liar. cheater. loser.

forgive me, father, for i have sinned...

i had an affair with a married man when i was 22 years old. no, it wasn't really an affair, it was more of a one night stand that had a sequel. he was a co-worker in my first job. an architect. what started as harmless flirting, turned into something uncontrollable that we eventually gave in to the call of nature. but the affair ended as quickly as it began. he said he couldn't cheat on his wife. he loves her too much, he said (or afraid of her was more like it). so it ended. and my world stopped for a while. i had let my emotions get the better of me. i cried. i hurt. i wrote him letters to tell him how i have fallen for him. but he turned deaf and blind while i became numb. the pain went away. i left the company and moved on.

and then i met a man in another company i worked for. a lawyer. during this time, i was in a relationship and so was he.. and not just one. so when his girlfriend found out about his extra-curricular affairs, she declared war. and i was her ally, or so she thought. one time, she decided to talk to him to finish whatever it was that needed to be finished. her chosen venue? anito motel in pasay. arrangements were made. he was going to meet us there after his night classes. so off we went to anito. 2 ladies in a cab, entered a motel, much to the delight of the cab driver (i'm pretty sure he was imagining things as he was driving). but unbeknownst to the girl, the lawyer and i made earlier plans already. after all the drama, i convinced her to leave him in the motel room and insisted that we go home. when i saw her get on the bus, i returned to anito to finish what the lawyer and i started. talk about sneaky. this affair went on for a while. we'd have trysts in the stairwell and i'd go back to my area dishevelled and with swollen, red lips (by this time, i had ended my 5-year relationship with another guy who can't seem to make himself marry me.. but that's another story). and because this lawyer had a reputation for being a classic commitment-phobic bachelor, i took it upon myself to change his ways. i thought i had the power to make him love me the way i was already learning to love him. but as fate would have it, i only ended with a bruised, but not broken, heart. i cried. i hurt. i wrote him emails and sent him text messages to tell him how much i wished he was mine. and he never did pay me any attention. i eventually left my job, but still managed to see him once in a while. we were even together in boracay. and then he called me one day to tell me that he was seeing someone else. that was the end of it.

i now have a new employer and in less than a year, i have managed to get myself into another illicit affair. he's an engineer and a married man, no less! it started with an email conversation, and ended in a room with an X-Men theme. what was supposed to be a one night stand turned out to have more sequels than i expected, and it's not showing signs of ending anytime soon. but now, i know better. for the first time in my adult life, i have managed to disassociate my emotions from my body. i know where my place is and i intend to stay put. we both have so much to lose - his family, and my fiance, and this affair will not compensate for the would-be loss should we let our emotions get the better of us. i think i have learned a thing or two from my past indiscretions.

so what do these affairs make me? i am a liar. i am a cheater. i am a loser. but i still believe i will live the rest of my life without regrets and without ever asking "what if?".