Trey

After Trey had gone, I wandered around my house, trying to figure out what to do with my life. The man I loved with every ounce of my being had just left to go back home after spending a week-long business trip at my house, showing me things about myself and my sexuality that I had never known before. My husband, on the other hand, was due back from his last-minute work emergency all too soon – and knew nothing of my sensual trysts with his best friend, Trey.

Two days of moping with no inkling of a resolution had me at the end of my rope. Desperate for someone to talk to, I called Jamie. Not only was he my best friend, but he would be sure to bake some sinful concoction sure to make me feel better as I sobbed out my agony on his shoulder. Sure enough, Jamie came through for me, even throwing in a box of tissues which I used up in short order.

Listening as I detailed my week-long physical affair with the man I'd grown to love over our years-long correspondences, Jamie held back any amusement or dismay at my predicament, merely asking a few questions here and there to clarify things. When I finally detailed how I'd been sliding back and forth between agony at the knowledge of what I'd done to my marriage (not to mention the fact that the mere thought of sharing a bed with my husband made me shudder in distaste), and the ecstasy of knowing that maybe Trey had feelings for me as well, Jamie smiled, brushed away a tear from under my eye, and sat me down on a stool at the bar lining one end of his restaurant.

-Girl, you've gotten yourself into a fine mess, he said, shaking his head. You

don't

love the someone you're married to, you

do

love the someone who's opened you up to yourself, and now you have to figure out what to do with your life.

-But I don't even know how Trey really feels, I whimpered in dismay, fighting back another round of tears. -I mean, I think he has feelings for me – I damn sure hope he does, after some of the things we've done! But how do I know if it's real? How do I know that it's not just some fling on his part? He's just starting up a new branch, has all the stress of that going on – maybe I was just --convenient?

-Is that really what you think? Jamie asked, pulling away so he can look into my eyes. -Or better yet, is that all it was to you – a matter of convenience? A quick fuck just because someone was there and willing?

-No, I whimpered, confused. I had come to Jamie expecting him to understand and commiserate with me, not to grill me.

Lifting my chin, and looking deep into my eyes, Jamie said – Then why do you expect it from him? Why can't you accept that he could feel the same way you do, that he loves you as deeply as you love him?

-I wish he did! I screamed my frustration at Jamie, giving in to my tears, sobbing broken-heartedly against his once-crisp white shirt. –I'd give anything to have h...him love me like that! I ache for him, and wonder ... how I can take another breath now that he's not here to ... to share it with me. I can't sleep in my bed with- ... without reaching for him.

-Oh babe... Jamie wrapped both arms around me, pulling me close, rubbing his cheek against my hair. Quietly he held me as tears wracked my body, all my hopes and fears and dreams laid out in the open for me to acknowledge. Finally, I began to quiet. With a soft touch to my chin, he lifted my red, swollen eyes to meet his concerned gaze.

-Sweetie, you know you've got to make a choice. Do you go with your heart, or your mind?

I started to say something, more tears welling in my eyes, but he stopped me.

-Do something for me, babe. Close your eyes and fast-forward your life about 10 years from today. It's 6am, you're just waking up, hitting the snooze button the alarm clock. You feel an arm wrap around you and snuggle you back under the covers, and you're grinning – this has become a morning ritual. Do you see it?

I nodded, smiling, easily able to picture this scene.

-Now babe, Jamie said, –Open your eyes. Whose arm was it?

With a gasp of stunned pleasure, I realized that the scene I had pictured so easily was a picture of mine and Trey's life together. In one simple scenario, Jamie had pointed out where my heart lay. Now I just needed to take steps to get there.

I was waiting for my husband when he came home from his trip. Quietly, sorry for the pain I was undoubtedly causing him, but knowing that for once I was doing something simply for my own sake, I told him that I wanted a divorce. I explained that we had grown farther apart every year, until we had gotten to the point of not knowing – or really caring – what the other was doing, or feeling, or even saying. I told him I might go back to school, and see what I was good at in the job market. I didn't want alimony – it had been a mutual choice for me not to work, and I saw no need for him to pay a penalty for that decision. I informed him that my things were already packed and would be moved by late afternoon of the next day, as I had just signed a rental agreement on a small, one-bedroom apartment across town. As he sat there, no expression on his face whatsoever, I quietly told him that I had realized a long while ago that the love which had begun our marriage had died off because neither one of us had taken the time to care for it, always assuming it would just grow on its own, without any effort from either of us. I realized now how horribly wrong that was, and hoped that if he married again, he would learn from this, and take the time and effort to ensure that the love didn't die, as it had this time.

