Chapter 1: “Cherry Day”

She wrote with a black ballpoint pen:

To do away with all the nasty thoughts…If only I could make love to my husband…if I could ask someone to show me exactly what it looks like and trust that all our adventures would stay in our room…to feel a longing in the middle of me that raises the temperature of all my thoughts and leaves me sweating…and I could simply walk around my house until I run into my husband and do the things I want to do with my husband. To think that I could do such things at any time of the day and feel no guilt or disgust or fear or regret, I could just feel the joy and pleasure and pain and heart and thumping and not feel a speck of wrongdoing and do it as much as I like… I have to be on my best behavior if I’m to even dream of a that. I can’t be letting myself indulge even though it feels nice and my hands want to go back to it now…