This Is Us
The Affair I Didn’t Have
Instead of cheating, I decided to make myself into more of what I desired
I’d been married eight years when Brian sat next to me at a writers’ workshop. I didn’t know his name was Brian then… I didn’t know him at all. Being new to the workshop, I’d taken my own seat in the circle of writers, and busied myself by reading through the stack of writing samples I’d been given when I walked in. With my eyes down, I saw his cowboy boots first. That caused me to look up slightly at this man who, staying true to form, also wore some kind of jacket that I guessed was called a duster. His face, again in character — handsome and weathered. Improbably, no cowboy hat, but a full head of good hair. I felt heat coming off him.
Could that be heat be coming off him?
Hold on. What was happening? It felt like a bubble of heat between us.
“Howdy, ma’am,” he said.
No, he didn’t say that. That’s what he said in my imagination. But, he did make eye contact and smile hello. And if a gut feeling could speak a sentence, the sentence in me in that moment would have been, “Katy, it looks like you might be in trouble.”
I’d only experienced instant attraction like that once before. I’d gotten into an elevator with…
