THE PERFECT LIFE

I was walking into the gym, she was leaving. We looked at each other. Aha! We smile and meet each other halfway. We hugged. We used to be friends but a disastrous love affair with her brother Stephen brought our freindship to a harsh and bitter end.

Stephen was a controlling nut-job who wanted to tell me where I could and couldn't go, who I could and couldn't be freinds with, he wanted to know why my toenails were painted pink for fucks sake. I left him faster than my shamefully short marriage. He ended up stalking me and threatening to commit suicide. I told him to go right ahead. His family blamed me for his madness. It turns out that Stephen was a "nice guy" before he met me.

This article is not about Stephen. It's about Emily.

The reason I didn't recognize Emily at first is because Emily did not look like the Emily I used to know. Emily used to be beautiful and graceful and playful. She was sexy and happy and confident. She laughed a lot. Her friends envied her. Everyone thought that Emily had "the perfect life"

She was married to a physician she referred to as "the man of her dreams" they'd just bought a mansion in an upscale neighborhood and she was pregnant with their first child.

Yes. Emily's life looked on track to perfection. She was doing it the way it's "supposed" to be done.

Yet one look at Emily tells me that she was falling apart. She'd packed on over fifty pounds. Her glow was gone. Her gym clothes were stained. Her eyes empty, skin pale and her once luscious hair was thinnning. Emily looked twice her age and a broken shell of the woman I used to know.

"How are you, Erotica?" She said smiling seeming genuinely happy to see me.

"I'm doing well," I said.

"And you?"

She hesitated before answering. "Things are ok," she said looking at the ground.

"How's Ben?" I asked.

"Things didn't work out," she said.

I wanted to ask, "What happened Emily? How did you get beaten down like this? Where did your glow go--your sexiness, confidence, happiness?

Where did it all go?

"It's good seeing you," I said. "We should get together and catch up,"

"I would like that," she said.

We exchanged contact information and went about our day. But I couldn't stop thinking about her.

It may not seem as if I have all of my ducks lined up in perfect order. It may not seem as if I'm where I'm "supposed" to be, doing what I'm "supposed" to be doing with my life. I'm divorced. I'm a single mother. I tumble from one failed relationship after another. But I feel as if I'm standing on solid ground. Life's journey is not a straight line. Even the best laid plans can and do fall apart.

Everything is transient.

Everything.

I'm right where I need to be. And that's because I live life by my rules. I'm happy and healthy and I'm aware. I'm sexy and confident. I'm funny. I laugh a lot everyday.

I see my friends, family, acquaintances stressing out trying to live the life they're told they should be living, and not living the life they have. And I can't help but wonder, whose fairytale are we living in?

They think that they need to be married and have children and a big house and this and that and the other to be happy and whole, and when they get those things, it turns out that this is not the fairytale that they thought it would be.

When the husband who defined Emily was gone, she fell apart.

What do we think happens after college, marriage, house, kids? Do we stop playing the game?
The game is never over. It's just getting interesgting. There are twists and turns and bumps in the road that remains to be seen. None of us know what we'll find when we turn the corner. I do not put much credence into how it's "supposed" to be. I prefer to focus on who I am and how I can be better.

I don't know how or why Emily's seemingly on track perfect life fell apart. I know to be aware of the bumps in the road.

And as I drove home, I couldn't help thinking about her and cheering her on. What defines us is not how far or how hard we fall, it's how well we get back up. We all have one more fight left in us.

We can all get back up, one more time.

BEFORE DAYBREAK

Before daybreakI will be gone...
Before the dust settles
And memories of me fades away
Before you are ready to let go
I will be gone

Don't cry for me
I am not yours to keep
Letting go
Is life’s constant that no one can escape
Your love will not last forever
That's only a story we are told
A fairytale...

Take me right now
While I lay wanton and wanting in your arms
While your scent still perfumes my flesh
The taste of you lingers on my lips
And my cunt overflows with desire

This moment is all I have to give you
Kiss me like I’m the fading embers of bliss
Fuck me like I'm the last taste of pleasure
Explore me like I‘m the last touch...

Before daybreak
I will be gone.

LOVE IS FICKLE

There was a time when I felt I loved my now ex-husband.

I would've torn apart any woman dare who threaten my happiness. I hated his ex-girlfriends for the moments they had with him. I wanted everything from him. Everything. Every drop of blood, every heartbeat, every thrust he'd ever taken and will ever take. I was young. I didn’t know that one day I would stand poise and ready to sell him for pennies. Here I am sixteen years later, and I don’t even remember loving him.

I felt that I loved CX too. When I found out that he cheated on me and was plotting to kill me, I suffered unimaginable pain. I felt as if I would die. My tears fall endlessly. Now, I would gladly give him away to anyone who will have him.

