Nathan went to the front desk while I stayed behind in the Registration Parking lane. Families were walking through the parking lot on their way back from Magic Mountain, sunburned and cranky after a day in the sun. Was I going to have an affair in a family hotel adjacent to a theme park, in a room that promised a view of roller coasters and screaming children? In the parking lot, I didn’t know. I was hungry, but there wasn’t a point to bringing that up now. Something in Nathan shifted, and as he walked back to the car I could detect something like excitement. He opened the door and smiled at me.

“First floor, near the ice machine.”

It occurred to me that I did this often: set something in motion and almost instantly regretted it. Though my marriage was failing, technically no one had done “the bad thing” yet. Meaning, the unforgivable act that would allow a marriage to crumble for good. Bobby and I both had our hands clean, as far as I knew. Though the beginning of our relationship was full of suspicion (mine) and denial (his), we had settled into an uneasy truce of mutual trust. Now here I was breaking that trust. It felt embarrassing and unnecessary. A friend had once told me most women waited to leave a marriage until their husbands cheated, so they had a verifiable reason to point to. It’s as if they want the husbands to do it, she said, so they had an excuse to exit and force a choice that would lead to their own absolution in the matter. I wasn’t looking for that kind of dramatic end.

We drove slowly through the parking lot as Nathan held a map of the premises that the woman at the counter had drawn directions onto. My whole body was buzzing—like I was about to start levitating, or maybe I was just having an anxiety attack. I tried to regulate my breathing so Nathan wouldn’t notice. He pointed to a corner of the hotel and said, “It’s there.”

I let air seep out of my almost-closed mouth as we pulled into a spot. I turned the car off, but neither of us got out right away. I had never had sex with someone’s father before. He opened the door first. I trailed him as he walked toward the room. I wanted to ask him, Don’t you have any reservations about this? But his sense of urgency told me he was probably already divorced.

The room had a busy carpet, swirls that could make a person sick. He had opted for a king bed. I dropped my purse next to the TV and stood on one side of the bed while he stood on the other. We were facing off over a floral quilted divide.

“Do you think Daphne’s looking down at us right now?” I asked.

“Right here?”