting enough or that those extra fewpounds might put someone off. In the end she had calmed herself byshouting at everyone else in the house before taking a long bath and shavingher legs for the first time since the night before they had gone on holiday lastyear. In the morning she had quietly dressed as usual but with her nice, newunderwear under her clothes while getting her family through their morning
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routine and out into the big, wide world while all the time thinking that she wasgoing to have her affair at last.When she got to the hotel she had been late but her lover was there waiting.The sex had been fine. At the time she had thought it had been brilliant butlooking back she was fired up on the excitement at the thought of having theaffair more than by the person she was with. In all honesty, it had been arelief to get it over and done with and out of the way the first time. It had beenslightly awkward with bumps and apologies from not knowing each other’sbodies the way she did with her husband.She really like that it had spiked her husband’s interest in her. He might notknow what she was up too but he had noticed the makeover and the air of excitement about her. It excited him and they were having a kind of renaissance of the passion they had felt at the beginning of their marriagebefore the kids, the mortgage, the endless jobs around the house. A simpler,carefree time when they had, she felt, had had time for each other. The thingthat got in the way of the spontaneity in their relationship was simply lack of uninterrupted time for each other when they weren’t utterly knackered. Eventhough the kids were older now, they required feeding and ferrying, help withhomework, sleepovers, parties, ‘quality’ parent time, ironing, washing (themand their clothes and their bedding). The house was a bit like the ForthBridge in that they never quite got to the end of the repairs and decoratingthat it seemed to hunger for. Conversations often consisted of who waspicking up or dropping off which child when, what they needed from the shopand who would take the dog to the vet. There was just so much stuff, day-to-day stuff to keep their home running and their kids were apparently never going to be of an age where they wanted to stay in bed all morning at theweekend. They were still up with the larks with things they wanted to do.Actual quality time with her husband had shrivelled to the occasional “how areyou?” conversations that occurred on their infrequent date nights. The sexhad never tailed off but it just got squeezed in at the end of a busy day whenthe kids were asleep. It wasn’t bad and sometimes they still managed avirtuoso performance but it was sometimes a bit, well, routine, really. Theyboth knew the importance of keeping that side of their marriage alive butreally it needed a bit of spicing up now and then.She hadn’t felt guilty about the affair until now because this definitely wasn’tlove and possibly wasn’t quite lust. It was naughty and fun and secret andsmall. All her big emotions were wrapped up in her family and her friends andher life. This was a pinch of silliness to break up the routine. She felt it gaveher a fresh sense of herself and encouraged her to jazz her image up a littleto keep the lover interested but until now she hadn’t really taken on board thefact of her lovers’ feelings. Or, if she was honest with herself, had even caredthat her lover might have feelings about this thing. Now she felt like kickingherself as the signs and sighs had been there for a while now. Her lovers’relationship was on the rocks and her lover was looking for a happy ever after.She should not have ignored the kisses that started appearing on the textsand emails or the word love that had been cropping up here and there. Shehad reasoned that if she ignored it then it would go away. She saw now that
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her lover had seen this as acceptance and had felt encouraged that thesefeelings were being reciprocated. Which they really weren’t. Which meantshe had to do something about it now.She thought about how it would be to give up her Tuesdays and the emailsand the texts. She thought about how it might be without the lover spicing upher days. She thought about the time they had had together. She thoughtabout her husband, sat in his office while she lay naked on a bed withsomeone else. Someone who was asking her to leave him. She thoughtabout all the small kindnesses he did her in a day, like a cup of tea when shewas mired in work. A quick kiss on the top of her head as he passed her onthe way to provide taxi service to the kids he had so willingly given her. Theway her was so good about liberating spiders to the outside world for her. Theway he cooked dinner with the kids every now and then so she could have anight off. Yes, she had to provide recipe and technical advice throughout and,yes, someone had to clear up properly once they had finished clearing thekitchen but still…She thought about how he had sorted out her mobilecontract problem on the phone for her when the call centre had made her want to cry with frustration. She thought about all these small, sweetnessesthat he brought her on a daily basis and felt a huge well of love surge throughher.She realised now that the sexual familiarity that she had with her husbandwas actually a very nice thing. It was nice to know what he liked and that her knew what worked for her and that he didn’t notice if she hadn’t shaved her legs. Her husband knew every nook and cranny of her body and loved it.She and her husband knew how to move together and this she now saw wasa rather lovely dance of love, if she had only had the grace to appreciate itbefore.She knew there was no way she could start a new life with this other person.She knew that deep in her heart she had never really wanted the person of her lover just the excitement and that she didn’t care about this person. Shehad never bothered to find out about her lovers’ likes or dislikes outside thehotel room, which she now noticed was actually very seedy. She wonderedwhat she had thought she was playing at as she realised how much she hadrisked for someone she hardly knew in a place she didn’t like.She got up from the bed and crossed the room to her clothes. As shedressed she smiled and shook her head at her lover and said she was sorry.She felt detached from the tears she saw in the other person’s eyes but gavea quick hug anyway and left before she could do any further damage with thisill-advised venture.She resolved to give her husband the time she had wasted on her lover. Her sweet, reliable, real life, real lover. She was suddenly profoundly grateful for all that her husband brought into her life and very relieved that she had thesense to see that now. She wondered where that sense had been when shehad been messing around with a virtual stranger. She was angry with her self 
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