She had married for the first time a year after college. Doug had been her closest friend, and five years of their ten were good. They tried grad school, started their first real jobs, bought their house, birthed their three kids. Then they started going stale. Doug stopped wanting adventures and started nursing allergies and hemorrhoids and pessimism. He turned into a complete drag, which made El complain about him to her best friend first and later to himself, which made Doug grumpier, and less secure, and then he started to tiptoe around El and try to second guess what would make her happy, and by the time she got to know her client Charles she was ripe for picking.

And Charles was ripe for dallying. Neither of them knew then that he was experiencing a classic mid-life ego crisis. El was thirty-two and Charles was ten years older. He already drove a red roadster, and he was possessed of a fine home, a successful career, and a willowy blonde wife. They made trips to Europe, held season symphony tickets, and adored their only child, a well-behaved ten year old son. They were both bored almost to tears. His wife engaged in retail therapy and decided she needed another baby. Charles began an outline for the novel he always intended to write, and began having business lunches with El. His book was to be based on his Viet Nam experiences, which contained his only extra-marital affair, and it was probably his memories about that Asian nurse that fired his lust as much as the long lunch conversations. He told El he didn’t make friends often but he treasured his acquaintance with her. He wanted to deepen it. He suggested a regular Friday lunch date.

El thought the invitation peculiar but interesting. She found his personal questions odd but provocative. What new friend asks how you behave when you’re angry? How many other dining companions share war stories and, when you reply with penetrating questions, marvel about how funny it is that his wife never asked?

She agreed to lunch with Charles every other week. Those dates soon became the centerpoint of existence for each of them. Within two months they were fully infatuated and they took the next step. Six weeks after their first sexual tryst they confessed to their spouses and began living together.

Their relationship lasted seven years and their marriage lasted six. It turned out that Charles would rather be bored and comfortable than stimulated and edgy; after he was done with El he contracted a relationship with the old college girlfriend he’d rejected thirty years earlier. El discovered she’d rather be lonely than frustrated; she has remained single ever after.

She interrupted her meditations to pay attention to the abdominal crunches. She tried to keep her belly level, like she was balancing a full bowl of water in the area between her hips and above her pubic bone, while she concentrated on protecting her lower back. There were eighty reps in the sequence. She was happy to get to her feet after that, and kick her heels back one at a time as she worked her butt.