Still expressionless, he looked at me, and in a low voice asked if Trey had anything to do with this sudden decision of mine to end our marriage.

-Not in the way you're thinking, I said, twisting my hands together. –Trey was a breath of fresh air – a friend who showed me what it's like to live again. He noticed things about my likes and dislikes that you had never picked up on in seventeen years of marriage. And he made me realize how stagnant our life had become – we never touch, we never talk, we never laugh. There's you in your life, and me in my life, and we just happen to share this house together, more out of convenience than any real desire to share our lives. And I just can't live that way anymore. There's a whole big world out there—and I want to live in it.

As I talked, my husband's eyes grew colder and colder, his face an unsmiling, expressionless void. –Does he know you're doing this? He ground out the words through thin, blanched lips. –Does he know you're tossing me over, and is he waiting for you with open fucking arms? Is my

wife

, he sneered, going to go running to her black lover – I assume you've been fucking him, huh?

I sat there, letting my own silence condemn me. He had a reason to be angry – in the length of our marriage we'd always been faithful, if more and more distant. I let him vent for a few more minutes, before standing up.

-No, I'm not running to him. No, he doesn't know I'm doing this. I've had no contact with him since he left. Because I'm not doing this for him – I'm doing this for me.

Me

, dammit! If I manage to find him a few years down the road and we make something work, then great. But this is for

me

, so I can find out who

I

am.

-Good. Go. Have a great life. Just get out of mine. With that, my husband of seventeen years turned, picked up his travel case, and walked into the bedroom, shutting the door. The click of the door latch echoed throughout the house.

I slept on Jamie's sofa that night, and we talked about everything. I shared things with him that I had previously left unsaid, as there are some things in a marriage that are kept silent between husband and wife. But now, I vented. I sobbed, I yelled, I kicked and screamed and beat up his sofa pillow. And when the rage and pain passed, I felt a thousand times better.

I moved into my new apartment the next day. Jamie took a day off from work to help me lug boxes out of my old house under the eagle eye of my silent, ice-cold husband. When I finished setting up my new home, Jamie made me get cleaned up so he could take me out to dinner. And over dinner, he questioned whether or not I had tried to contact Trey yet.

-No, I murmured, ripping the edges of my napkin. -And I don't intend to.

Leaning over, holding my hand, Jamie asked why, if I loved Trey so much, was I excluding him from my life at this crucial time.

-It's because I

do

love him so much, I explained, wiping a tear from my cheek. –My life is a mess, it's going to take 6 months for the divorce, and God knows how long for me to get on my feet and figure out who I am and where I want to go. I can't ask him to take me in with no job, no prospects, no skills, and no money. I did that once, and look where it got me!

-So why don't you let him know how you feel? Jamie asked, rubbing his thumb over my palm.

-Look, I replied, worn down and miserable. –I'm not going to hold him back from possibly finding someone else—someone who'd be so much better for him than I could be. I don't know when I'll find me – so how can I ask him to wait around, indefinitely? He's got a great job, plenty of friends, he's opening new branches – he doesn't need my shit cluttering up his life right now. If he's still free, later, then.... With this, I bit back a sob.

-Okay then, let me ask this, Jamie said, looking deep into my teary eyes. –What are the chances you're pregnant?

I gave a broken laugh, letting my utter misery show briefly before covering it back up. –No chance. The day I told my husband, I already knew I wasn't pregnant. I didn't even get that one wish.

Closing my eyes, I struggled for control. Taking pity on my fragile emotions, Jamie soon paid our bill and took me back home.

The following months passed in a blur. I entered the local community college, and struggled to find my place in an unfamiliar world. I kept strictly to myself at first, struggling with most of the subjects, but determined to make something of myself. Jamie became my constant companion, often showing up during late-night study sessions with pizza and beer, helping me understand algebra and history and laughing with me over our mutual hatred of biology. Gradually I made a few study friends, but they were always women and usually older students like me.

The day the divorce became final, Jamie took me to his place, knowing that the walls of my little apartment were threatening to close in on me. I jokingly told him that it was a good thing he'd gotten me out of there, as he'd saved my textbooks from being thrown across the room, as well.

