I pulled my hand back, luring him closer, like a snake charmer. “Use those teeth on

me . . . those lips . . . that tongue,” I barely rasped into his ear.

He ran a thumb over one of the nipples, hardening it. But just before he placed his lips on it, he rested his forehead against my chest. “Lil, I promised myself, not here anymore. Not until you came with me.”

“It's just us,” I begged. “This is just a place.”

He let out a massive sigh, kissing my breastbone, the plump paleness of my breast, and working his way to the peak, where he used the tip of his tongue to draw out a careless moan from my lips. Flaxen rays of light snuck through the window, onto my exposed skin, illuminating the tiny goosebumps his mouth cajoled. I arched my spine towards Bobby, begging him with my body to make the doubt and fear disappear.

“I'd do anything for you, Lil,” Bobby murmured into my neck.

I braced his face so that his eyes would meet mine and I kissed him everywhere my lips could land, spreading the taste of my tears across his face.

He pulled my hips to the edge of the table, reaching in his pants to pull himself out. A pleasant, anxious fluttering surged in my stomach at the sight of his throbbing phallus, gripped in his thick fingers. My dewy opening blossomed like a morning flower at the promise of Bobby boring into me. When he did, I wrapped my legs around his hips as I drew out a cry into his neck. Rory's discarded breakfast plate and my battered toast clattered on the table, skittering little by little with each thrust, until one of the plates crashed to the floor. But it didn't matter. This place was an artifact. My heart was already imagining a new future.

Bobby's girth inside of me, so tight that I could hardly breathe, took my focus. It dampened the screaming voices of trepidation. It dulled the sharp stabbing of fear.

“I can't live without you,” I gasped into Bobby's lips. “I can't go back.”

“You're my goddamned heartbeat,” he answered against mine.

Our bodies melted into each other, like hot caramel, so that we could no longer tell where one person ended and the other began. Just a messy haze of sweat, tears, and skin. We were linked in ways that we could never break. That distance, time, and duty could not separate.

My hips thrusted up to meet Bobby's and we crested against each other like waves against a bluff, the table barely needing to support me as I clung to him. His shirt stuck to the sweaty knolls of his chest and arms as he grunted savagely, coming closer to his climax.

“Come with me,” he groaned into my neck.

I braced Bobby's torso against mine as I convulsed against him, biting down onto his shoulder as an intense stampede of pleasure rolled over me. I held on as tightly as I could, feeling like if I let go, I would drift away and never be able to hold him again. That I would lose him in this helpless abyss of rules and unfairness we call life. Bobby tensed against me, his groans as gritty as mud and earth as he released inside of me.

I kept my embrace firm around Bobby, hoping we would freeze in time like the images I had seen in textbooks about Pompeii. Or that we would burst into trillions of stars, so that we could live in the heavens for eternity like the constellations we admired on moonless nights. So that one day, other weary lovers could look to us in the sky for hope.

But we were still here. Pieces of flesh and bone, desperately clinging to each other.

“I have to go, Lil,” Bobby said somberly. “I'll see you tomorrow.” It seemed he was trying to convince himself more than me this time.

I let my arms go limp as Bobby slid away from me, collected himself, grabbed his bag, and left.

I mindlessly collected the dish fragments from the floor trying to decipher what was holding me back from going with Bobby. This was the life I had dreamt of. But I had made vows. I had chosen my path. Somehow I felt like packing my bags and leaving was cheating.

Maybe it was the guilt I carried from being with Bobby the night before the wedding. That the rest of my life was penance for that one act. Or maybe I cared more about what other people thought than I had realized.

A small shard pricked my finger and pulled me out of my fugue. I stood up and placed the chunks of porcelain in my hand on the kitchen table and wandered the house, taking stock of the life I had here.

Things.

Furniture. Clothes. Cars. A house. A few acquaintances. This was all an illusion. As if I tried to grasp any one of them they would slip through my fingers like sand. I didn't really have a life. I didn't miss any of these things when Bobby and I were up at the lake. It was as if I had picked out the pieces for my real life dollhouse. And I felt as empty and fake as the doll in the center of it all.

My family, they would always be my family. I could only hope they would forgive my decision if I left Rory for his brother. But it wasn’t them who would live with the consequences of the choice I faced. I couldn't keep choosing this life to please them while I suffered.

I didn't have a say when Bobby slipped away seven years ago. When he never visited. When he left to war. When he vanished from the face of the earth. But I had a say now.

If I did this, I would be starting over. Everything I owned was shared with Rory. I had a modest trust fund, virtually untouched. That, and my clothes, was all I could take with me. Someday, I would split my parent's estate with my sister, but who knew if that would change when they found out about my behavior. It didn't matter though. Between Bobby and me, we would find a way.

I slipped on some clothing and grabbed my purse and car keys. I needed air. The house was stifling. I drove aimlessly at first, down the main street, through county highways, until I decided I had a destination: the lake house.

It was only an hour away from home, and the afternoon sun was still at its peak when I arrived. I kicked off my shoes and dug my toes into the cool grass, closed my eyes, took a lungful of crisp air, and smiled.

Freedom.

This is what it would be like. We would experience the world together, and then we would get a little cottage by the lake or the beach, and we would read to each other, or sing, or dance. And one day, our little babies would lumber around in their diapers, and then they would grow enough to run and jump into the water, and then they would one day fall in love and have their hearts broken and patched back together and then we would watch them as they watched their little ones. Bobby and I would witness it all, experiencing every smile and tear with them. This was the life we were meant to have.

And if I wanted to try something new, Bobby would encourage it, not tell me what I wanted. And if Bobby wanted to open up a shop to build furniture or fix cars, I would encourage him. Because all we wanted was what the other wanted.

In the walls of my house with Rory, my dreams had been strangled for so long, it made it impossible for me to imagine anything else. But out here, on the tree swing, watching the birds sweep over the water, feeling the breeze curl along my neck, I could smell the scents of my new life. Taste its flavors. Feel it tickle my skin.

When I stripped it all away, it wasn't so hard to imagine leaving.

After watching the bright afternoon sun dull from the swing, I made my way into the house. I went upstairs to the bedroom and into the jewelry box. I slipped off the ring I had worn for seven years as an impostor and returned it to its rightful place: my mother-in-law's jewelry box. Next to it was a small box that held just one item. I opened it and slipped the pale apricot-colored gem on my finger. I found an empty large cardboard box and carried it to the living room, where I grabbed the record player and a few records, including the Billie Holliday vinyl.