We'd met at work. His is not a physical perfection. A bit thin, a bit hairy, not quite tall enough, a voice a bit too deep to match his boyish face. The coloring of eyes and hair is shades of chestnut. The eyes are big and wide-set, and sometimes he seemed a bit startled and fragile. The lids sometimes would droop low in a languid sensuality as he puffed on electronic cigarettes. He is so young, nearing the mid-twenties. I am nearing my mid thirties, a mother. He will never be mine, he is not husband material, but I can't stop wanting him.
He does not want me as I want him. Perhaps he would if I was younger, thinner, unmarried, but I am not in his orbit. I accept that, yet a string of desire keeps me in a daze around him. I can pour my soul to him, and he lets me make a fool of myself in silence. He is not the lover I want him to be. He does not reject me, but listens to my flight of ideas without judgment. He is flirtatious, as he is with many women. I cannot trust my feelings, but cannot deny them. We share ice cream on our breaks at a nearby shop; sometimes, I buy his ice cream and sometimes he buys mine.
Today, he unexpectedly sees me making the long walk to the offices. "Get in." he commands, as he pulls up in his clunker of a vehicle. I give simple responses to his few questions. Together, we sit at an empty meeting table across from each other.
He begins to flirt and I flirt back. He begins to lift up his shirt, and his body is chiseled and hairy. My eyes dip downward, as his pants are worn low. His hips are not hidden, thin and lithe and hairy. He may as well be naked, for I am imagining the pants have disappeared. How raw this is for me, how cruel to be teased with what I can't have. And, is this cheating?