The Position

by Meg Wolitzer

The mother’s eyes were shut, ostensibly because the pleasure was simply too great to absorb with them open, or perhaps because she knew her children would soon be seeing this picture, and she didn’t really want to make eye contact with them.

Instead of being a lover, Claudia Mellow was a friend, and a good one, too.

at once he heard the unwanted undercurrent of a magnanimous chuckle that had been planted deep in his vocal cords the moment his first wife gave birth to this man sitting across from him, their first son.

Paul realized how sorry he was to see her here. His own wife, and her presence sank his heart.

it was disturbing sometimes, the first time, if you weren’t drunk and you had to confront the purity of your own desire.

To be wanted, to have someone say Come home, as if you were a runaway, as if you were Lassie, and nothing would be all right until you set foot inside your house—this was what everyone hoped for.

Love broken stayed broken, unrepaired. Or if someone did try to repair it, you would forever see the spot where the soldering iron had applied its adhesive silver. The weakness. The place that must not be jarred or touched or stirred up again, for if that happened then there would be another break along the exact same fault line. But this time it would be cleaner, irreparable, final.