The Weight of Secrets

Wednesday dinner was meatloaf.

I’d made it on autopilot - mix, shape, bake - while my brain ran in circles like a hamster on a wheel. The kids chattered about school, about a substitute teacher who couldn’t pronounce “Worcester Sauce” about a boy who’d fallen off the monkey bars. Simon laughed at all the right moments. I moved my fork from plate to mouth and back again.

“Mommy, you’re not listening.”

My daughter’s voice cut through the fog. She was staring at me with that particular seven-year-old indignation, her eyebrows drawn together in a miniature facsimile of Simon’s frown.

“I’m listening, sweetheart. Monkey bars. Tommy fell.”

“That was five minutes ago. I was talking about Emma’s birthday party.”

Simon’s eyes found mine across the table. His expression held the question - you okay? ... but he didn’t voice it. Not in front of the kids. His foot nudged mine under the table instead, a small gesture of solidarity that made my chest ache.

“Sorry. Tell me about the party.”

She launched back into it, mollified, and I nodded at appropriate intervals. The meatloaf tasted like ash. Between my legs, the soreness had faded to a dull reminder, a muscle memory of what I’d done. Every time I shifted in my chair, I felt the absence of Jamal’s cock and the presence of my guilt, tangled together until I couldn’t separate one from the other.

After dinner, Simon did the dishes while I herded the kids toward baths and pajamas and bedtime stories. The routines were a lifeline. Wash behind ears. Find the missing stuffed rabbit. Read two chapters of the book about the dragon who wanted to be a baker. Kiss foreheads. Click off lights.

By eight-thirty, the house was quiet.

We collapsed onto the sofa, some show flickering on the television that I wasn't able to pay any attention to. Simon’s arm draped over my shoulders. I curled into his side, my head finding its familiar spot in the hollow between his chest and shoulder, and his hand stroked my arm in that absent way he had.

His body smelled like soap and the faint woodiness of his shampoo. His heartbeat thudded steady under my ear. My husband. My kind, attentive, unsuspecting husband.

Guilt pressed down on my sternum like a stone.

I’d had sex - hours of sex - with another man in our home. In our kitchen. In our shower. In our bed. And now I was curled against Simon like nothing had happened, like I hadn’t watched myself in the mirror riding another man’s cock, like I hadn’t cried afterward and then immediately lied about it.

Fine. The ceiling looks great.

The words echoed in my skull. I squeezed my eyes shut.

On the television, a detective was explaining something about DNA evidence. Simon’s fingers traced lazy patterns on my shoulder. Neither of us spoke.

At some point - I don’t know when - the show ended and he clicked off the TV.

“Bed?”

“Yeah.”

We climbed the stairs together. The bedroom door stood open, and I remembered, with another lurch of guilt, that I’d changed the sheets earlier. Fresh linens. Pale blue. Simon had mentioned last week that the old ones were getting pilly.

He didn’t know I’d changed them because Jamal’s sweat had soaked through to the mattress.

He didn’t know anything.

The kiss goodnight was brief - a press of lips, a murmured “love you.” I whispered it back. Then the lamp clicked off and the room settled into darkness and Simon’s breathing lengthened into sleep within minutes.

I lay awake.

Staring at the ceiling. The dark shape of the wardrobe mirror. The faint glow of the streetlight through the curtains.

And my thoughts - god, my thoughts went back to Jamal. His cock. The stretch of it, that impossible fullness when he’d first pushed inside me. The orgasms, one after another after another, each one ripping through me like I’d never been touched before. His cum inside me, hot and thick, dripping out afterward onto these very sheets.

My thighs pressed together. My pulse kicked.

Right here. On this bed. Where Simon was sleeping now, his back rising and falling in peaceful rhythm. I’d spread my legs for another man right here, and I couldn’t stop replaying it. Couldn’t stop feeling it - the phantom sensation of being filled, stretched, used.

My heart skipped. Skittered. Settled into something faster than it should have been.

I forced myself to roll over, away from Simon, away from the memory. Eventually, exhaustion won and I tumbled into a sleep full of fragmented dreams I couldn’t quite remember when morning arrived.

---

Thursday dawned gray and humid.

The kids were a whirlwind of lost shoes and half-eaten toast and lunchboxes that needed packing. I moved through the routine again, but the fog of yesterday had lifted slightly. Doing things helped. Doing normal things.

The school bus swallowed the children at 7:45. I stood on the porch and waved until it turned the corner, then went back inside to the quiet.

Simon was in the kitchen, coffee mug in hand, his messenger bag already slung across his chest. His dark hair was still damp from the shower, and his stubble-shadowed jaw caught the morning light in a way that made him look almost dangerously handsome. For a second - just a second - I forgot Jamal entirely.

Then he spoke.

“Do me a favor.”

“What?”

“Carry Lucky today. Will you?”

The words landed in my stomach like a stone. My mouth opened. Closed. “You mean it? All day?”

His hazel eyes held mine, steady, warm, completely unaware of the storm raging inside me. “Just do.”

He kissed me - a real kiss this time, not the brief goodnight peck. His lips lingered. His hand cupped the back of my neck. And the guilt surged so hard I nearly confessed right then, nearly let the words spill out: I fucked Jamal, I fucked him in our bed, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry ...

I didn’t.

I kissed him back.

Then he was gone ... the front door clicked shut, and I stood alone in the kitchen with his request hanging in the air.

Carry Lucky today.

Lucky. The egg-shaped vibrator we’d bought together at the boutique. The one he’d controlled from his phone while I writhed on the bed and came harder than I’d ever ... well, harder than ever before yesterday.

