I’m a different woman. This is a different life. I’ve left my past behind. Right up until it moves in next door.
Everyone has skeletons in their closet and I’m no exception. I’ve got history in this world. I’ve got a past that I want to keep in the past. I’ve got a past that my husband would never approve of.
It’s been so many years and I’ve managed to keep it hidden. I’ve kept it under wraps, my own little secret. I’ve been so good, but the man who moved in next door knows exactly what I’ve done.
He knows me from the moment I first say hello, and I know why. I know that he was lurking in the dark and watching the wild version of me. I know that he’s seen me embrace all those men all at once. I know that he’s seen me lose control.
I’ve been good. I’ve kept to the straight and narrow. I’ve stayed faithful to the man that I love and kept my promise to be his and his alone.
I’ve been good for so long, but the memories keep on coming back. I thought I could hide them away and pretend they don’t exist but the truth is even before the neighbor arrived I could feel my resolve breaking. I’ve been bored for so long and the memories of my past aren’t doing it for me anymore.
I’ve been good for so long. I want to be bad again.
Excerpt
I should run. I should run. I should run.
I have a life and a husband and I’m the president of the fucking neighborhood welcoming committee. I have built a life for myself and it’s a good one, an enviable one. I want for nothing and I left that life behind with good reason.
Because I didn’t recognize the woman in the mirror when I got home after my performances. She was buzzing with the high of having performed, of having pushed her limits. She was pushing me further and further and there had to be an end and there had to be a point where I would break myself.
And I was afraid of the little voice in the back of my mind and how sure it was. I was terrified when it whispered to me at all times. When it spoke in my sleep and in my dreams and in my fantasies. When it whispered behind my ear at my desk, in the boardroom, and at a restaurant when I sat suffering through another in a long line of dates with some boring asshole with a nine to five and the expectation that I would plop down into his life and start popping out fucking rugrats and clean his house for him.
I was terrified that the voice was true, was far more understanding about the situation than I could ever own up to being. Because it told me that I would never find my limits. It told me I was special and that I could always take more. It told me my appetites were endless. And I think it was right.
He didn’t say a word to me. He just stepped a foot closer.
“People change,” I protested weakly, not even believing it myself.
He laughed at my words, cocking his head and asking me, “Do they?”
“I’m married now,” I interjected, but if I didn’t care about that then why would he?
And sure enough he just replied, “Does it matter?”
I swallowed hard. He was so close to me now and his hand reached out and plucked the pie from my grip. I blinked, staring up into his eyes.
“I’m happy?” I said, the words coming out as a question and lie all at once.
He called me out on it, flinging the pie to one side dismissively as he asked me, “Are you?”
I didn’t answer with words. I didn’t need to answer with words. Flinging myself at him and wrapping my arms around him, pushing my body up to his while my lips connected and parted and my tongue slipped forward eager with my need. All of that was answer enough.