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corner of my wallet, as if I might call it one day. I’m sure he only wanted sex, but that counts.
    I took validation from anywhere. If Walter didn’t find me appealing, Marco Ferrara, with his smooth husky voice certainly did. The way he smiled at me at work was enough to make me happy.
    “ Do you ever wonder how long we’ll be married?” I asked in a voice that was almost inaudible.
    “ Why? What do you think?”
    “ We’re always at odds, arguing about little things that wouldn’t have mattered to us years ago.”
    “ People change. They don’t always see eye to eye. It means nothing. So please come back to bed.”
    “ So is that a no or a yes?”
    “ What do you think, Tracy?”
    I didn’t answer right away. It felt like a no, but saying it aloud made it real.
    “ Sometimes I think we will, and other times, we don’t seem to have the energy to care what happens to us.”
    “ I’m going to sleep.” He pulled the sheet over his head.
    Was I asking for too much? I only wanted life to slow down long enough for me to catch up. It seemed like Crystal grew up overnight, and now the only thing waiting for me was a long stretch of deserted road. That nagging feeling skidded across my brain again. I closed my eyes, but I couldn’t ignore it.
    “ Are you having an affair, Walter?”

Chapter Six - Walter
     
    I pretended to be asleep right through Tracy’s questions until she turned off the light. When her breathing became slow and soft, I pulled to the edge of the bed and slept.
    The next morning sunshine filtered through the shutters, bathing the room in a warm light. Tracy backed into me and wiggled her ass, even though she was asleep. My penis pulsed to life. I turned away from her and pressed my erection with my hand. I couldn’t have sex with her, not today. Today was reserved for Sasha. And before I broke it off with her, I planned to have an afternoon of unadulterated bliss between her legs.
    Last night’s dream about my mother was still fresh in my mind. Tracy had triggered it by drilling me with that question. How the hell did I know if we were going to stay together forever? Tracy often set nightmares about my mother in motion. They were always disturbing and left me flapping in the wind like clothes on the line during a Georgia storm.
    I woke up with my heart pounding. Even after a full night of tortured sleep, I was exhausted. My mother lived two hundred miles away and no longer ruled my life. But she was always in my head, trying to find a place she hadn’t poisoned yet.
    The clock read 6:43 a.m. Sunday morning. I didn’t need to begin the day by jumping out of bed and dashing off to work. Sales forecasts, profit objectives, or second quarter earnings didn’t matter. I promised myself not to set foot in my home office to check email or faxes or stock prices. If the sales team needed pricing approvals, then they had to wait until Monday.
    Being the vice president of Global Sales sounded interesting on paper but, in reality, the job never ended. Seeing Walter Baptiste engraved on the gold nameplate used to thrill me. That wore off when I realized it meant babysitting an uninspired sales team in a downward market. Someone always needed to talk with me, meet with me, or wanted me to solve a problem of their making.
    But Sundays belonged to me. No one else ordered my steps. Least of all Tracy.
    She slept and the house was quiet. For a moment I enjoyed the sound of nothing. The absence of noise. Tracy turned over, her eyelids fluttered. My wife was beautiful. No matter what else was going on between us, her beauty captivated me. I admired her ability to be optimistic in almost every situation. Her perpetual smile still made me stare. Her hazel eyes should have been enough to keep me enthralled for the rest of my life, and after today I would recommit.
    Give our marriage another chance.
    Even with the extra pounds, she still had curves. The extra weight didn’t bother me as much as she thought it