The irony was almost cruel.

I tidied first. It was easier to think while moving.

The kids’ dirty clothes went into the laundry basket. The breakfast dishes went into the dishwasher. I wiped down counters and swept crumbs from the floor and tried not to think about the fact that Jamal’s bare back had been pressed against these very tiles.

The washing machine beeped its completion, and I carried the wet laundry to the back door to hang it on the line. The morning sun was already burning off the humidity. Birds argued in the maple tree. A neighbor’s dog barked twice and fell silent.

Then I went upstairs to collect the rest of the laundry.

My skirt was in the hamper. And my blouse. And the panties I’d worn - the things I’d hastily shoved to the bottom, hidden beneath towels and Simon’s gym shorts. I pulled them out and the awkward feeling hit my stomach like a fist.

I stood there holding the evidence of my betrayal, and for a long moment I couldn’t move.

Then I shoved everything into the machine, added detergent, and started the cycle.

The hum of the washer filled the silence.

Lucky.

I found it in the nightstand drawer, still in its white box. The egg was pale pink, smooth, smaller than I remembered. The flexible tail curved like a question mark. I held it in my palm and looked at it - really looked - and the strangeness of the moment settled over me.

Forty-eight hours ago, Simon had controlled this toy while I gasped and bucked and came apart. Forty-eight hours ago, he’d been the only man I’d ever touched. The only man I’d ever wanted.

Now here I was, about to insert a vibrator at his request, while my body still remembered another man’s cock.

I sat on the edge of the bed. Spread my legs. Hiked my slip up around my hips.

The first press of Lucky against my folds was dry - too dry - and my body resisted. Of course it did. My mind was a mess of guilt and confusion, and arousal felt like a betrayal in itself. I fumbled in the nightstand drawer until my fingers found the lube. Slicked the egg. Tried again.

This time it slid in.

The silicone was cool, then warming. I pushed until the egg settled deep, that familiar pressure against my G-spot, and the tail hung down between my thighs. The little red LED blinked to life when I pressed the switch - paired and ready.

I let my slip fall back into place. Stood. Took a breath.

Back to housework.

The laundry went onto the line. Towels. Sheets. The kids’ tiny socks flapping in the breeze. My body moved through the motions while Lucky sat motionless inside me, a dormant promise.

By ten o’clock, I’d almost forgotten it was there.

I grabbed my purse and drove to the grocery store. The parking lot was half empty, mid-morning on a Thursday. I grabbed a cart and started working through my list - produce, bread, something for dinner that wasn’t meatloaf.

The tomatoes looked good. I was leaning over them, comparing two heirlooms, when Lucky buzzed.

A short pulse. Low intensity. Gone almost before I registered it.

I straightened so fast I nearly knocked over the display. My hand gripped the edge of the cart. My eyes darted around the produce section - old woman by the lettuce, stock boy restacking avocados, no one looking at me.

Oh no. Not now. Simon.

Somewhere in his office, he was sitting at his desk, phone in hand, touching that circular touchpad with his thumb while I stood frozen in the grocery store. He probably had no idea where I was at the moment.

Lucky moved.

Not a vibration this time - a movement. The egg shifted inside me, the tail curling and uncurling, and the sensation was so unexpected that I had to bite my lip to keep from gasping. My knuckles went white on the cart handle.

The buzzing started again. Low. Rhythmic. That heartbeat pattern - two quick pulses, pause, two quick pulses.

I bent over the vegetables. Pretended to examine a cucumber. My face was flaming. Between my legs, the vibration intensified, shifted, found a frequency that made my hips want to rock.

Hope no one’s watching me.

But someone was.

“Everything okay, miss?”

The voice came from my left. I turned and found an old man in a cardigan, his cart half full of soup cans, his brow furrowed with genuine concern. He’d stopped his cart beside mine. His eyes - kind eyes, grandfather eyes - studied my face.

“Yes,” I managed. My voice came out breathier than I wanted. “Just - indisposition.”

The word sounded ridiculous. Indisposition. Like I was a Victorian woman having a spell of the vapors. But Lucky was doing something now that I couldn’t describe - a pattern I’d never felt before, the egg vibrating and moving simultaneously, the tail pressing against my clit from the inside - and I couldn’t form coherent sentences.

“Do you need to sit down? There’s a bench by the pharmacy.”

“No, I’m ... thank you. Really. I’m fine.”

He lingered a moment longer, then moved on, his cart squeaking faintly as he went. I exhaled. My thighs were trembling. The vibration dipped, rose, dipped again - that unpredictable pattern that had made me shatter in the bedroom. Not here. Please not here.

I abandoned the tomatoes. Moved through the store on legs that didn’t feel like my own, gripping shelves when I needed to, praying no one noticed the flush creeping down my neck. The cashier - a bored teenager - scanned my items without looking at my face. I swiped my card. Grabbed my bags.

The car. The blessed privacy of the car.

I locked the doors and let the moan out - a sound I’d been holding for ten minutes, low and desperate. Lucky was still going. Still buzzing and moving and pressing against that spot that made my vision blur. My head fell back against the headrest. My hips bucked against the seat.

I was close. Right there. The heat was building, coiling, my breath coming in short gasps ...

Lucky stopped.

Just stopped. Dead. No buzz, no movement, nothing.

“No,” I whispered. “No, no, no ... Simon, you bastard ...”

Nothing.

I sat in the car for a full minute, breathing hard, my body screaming for release. But the egg stayed silent. The red LED blinked once and went dark.

He’d timed it.

I drove home with my thighs pressed together and my hands shaking on the wheel.