I was leaning on his counter, talking with him about classes and my newfound affinity for creative writing, when his doorbell rang. Jamie motioned me to answer it, claiming he was too busy stirring the pasta to be bothered. Thinking nothing of it, I opened the door – and found myself staring into Trey's gorgeous eyes. The hallway began to spin, and the next thing I remembered was sitting on the floor, slumped in Jamie's arms, Trey's fingers caressing the line of my cheek.

Clearly reading my confusion, Jamie laughed and said that since I was too stubborn to call Trey, that Jamie had been keeping him informed of my activities and whatnot. Trey knew that tonight's dinner was to celebrate my divorce, and had asked if he could at least show up, now that I was a legally 'free' woman, to talk with me about all that had happened.

That said, Jamie grabbed a jacket from the closet and headed out the door, saying that dinner was on the stove and ready to go – and to call him when the coast was clear. He left me there, sitting in his hallway, within touching distance of the man who still held my heart – and always would. With a strangled cry of joy, I launched myself into Trey's arms, sobbing my heart out, running my hands over and over that familiar body, chanting his name over and over.

We talked and talked and talked that night, baring our souls completely to each other. He had been very hurt by my decision to not even keep in contact with him after he left my house. He had found out about my divorce through Jamie, who had then kept him abreast of my life, knowing how much the two of us obviously loved each other, and doing his best to play cupid while still giving us the room to make our own decisions. The look in Trey's eyes when he saw that I still wore the dragon pendant was priceless, and he just held me tight when I told him that I'd never taken it off – I belong with him, and even if I couldn't have him, I was still his in my heart. Rocking me side to side in his embrace, he kept telling me how silly I was for thinking that he could feel any less than what I did. Sitting back on his heels he smiled, saying that when two people connect as we had done over the years, finding that perfect balance between lust and love and friendship, then they were obviously destined to be together. With that, he pulled a sparkling ring out of his pocket, knelt in front of me, and asked me to share his life.

I cried like a baby, fingers shaking as I reached for that ring. Engraved with two intertwined dragons to match the ones on my pendant, it was absolutely beautiful, and obviously custom made. I couldn't have said no if I had wanted to – and I didn't want to! We agreed that we would endure a long engagement, to give me time to find my feet. I still hadn't spoken with my ex-husband since the night I left that house, and felt he deserved to hear this news from me, as a matter of courtesy.

It's been twelve years since Trey traveled to the west coast to set up a new branch of his company, and stayed at the house of his best friend and his best friend's wife – who was also Trey's on-line lover. Ten years ago tomorrow, Trey and I got married in a small, simple ceremony on a quiet beachfront, in front of our closest friends. And in the past 10 years, we've deepened our love, respect and admiration of each other. Jamie joyously accepted the title of Godfather to our daughter and two sons. Our children never question their mom and dad's love for one another, and we take extra care to make sure that we nurture that love,

making

the time to feed it and watch it grow.

Trey and I often look back at the way we met, the journey we took to get to where we are now – and we thank God every day for giving us this chance. My ex-husband married an old sweetheart who had recently gone through a divorce of her own. They're happy together, and I'm happy for them. I moved to the east coast to be with Trey, and on the rare occasion we find ourselves on the west coast for either his business or my book signings, we meet for a drink – the animosity is gone, replaced by a vague indifference. Trey refuses to give up on so many years of friendship though, and keeps trying. I think he's actually making progress, and hope so, for both their sakes.

As for me, I'm happier than I could ever have hoped for. What I feel for Trey goes deeper, and is far stronger, than anything I could imagine. Every day is a wonderful surprise, waking up to find this man in my bed, curling his arm around me when I reach over to hit the snooze button. There is a new joy in every waking moment, and a sensual pleasure in every nighttime rendezvous. In Trey I have found the husband I always hoped for, the lover I always dreamed of, and the father that all children should have. My life could never be better.

So the next time you see this white woman walking hand-in-hand down the street with her black husband, watch for just a moment. You're sure to see them share a secret smile, just before he pulls her tight into his arms, dipping her low and kissing her deeply, their children laughing and rolling their eyes at their parents' easy affection and spontaneous laughter. I only wish everyone could be as happy as my Trey and I are.