Thursday

Thursday night with Mike is the best night of the week. I'm not just saying that because of the sex or anything, but really, it is the best. With my Friday dates with Adrienne and my whole weekend for the kids and every weekday filled with practices and brainstorms and interviews and business descisions and running everywhere trying to keep up friendships and partnerships and talking to fans, Thursday night is just the night that I don't have to try.

It's easy. Just sitting there in his arms after some... call it stress-relief... and closing my eyes and feeling like I don't have to do anything. The radios in my head turn down. The rest of the world is cut off. All there is is me... and my best friend... and the sheets that surround us.

"I love you," I want to say. But I don't know if that's inappropriate. Seeing as we're only together on Thursdays anyway. Seeing as tomorrow, we'll go straight back to being friends and bandmates, no longer lovers until next Thursday night comes around. We'll spend time with our wives, with our kids, with our friends who probably even know what we do but don't say a word... it'll be normal and hectic again. We won't have time to give our love to two people, even if we want to make Thursday night last longer.

And besides. Maybe he doesn't love me, even on Thursdays. Maybe all it is is stress relief.

I wouldn't mind. I can only feel this way one day a week anyway. But if it stops... If I go too long without Mike's soothing scent and his comforting arms and soft kisses and calming eyes... if I can't press close to him and let him shut the world out of this room... I think I'll go insane. Best not to say. Best to keep our Thursdays sacred and simple and isolated.

I close my eyes, feeling his breath on my nose as he rests his face close to mine. I want to say it again: I love you, Mike. The feeling grows more as I feel a tender kiss on my forehead. Oh, Mike, I love you. Don't you know that? Don't you feel it too? Don't you want to melt here, with me, and never move or speak again except to say again, "I love you?"

I press closer to him and appreciate the little squeeze his arms give me when I do. I wonder what it would be like if he said it. He'd say, 'I love you,' and I'd say, 'I love you, too, Mikey.' And then what? We go on like confessions of love are nothing? They're not. I know they're not. He does too. And Mike's never lied about that to anyone in his life.

So what does that make this?

Confusing is the best answer I can give to that. I just wish I could understand. I wish my wife could pull me away and make me relax like this so I wouldn't have to question. I wish Mike would make this easier, but still, he holds me, and he breathes the same air I do, and he makes the world quiet, for me. How could I ever refuse that?

I look back up to him and meet his ice blue eyes with my green ones before his lips on mine make my eyes close. It feels like he loves me. It feels like the world's melted away to leave only us. My wife isn't there. My kids aren't there. His aren't, either. It's just us.

But we are wrong.

I shouldn't be doing this.

I'm betraying my wife.

Another kiss. His hand caresses my cheek. I stare into his eyes. He stares into mine.

"I love you."