I wonder if part of the thrill of being with you is in knowing you aren’t with her. She has your bed and your eternity, but I get to enjoy the passion and the cinnamon kisses in the storage closet in the basement. I get to run my fingers through your sweat soaked hair while you push my skirt up to my waist and whisper “shhh baby” in my ear. I get to be part of the secret, part of something she’ll never know.

I run to work with the wind in my hair and a smile on my face, pushing out of my mind the thought that you’ll never leave her, that the baby that’s waiting inside her to meet you will only make you love her more. Thoughts like that make me want to vomit, and all I want to do is enjoy you being with me.

I’m late. I run past the coffee shop where I first saw you look at me with something more than admiration, past the bar where you pressed me against the wall near the bathroom and said “you’d better be careful or you just might get what you’re looking for” and where we later shared our first kiss in the parking lot after she’d left with her girlfriends. I run past the restaurant, where you always go together. There you are, with her. I look at you, smile and wave. Then I look at her; like looking in a mirror, only she’s not smiling. There are tears in her eyes, down her cheeks, and I know all too well. I blow her a kiss.

Oh what a sister I’ve become. From the innocent tow-headed toddler to the shameless adulterer; and she’s still perfect. Straight As, straight teeth, straight laced. I’ll never measure up. But I’m the one smiling while she’s sitting there crying; wondering whose hair she’s found on her husband’s coat. One of these days maybe I’ll learn that competition isn’t all healthy.

© 2008 Alix Purcell