Rebound

They say love is all you need.

They’re wrong.

Sometimes, no matter how much you want to stop it from happening, you have to watch the person you love most in the world slip through your fingers. Even when it feels entirely wrong, you can still find yourself sitting in a lawyer’s office with your spouse, negotiating the terms of your divorce.

It doesn’t matter that she’s the only woman I’ve ever loved. Or that we both meant it when we promised each other forever. It matters even less that she can still make my knees weak with nothing more than a smile. None of that is enough to fix the things we’ve spent a lifetime together breaking.

We were meant to be together but destined to be apart. So we’re doing just that—separating our joined lives into two distinct, single ones. An amicable uncoupling. Or so it appears on the surface.

Only it’s not so easy to extricate yourself from someone who’s been a part of your life for two decades. It’s even harder to deny the physical attraction that’s still there, simmering underneath the surface. If only we didn’t have so much baggage, maybe we could enjoy some no-strings fun to take the edge off the whole divorce situation.

That thought is exactly how I wind up doing the unthinkable: having an affair.

With my wife.

With my family on one side and my wife on the other, I’m torn between what I should do and what I want to do. Torn between my head and my heart.

No matter what I decide, one thing is for certain: There is no such thing as no-strings-attached when the object of your infatuation is also the love of your life.