When I Travel to Dime Store Novels

I had only ever cheated on my husband once before.

Richard and I separated for six months in our third year of marriage. It had been my idea, the separation, but he had agreed to it too quickly. As our empty house would settle at night and my friends would congratulate me for demanding the sort of treatment I deserved, I would sit and stew. It was all well and good to throw out your husband, if he came back. But what if he didn't? Was I really prepared to lose this house? This lifestyle? This marriage? Was I ready to date again? Diet again? Primp and preen and wait by the phone? I wasn't a girl anymore. Did I still have it?

I got my keys and got into our car, a Ford something-or-other with leather seats.

Richard still had it, that was for sure. At least, I certainly thought so when I met him. And everyone had said so when we married, especially my girlfriends. The years had made him look more paternal. Damn him. Aging makes a woman look maternal, and maternal is the opposite of sexy. But aging makes men look paternal, and paternal is so damn sexy.

I had been driving and fretting for hours before I realized where I was going. Richard's parents had a cabin upstate, and here I was driving the red eye straight to it. I didn't really think he'd be there, but I had to be sure. Helen hadn't returned my calls, and she was single. She was the sort of friend who would steal your husband. She dated a married man almost six months back in college.

Of course, if Helen was the problem, then I didn't have much to worry about. Helen had stringy, curly hair; Richard preferred silky, long black hair like mine. And even though Helen was slimmer than I was, she was more of a petite woman. She had small breasts and small hands. Richard needed someone more his size, or at least more his equal. I had played volleyball in college. That was how we met, actually. I was tall and strong and athletic, and Richard loved my body. No, Helen would not be a problem.

By the time I realized I was almost out of gas, my only option was a dingy truck stop off a two-lane highway. Harley & Quinn's, or so the sign proclaimed. It was one of those long, boxy cafes with yellow-lit windows all across the front exposing a long counter and a row of booths. There was only one gas pump out front. An attendant came out and began to pump my gas. I told him I was going in for a bite and could he please just leave my car when he was done? He snorted.

I slapped him. I slapped him right across his handsome, grinning face. Right across those oddly straight and white teeth under that dirty, motor oil streaked face. Right across that strong jawline. Right across those piercing blues eyes that seemed to twinkle as soon as I struck him.

I couldn't believe I had hit him, and he could tell. His thin lips curled into a mischievous smile, his eyes never leaving mine. My mouth dropped open and closed, open and closed, like a fish slowing dying on the line. He unscrewed my gas tank lid and pushed the nozzle in hard. The car shook with the force and I shuddered.

He grabbed my wrists and pulled me towards him. I was terrified and intoxicated by the strong smell of gasoline and musk.

"Open the door," he commanded. I wrenched one of my hands free of him and obeyed.

We slid into the back seat, me on my back and he on top of me. I stared directly into his eyes, and I felt him grow stiff against my thigh.

"I want you to tell me that you don't want me, that you could never want me. I want you to tell me I'm unattractive, that I'm unfuckable. Can you do that for me?" As I told him what I wanted, what I needed, I ran my hands up underneath his sweaty work shirt. I could feel the slope up the center of his back, hot and slick with sweat. The muscles across his back tensed and bulged beneath my fingertips. His hands found their way to my breasts, squeezing them hard.

"I can do that for you," he breathed.

I stiffened and looked at him sternly. "Then show me you understand."

He stopped his hands dead in their tracks, eyeing me suspiciously. Then, without warning, he fiercely shoved his hand down the front of my pants, deeply probing me.

I have never been so utterly degraded, so thoroughly satisfied, and so
perfectly understood as I was that night with a gas attendant whose name I never bothered to get. At the time, it didn't seem to matter. And, in retrospect, it doesn't.

But that was the last time I cheated on my husband.