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As Melissa got into my car, I noticed that THING sitting on my dashboard.

I got defensive. “That’s not mine. It belongs to my mom.”

 She picked it up. Flipped it from end to end. “I don’t do these either.”

“Heh. I think It’s overrated. I would never buy and collect such things. Look at how corny it can get.”

“Wilde for you…The Best Man in Texas”

 We release giggles.

I respond with a theory. “I think that sometimes women read these things because they lack the romance in their lives.”

—

I remember I had time to kill in a rent-a-book store more than a decade ago. Overcome by laziness to move and after overfeeding my brain in the Teenage fiction section. I stretched out a bit to reach for a book.

…The kind that my mother aunts and older female cousins seems so immersed with…

The book just unravelled itself with pages marked by folded edges pointing inwards to the text. This must be the highlight of the book.

 “…He then undid her shirt and XXX her XXX. She XXX his XXX.”

Spare the eyes which have not even undergone puberty transitions.

My fragile little 10 year old mind was in dysfunctional clockworks. I thought romance was supposed to be walk in the parks, chocolates and flowers, break ups and make ups, and sweet kisses goodnight!

In disbelief, I picked up another book. And another. And another. The same markings on the top corners of the page. Bloody hell. Must have been one hell of a woman with urges. All the same check in and check out date.

Now that I think of it, I think some women are just addicted to the juicy sections of it. It maybe immersive literature, but not literature where I’d like to open up for discussion with friends or a book club.

——

Mommies with books like these with underaged children, please don’t  leave your books lying around the house like that. Especially if your kid likes to read.