“I feel cheated. You have everything. A home, vacations, anniversaries, and what do I have? Letters hidden in my closet. The truth concealed in my heart. All I do is wait for any chance I can get to be with you. What kind of life is that?” I slapped my hands on the bed. Cody and Sammy, curled near my feet, lifted their heads. “I hate that the little time we have is rushed. That I’m constantly wondering when we’ll meet again and never appreciating the time we have. I’m also having second thoughts about working again as the night director this summer. It’s hard being around you. I want you before work and after work. Sneaking around makes me feel as though I don’t exist. If you loved me, then—” I stopped as I always did, but my anger gave me a surge of confidence. “You’d let me go.” As the words left my mouth, it became clear, like the clean daylight when clouds have passed, that my freedom was altogether my decision. I didn’t need to be “let go.” I only needed to let go.
“Perhaps you’re right.” Sarah shrank back onto her stack of pillows as though the air inside her had escaped. “I only seem to make it harder for you. I’ve been such a fool. Go back to your life.”
What life?
I reached for her, my heart filling with dread at the thought of a future in which we were no longer together. Our hands were soon touching, grabbing, tugging each other closer, our tears and fears fueling our passion, sadness our new foreplay. No gentle kisses or caresses, just harried movements fueled by anger and needs. We were trying to merge into one, as though that would prove we belonged together, as though that would make it right.
We split apart, our breathing rapid, energy depleted, like animals after a fight. Sex had become our go-to cure to assuage arguments. If we were any other couple, we would’ve met each other’s friends by now, maybe moved in together, started planning a future. But that wasn’t possible. Not for us.
“Blu.” Sarah sighed into the darkness. “My life has changed because of you, and if it were doable, I’d change even more for you. The problem is I have thirty years too many wrinkles. Hearing you say you want out makes it sound like I put you in a place you don’t want to be. And since I’m in love with you, I should try to help by doing something. But what?”
By deciding: Linda or me.
But Sarah would never leave Linda. I recognized that now. I might’ve been her heart, but Linda was her family, and that pull was stronger. Sarah had committed herself to Linda years ago. They might’ve had a sexless union, but they had a life together, a home, cats, friends. I couldn’t compete with that. If I were to have any peace, I had to end it. It would be hard, but it would only get harder. I’d break up with Sarah in the morning. What other choice did I have besides more heartache? With my decision made, I fell into a deep sleep, certain this would be our last night together.
Excerpted with permission from Half In: A Coming-of-Age Memoir of Forbidden Love by Felice Cohen (Dividends Press). Available from Amazon and Bookshop.