“Uncle X,” she breathes. “X…”

“We could just stay here,” I offer as I take in the absolute stillness of her tiny face. She’s completely calm here with me in the moonlight.

“We could,” she says, sincere.

I think of Caylee. If love was a skill or game, I’d be ashamed to reveal to the world that Caylee’s the one I ended up with. It would ruin my credibility right away. But yet, even now, considering her wide chipmunk face, anachronistic glasses and hair . . . and her body that doesn’t really have curves, but clumps and bumps . . . I’m more torn about my wife than any of my other woes.

Jolene takes a fraction of a step back. Perhaps her eyes narrow (it could be my imagination) as she peers into mine. 

“What about you?” I ask, and feel dumb for not doing so sooner. Asking feels like the sudden release of a caught valve. I relax a tad instantly.

“What about me?”

“I think we’ve covered how I’m doing.” I survey once more our stark surroundings bathed in pale light. “What are you up to, or thinking about? What’s on your mind?”

She grins unmistakably. “I saw Tyler.”

“What?!!” I spit. “What the fuck?!”

“Yeah, he took a few pics. Paid me a shitload of money. He didn’t even mention you or anything, which I thought was fucking bizarre, no? But I know we got through to him, that dick.”

“Wow, I…” I have no idea what to say.

“Yeah, I . . . I bought this DJ equipment. Turntables and things. But I don’t think I have the patience for it. Still, there’s something…” She trails off.

My mind is struck like a lightning bolt by that same vision-image I had in my garage the other morning of Jolene and I on some elaborate dance floor somewhere . . . and the fact that seeing that basically pumped me with so much motivation that fapping instead of lifting wasn’t even a possibility.

Am I fucking psychic or something? I don’t believe in that shit.

“Maybe it was something about that class we did with Candy,” she goes on. “Seeing you there, with us, on the floor pushing the bar up with the music… I don’t know. I don’t know what it is.”

“So, you don’t know exactly what you want to do with music, or parties . . . but something?”

“I don’t know. No plan, really. I just had a feeling, and had that new money, so yeah, I went and bought some shit.”

Caylee’s still hovering around somewhere at the edges of my mind like a strict kid who just loves being a hall monitor in school, busting folks for breaking rules. And yeah, that’s totally her, so it fits that the idea of her would function the same way for me. It makes sense that if I have a vision of Jolene on dance floors with smoke and green lights right around the time Jolene gets inspired to move that way in her life, then Caylee’s gotta be right there to remind me I’m anchored to someone who would never (ever) even consider living out anything close to what I saw and what Jolene felt.

Na, Caylee would rather just sink into her big chair in our living room all day and night, and have screens of different sizes stimulate her with pictures or words to stir a few similar droll emotions.

And fuck it, I don’t necessarily hate that boring life either. I’ve been liking it more lately, laughing with my unshapely lady hysterically long into each night as we binge shows and eat and drink all sorts of tasty shit. It’s been way better than pumping out load after load of fuck-batter alone in my room. So yeah.

But right now, I’m here with Jolene, and…

“Where’d you just go?” she asks softly. The voice doesn’t even sound like hers.

“I thought about Caylee,” I admit, but the thought is already a distant memory, maybe from years ago.

“Is Caylee your soul mate?”

“Yes.”

She turns slightly, but shifts closer until the top of our arms touch.

I soften. “Do you have a soul mate?” I ask.

“Yes.”

A lifetime slips by then. My lifetime. There’s special moments with parents celebrating normal milestones. There’s missed school dances and lonely nights spent fixated on possibilities for better chances next time. Yes, there’s Caylee as the full arc of a wave that builds from other, similar loves, which I know must have to lead to growing old together and laughing at one another as our bodies crumble to dust.

But there’s also right here, right now, on these stairs.

I remember the time Jolene and I kissed, and every driving force within me pushes me to reach and draw her to me so our mouths will meet again in this perfect moment.

Instead, maybe just to stall the inevitable kiss . . . the unstoppable joining . . . I ask quietly, “Do you think it’s possible to be in love with more than one person?”

It’s more than possible, and I see in her eyes her choice not to cheapen my words with a trite yes or no. 

It’s not fair (but it is). This all happened so fast. How could I be ready? I spend an hour alone with Jolene, and suddenly we’re back to kindred-spirit-level love and ideas of lives so unlike my perfectly acceptable existence with Caylee . . . the life I’ve built together with my wife over decades of learning, adjusting, compromise, decision… 

Like everything else that might keep me tethered to the ground and reality, my marriage seems poised to be burst like a fragile balloon.

It’s not fair (it is).

I want to do right by Jolene. I want her to live her own life. I don’t want to hold her hostage, or limit her to my used, greying manhood. But when she’s this close, and her soft, unflinching, peaceful face is near enough to move to without having to move…

When that eerie, indomitable smile of hers is right there, and her perfect body is but a few swipes and other motions from being once more exposed…

There’s only so strong a man can be, especially one so damn irresolute and faltering as her presence only confirms I always am.

Fuck me.

“You know what your problem is?” She smirks. “You still think it’s just you.”

“What do you mean?” I utter in the tone of one surely about to transform into a werewolf, and so fumbling to be held fast in iron chains.

“I can’t just tell you that.” She looks me up and down, and maybe shivers. “Nothing’s gonna happen tonight.” Does she sound disappointed? No, she couldn’t be, right? “But to answer your question: Yeah, I don’t think love cares about the limits we try to put on it. And I don’t think good and bad always make fucking sense. So, there you go.”

We stare into each other’s eyes, surely both knowing things neither could (nor need) describe.