“Well,” she said, sighing, “I’m not a fan of cheating. I never write it, as you know. It’s a super-difficult topic. Sometimes a trigger topic for certain people who had a trauma with it. There are always circumstances where perhaps cheating was necessary in the beginning—abusive partners and such—but in the end, for it to be a healthy relationship…something has to change.”

I nodded, mentally soaking up the words to apply to the next blog.

“And as for the age difference thing,” she continued, “that’s tricky, too. If someone is thirty and the partner is forty, there isn’t much of a maturity difference, is there? But if someone is, say, eighteen and the partner is twenty-eight, then there’s a major gap in emotional development.” She eyed me, and I couldn’t help but laugh.

“You sound like Dad.” No doubt his decades of psychology had rubbed off on her over the years. Hell, it had rubbed off on me with this intense desire to help people.

“Don’t tell him that.” She swatted me with the pair of socks she’d rolled. “Anyway, does that answer your question?”

“Yes,” I said.

More or less. I was able to draw as much from my own feelings on the topic, but I’d wanted a trusted source to confirm it. The commenter I’d selected for today’s post was in a wicked emotional state, and I’d have to handle it as delicately as Mom implied.

Mom gathered the folded clothes that were hers or Dad’s and placed them neatly in the basket, leaving mine on the bed. “If you’re writing a book,” she said, stopping in my opened doorway, “I may be able to help you, you know?”

I smiled at her. “You’d be the first person I’d tell if I was attempting to pen a novel, Mom.”

“Just checking,” she said, flashing me a wink and headed down the hall.

I waited a few minutes before opening my laptop again. Now prepped for my next post, I needed to publish it before I had to get ready for tonight’s date. Swallowing hard, I placed my fingers on the keys.

Question of the Day:

Fortnite4food asks: “I’m in love. Think about her all day and night, can’t eat, can’t sleep, all-consuming kind of love. There is only one problem.

Okay two.

She’s married.

She’s six years older than me.

We were friendly at first. Then things happened. Amazing things. She loves me, too. I know it.

But she hasn’t left her husband yet, and it’s torture seeing her every day and not being able to show anyone I love her. I can’t hate the husband, either, because I’ve met him and he’s a good dude. I feel like an asshole, but she’s it for me.