Bad Love

Chapter 13

For Jasmine weekends came too quickly and lasted far too long; forty-eight interminable hours during which she had to be hyper vigilant in making sure she did nothing to arouse her husband's suspicions of the affair she was having. There was no telling when a look she aimed in Andrew's direction might get intercepted by her husband. For two full days she wouldn't feel the soft touch of Andrew's hands and lips on her skin, nights dragged on forever while she read magazines and watched mindless television, waiting for the hour to come when she could sleep so there'd be eight fewer hours she'd have to spend with her husband, hoping this wasn't the night when he decided the time had come to kick-start their sex life. The very idea of Bradley putting his hands on her in an expectant manner was enough to make Jasmine shudder. Weekends of late had become especially disagreeable for Jasmine. She spent the majority of the day alone with Bradley and Lucy due to Andrew sleeping until the middle of the afternoon, and when she was in the same room as Bradley she looked at him and saw eyes that were overflowing with suspicion. When Andrew also happened to be in the room he watched them with searching eyes; every interaction between them, however minor, resulted in a curious squint. During weekends Jasmine felt like she was suffocating. In the afternoons Jasmine, Lucy and Andrew still took their trips to the beach together to get away from Bradley, only now he started joining them. They'd be at the beach for a short period of time of about thirty minutes when Bradley would arrive and impose himself on them. She had no way of knowing it, but Jasmine was sure he'd somehow been watching them the whole time they'd been there without him. He looked at her with eyes that condemned her as guilty and whenever their eyes met that's exactly how she felt. Jasmine now fully understood what it meant to have an affair. The fear and panic that she felt with Bradley around caused her to question the feelings of love that she and Andrew shared and, for the first time, she seriously contemplated the future. Several times since the beginning of their affair she and Andrew had joked about the idea of her leaving Bradley for him and taking Lucy with them, but they'd only ever talked about it jokingly and with Bradley sniffing around them things had become gravely serious.

It was a tremendous relief to Jasmine when Bradley finally left the house at 3 a.m. on Monday morning. The oppressive atmosphere that he'd brought with him immediately dissipated and Jasmine once again felt like a free woman. Every time he left the house to return to work there was nothing Jasmine wanted to do more than go into Andrew's room and ensconce herself in his loving arms. Lately she hadn't been able to do that. Every week she would walk to his door and see the light on inside and remember that he was in there thinking and writing, forcing her to return to her room where a cold and empty bed awaited her. What existed between her and Andrew was now nothing more than just sex. His novel was the most important thing in his life, using up all the imaginative energy he'd used to create the goddess-like image he used to have of her. For Jasmine, the greatest appeal of the affair had always been Andrew's awe of her; he said beautiful things to her and touched her body delicately because to him it was the most precious thing in the world. Having promised him her patience and understanding Jasmine felt that it was selfish of her to be mourning the loss of her favourite things about their affair when Andrew was working on something as huge as a novel. She felt her selfishness wasn't entirely unreasonable though. She felt like she was being used again, Andrew was using her for sex the same way Bradley used to, and with Lucy being interested in nothing else besides Andrew's novel Jasmine couldn't retreat into motherhood as she had done before. She needed things to change; she only had two things in her life: her daughter and this affair, and Andrew's novel had robbed her of both. She thought about ending the affair, but it was unthinkable to her that she would never again feel his lips against hers or his hands on her skin.

Jasmine knew Bradley well enough to know that with all of his ambition and drive came a jealousy that was equally impossible for him to restrain. Thus it came as no surprise to her when, not long after he started displaying serious suspicion about the possibility of there being something between her and Andrew, he arrived back home on Monday morning at 11 a.m. with the news that he'd had to close his site for a week due to heavy rains and that he'd be spending that full week at home. Getting through two days with Bradley breathing down her neck and no meaningful contact of any kind with Andrew was hard enough; Jasmine didn't know how she was going to manage a full week. Every day that week, from morning 'til night, Bradley went to extreme lengths to make their living space as hostile an environment as possible for Jasmine. He didn't spend any time on his phone or at his laptop; he spent nearly all of his time staying in close proximity to Jasmine, regularly uttering innuendo and keeping his eyes peeled for any reaction that might indicate guilt.