I really enjoyed Landers' piece on meeting his partner and felt inspired to do similar. The title speaks for itself...

Kissing is Dangerous…

She joked that kissing was dangerous but knew that it was true.

She had been glad to find a friend with whom she could share erotic ideas and seemed so in tune with her other thoughts. Someone who agreed that PK Dick was both brilliant and awful. Someone who not only understood ‘Swansea camp’ but could speak it… Someone who understood why something called the ‘dreaded duck of doom’ was funny… Someone who thought said duck speaking Swansea camp and wearing tartan slippers was even funnier.

And when the exchange of erotic writing rang bells, melted her, thrilled her and reduced her to cliché-addled confusion, how could she not know that cyber was dangerous?

She also knew then that talking would be dangerous. And it was. But how could she have avoided it? How could she have not gone on to find out? And how then, could she not fall for the Welsh lilt and laugh? How could she not be spellbound by the interchange that was so much swifter than the emails that had hooked her?

And how could she ever forget that glorious moment of the pause and the words ‘Spank you’ said with feeling and in that accent in answer to her question? The words so thrilling after the innocent banter and traditional flirting.

And of course she knew that meeting would be dangerous, but how could she not? How could she not find out when she was living for emails, then for phone calls? And how could she not, when his haunting presence followed her to London? And how could she not when he kept her awake? And how could she not when she knew she was already unfaithful? And how could she not, when she needed to know…

And she found that meeting was dangerous. And she found that meeting in the most innocent of circumstances and ‘behaving’ did not stop the electricity of an accidental touch of the hand. And she found that she was not capable of innocence no matter how well she behaved in his presence. And she understood sins of thought better than any catechismal definition. And she understood the subtleties of adultery and betrayal as she understood that kissing was dangerous. And she accepted her culpability with that knowledge.

And she changed her life before they kissed because she already knew that kissing was dangerous. How could it not be? She had known that cyber was dangerous. She had known that words were dangerous. She had known that thoughts were dangerous. She had known that voices were dangerous. She had known that meeting was dangerous. They had joked that kissing was dangerous.

And knowing, she finally kissed him.