The Road into the Woods

It was all so familiar and

so unreal: there was the

childrens’ school, dark and

quiet; the cafe where she

met her friends; the little

lingerie shop whose wares she was

wearing; the enormous Tesco, still

thrumming despite the hour—all so

odd and ordinary, then

the road climbing out of town into the

woods where her children loved to

scamper, where she had played

silly games with her friends, first

held a boy’s hand, first

kissed—in the car-park of which

she was about to suck

strangers’ cocks, encouraged by the

man driving the car who

wasn’t her husband.

The town looked so small and

cosy from up here: she hoped the

children wouldn’t wake and

disturb her husband; that he wouldn’t

start smoking again; that he’d

still love her when she returned

changed and dirtied from her

adventure.

The car turned and her town was gone: it was

just her and him in that

headlit tunnel through the trees,

with those men and her

frightened excitement at one end and

at the other

everything else.