Lying Next to Me

by Gregg Olsen

I’d become a father. Sophie, a mother. I learned that mother is more than father. Mother trumps everything. Father is a role. Father is biology. Mother is sacred. Motherhood consumes every bit of a marriage. Every last crumb.

“The ones that test the limits sometimes do the most amazing things in life. That’s what I’ve always thought.”

I wonder how many people wish they could unring a bell. I do. I feel that way right now when I think of that Saturday afternoon when I noticed that she had left her Gmail open and I clicked on a folder marked “Personal.”

A noose was around my neck, and I couldn’t breathe. That’s the best way to describe that first reaction. Just no air.