I thought I loved a lot of men or at least felt deeply for them to the point where I didn’t want anyone else to have them.

In the later part of my relationship with Nick, I started resenting his ex-wife. I resented her for having his children. I wanted to have his children. Resented that she used to be his wife.

I had a lot of meaningless hatred going on. I also knew that my anger and resentment of this woman was misplaced.

My anger had nothing to do with her. It was Nick and I. We were falling apart. He was slipping though my fingers. We weren’t strong enough to make it. I knew all this but when I blew up at him, none of these things came out. I sounded like an insane woman asking what the fuck is this? Are you and your ex-wife getting back together? Why can’t you say no to her?

He would look at me as if I had lost my mind. And yes, as sure as the sun shines bright on a cloudless day, I had lost my damn mind. There is a possessive element to love. There's a certain degree of madness and irrationality to love.

Today, I stopped by his house to grab the last of my belongings. His ex-wife was dropping off one of their sons to get something from inside.

I bumped into her in the driveway with a box of clothing in my hand.

“Hello,” I said.

“Hello,” She answered.

“I’m Erotica,”

“I know. I’m Sarah. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

I stood there awkward, not sure what else to say.

“That green looks great with your skin tone,” I finally said.

I was taught that when at a loss for words, compliment. Everyone likes a compliment.

She smiled. “Thank you,”

And as if we’re playing the same damn game, “I didn’t realize that you were so young,”

“Yes,” I said. Lifting my head high and flashing her a big bright smile.

And knowing that there was nothing else left to say, I bid her farewell and walk away.

I realized something...even if Nick got back with her, I wouldn’t care.
It was never her. It was not even him.

Love is fickle.

We get into trouble when we convince ourselves that the one we’re with is the only one for us even if they treat us like crap. What we fail to realize is that we can love over and over and over again. How did we get so brainwashed? I don't know. Whose fairytale are we living in? I don't know that either.

Love is fickle.

Now when a relationship ends, I think back to my ex-husband and the large field of men who came after him. And I know that everything is going to be all right.

Where are all these men now and what do they all have in common?

They all live in the same old house on the hill. All on the same long list of men I used to love.

THE THREESOME

Eric and I were sitting around sipping tea. Staring out the window and listening to classical music. Occasionally his two talking parrots shriek hello and would fly over to sit on his shoulder.

We were discussing the work of Ayn Rand who happens to be one of my favorite author.
The doorbell rang and Eric got up to answer. In walked a woman who Eric introduced as Karina. He told me that he wasn't seeing anyone so I assumed she was just a friend.

Karina is not beautiful in the classical sense…but there was something striking about her. She was dressed in an old pair of men’s jeans that swallowed her petite frame, a white shirt that looked as if it belonged to her boyfriend, and an old pair of converse. But the way her black hair settled about her shoulders, the way her lips pout, the way she sat…was so feminine I couldn’t help watching her.

Eric sat back down and we continued talking about Ayn Rand. Karina listened but showed no interest in the conversation. After a while, she went over to sit on his lap and started kissing him. He kept talking about Ayn Rand all through her kisses.

I got up to leave. Karina had taken off her shirt and was stepping out of her man pants. I stare at her tits. A mere mouthful but with thick luscious nipples.

“You don’t have to leave,” Eric said. We are going to have “the sex” would you like to join us?

I stare at him. “What? No,"

"Why not? Have you ever had a threesome?"

"No. But..."

"Then why not?" he said.

I just stood there.

Karina had fallen to her knees wearing only an itsy bitsy white thong and was unzipping his pants.

Her ass is small but lovely and I stare at her thinking this is fucking hot. I wanted to get the hell out of there but find myself unable to leave.

“He’s not my boyfriend,“ Karina said. “We just have sex. If you don’t want to join us, you can just watch,”

I stare at both of them staring back at me. And instead of hightailing it out of there, I sat down with my legs crossed tight to ease the throbbing between my legs.

She took Eric’s cock in her mouth. Watching me as she sucked it slowly. I didn’t care about Eric’s cock. It was her lips…that made me ache. The look in the eyes that made me tremble. They kept inviting me to join them, and damn, I was tempted. Tempted like I’ve never been before or since to indulge in this sinful treat. I wanted to touch and taste too…Karina.

Eric ate Karina’s pussy and then fuck her right in front of me. The sight of his cock abusing her little pussy made me want to suck her screams for her lips. I watch. Transfixed. Torn between temptation and surrender. Her moans, the way she writhe beneath him, her small hands clutching his ass, the way she begged and begged for more as she watched me watching her…was pure torture.

I got up and left.

“Is there a sexual experience you regret having or not having?” That‘s the question Alan asked me today.

That day with Eric and Karina came to mind. I don't know if I regret not joining them. I’ve always thought of it as the threesome I never had. But I did have front row seat.