我精神出軌了一個比我年齡小一半的男人——但這拯救了我的婚姻

It's New Year's Eve and glitter sprinkles the space between my brow and lids. I have two teen boys at home and I'm retiring from a 22-year marriage with their father. I've never glittered in my life. Hell, I haven't worn makeup since I was a teenager!

現在是新年前夕，我塗了閃閃發光的眼影。家裏，我有兩個10歲的兒子，而我和他們父親22年的婚姻也瀕臨尾聲。我的生活從來都沒有閃光點。從青春期到現在，我算是第一次化妝！

And I'm staring into his eyes. The first unrestricted crush I've allowed myself since I was 20 years old. A crush I've worked through, journaled about, and ultimately recognised as a healthy response to mutual emotional and physical attraction. A crush I haven't forced myself to subdue, like the others over the married years.

現在，我瞪着他的雙眼。這是我20歲以來第一次迷戀某人。我對這份戀情做出了很多努力，會寫日記記錄，最終人們認爲這是彼此情感和身體吸引的健康反應。我沒有強迫自己屈服於這段戀情，就像那些結婚多年的人一樣。

"So, what are you doing tonight?" I ask as I hand him the cash, driven by a desire to feel that intoxicating glow of chemistry-something I've lived without for most of my adult life.

“那麼你今晚有什麼安排呢？”由於想要感受我們之間的化學反應，因此我在遞給他現金時問道，在我的成年生活中，基本都沒有心動的感覺。

"Going home," his voice flat. "It was way busier tonight than we expected," he smiles tiredly as he takes the money, our fingers grazing, our familiarity understood. But this is the latest in a recent series of increasingly uncomfortable exchanges in which I've begun to admit he's withdrawing the romance.

“回家，”他語調平穩的說道。“今晚比預期的要忙很多，”他一邊拿着錢一邊疲憊的微笑着，我們的手指觸碰，相互之間更加熟悉。但這是最近一次的交流，我們的交談越來越不舒服，我承認他不再那麼浪漫了。

Which is painful. Because it was hard won, that romance. It is the first guilt-free, swooning-beyond-my-marriage I've ever let myself feel. Ever. And he is younger. Much younger. One year ago tonight, well before I'd ever noticed this sexy young cashier, my soon-to-be-ex-husband and I were preparing for his major surgery. We'd taken our wedding rings off a year before that. But within days of our decision to formally separate, his surgeon called. Divorce could wait. We were (and remain) close friends, and he needed my support.

這很讓人痛苦，因爲浪漫是很難得到的。這是我第一次毫無愧疚，而這無關婚姻。我從來都沒有這樣過。他很年輕，比我年輕多了。一年前的今晚，在我注意到這個性感的年輕收銀員前，我那即將成爲前任的丈夫和我正準備他的大手術。在這一年之前，我們就不戴婚戒了。但在我們決定正式分居的那幾天，他的外科醫生給他打了電話。離婚是可以等待的。我們是很好的朋友，他需要我的支持。

But I needed support too. And when I'd run to the grocery store for quick, easy meals during the long, intense recovery, there he'd be, just doing his thing, asking questions of every customer; making them feel at ease.

但我也需要支撐啊。在他漫長的康復階段內，每當我跑到雜貨店吃一頓簡單的快餐時，他就在那裏做他的事情，問每一位顧客問題，讓他們感到輕鬆。

In the first of his ventures towards me, he dropped hints about his age (I'm not that brave, and I never did tell him my own). He reminded me of snow falling years earlier, in June, when he'd had to call into his old job on that snowy summer day back in 2008…when he was 14.

他第一次和我搭話時暗示了自己的年齡（我沒有那麼勇敢，我從來沒告訴他我的年齡）。他讓我想起了多年前的下雪天，那是2008年的六月份，當時的他十四歲，不得不在那個大雪紛飛的夏天打電話給以前的老闆。