Shoulda Walked Away

"Nice." The speakers in the supermarket had just launched into a low-volume version of

Died In Your Arms Tonight

by Cutting Crew, and Mike at once began humming along. His wife glared back.

"Fucking overplayed earworm," she sniped, bending low to look for her GMO-free syrup.

Mike rolled his eyes, waiting idly with the shopping cart, his attention straying to a merry voice behind him singing quietly along to the music.

"Must've been something you said..."

He began singing too, softly, his eyes glancing sideways to see who the other singer was. She was shorter than he was, singing as she side-stepped in to study the organic honey on the shelf right next to Mike. He was still mouthing the words as she glanced over, their eyes crinkling into a pair of smiles as the chorus began.

"Oh!" they sang, "I just died in your arms tonight..."

The woman glanced down quickly, seeing his wife crouched low, frowning as she trawled the shelves for a better deal. She smiled conspiratorially at him, the lyrics coming from just under her breath. Mike caught a cute, fresh face under a Packers ski cap, a slight body hidden by an unzipped Canada Goose parka. Sweatshirt. Tights.

The swelling chorus rose, her voice coming closer as she drifted near. Invading his space. Filling his senses. He could not move without shoving the cart into his wife, which meant the woman's body was pressed fully against his, her arm reaching past him to grab for a jar of artisanal honey. "Excuse my reach," she whispered through the song.

"Must've been some kind of kiss," he sang back gently, and she was grinning as she took her jar and then left him with the smell of her shampoo and the memory of her warmth against his.

They met again in the next aisle, his wife gone now to search the aisles behind for the sugar she'd forgotten. He waited with the cart as the woman approached with her basket, singing.

"She's loving by proxy," she sang low.

"No give and all take," he replied, eyes crinkling, and then she was past.

Next came the freezer aisle. "Just get some ice cream," Mike's wife sighed. "I'm going to go pee."

"I just died..." he began, singing.

"Jesus," she bleated, heading off, but by then the woman had shown up at the end of the aisle.

She roved slowly toward him, the chorus screaming again, her cheeks bright red, basket swinging. She glanced curiously at Mike's wife as the two women met, then continued toward the ice-cream freezer with her eyes asking a question even as her mouth sang the bridge.

Mike raised his left hand, the wedding ring glinting there, and the woman nodded thoughtfully. "I followed my hands," she murmured, her voice still merry, "not my head."

"I know I was wrong," he agreed, and then he was backing away from his wife's shopping cart, looking down at that flushed face beneath the Packers cap, the guitar wailing through its plaintive solo from the ceiling speakers as she stepped boldly up to him. Once again her body met his, only this time there was no honey on the shelf to explain it.

She angled her face upward, so vibrant; it seemed the most natural thing in the world when his hands eased upward, sliding under the quilting of her parka, his fingers trailing beneath the hem of her sweatshirt, finding warm skin as they encircled her supple waist. She smiled at that, the guitar wailing still.

Mike stood completely entranced as she melted against him, one hand on his chest while the other rose to cup his cheek, caressing the stubble there. Her face drew closer and closer, both of them snared in the spell of the solo, her wet lips parting just slightly. He felt her hand tremble on his face, the shampoo filling his world as he stooped on a wild impulse with his own mouth meeting hers.

The kiss was abandoned, selfless, completely open: their tongues dueled through the solo, and as the tune faded into that last, slow chorus, they spread back apart in a long, shining string of spit. Their hands slid slowly off each other, reluctant.

"Shoulda walked away," he sang quietly, shrugging, the music fading.

"No. You shouldn't have," the woman whispered back, pressing a piece of paper into Mike's hand as she turned. And walked away.

Her phone number was scrawled across it, along with a name. Nicolette.