"A friend is someone who knows all about you and still loves you."
― Elbert Hubbard

Michonne had lost her ID card. She was absolutely stunning as I watched her search her purse including her matching designer wallet. It was the first time I had ever laid eyes on her way before Hong Kong.

Her nails were done. She looked really nice. Smelled nice too. I liked the gloss on her lips and the way her hair was done up. She didn't make a fuss when I explained the lost ID policy. She didn't insist that I should know her husband or that she was above the rules everyone else adhered to on the base. I liked the fact she was different than anyone I had ever known. She didn't make me sorry she lost her ID. I was strangely sympathetic.

"Is this your first time, ma'am?"

"Yes. I am so sorry for holding up the line."

"It's okay. Just go inside that building there and let them know what happened. They will give you a temporary pass. You have your stateside driver's license?"

"Yes. I have my Georgia license."

"You're from Georgia?"

"Yes."

"You don't sound like it."

"I was raised by my Bigmama in Atlanta. When I went off to college, she moved to King's County."

"I am from King's County. But yeah go on inside Ms. Michonne Benton they will get you hooked up with an ID as quickly as possible."

"Thank you Petty officer 1st Class, Grimes."

"You're welcome, ma'am." It was hard to fight the smile on my lips.

She seemed kind-hearted, considerate.

I began to notice her in places that I never saw her before. She was a jogger. I would sit in the military police vehicle on base and watch her. She had a routine. I was amazed at her endurance, her stamina. She was physically fit without having someone tell her she needed to run a mile and a half and by my estimation, she ran 5 miles or more almost every day.

Whenever I would see her in the store, she was either looking at the expensive bags that were offered at the military store, or she was in the health food aisle. Most times she was accompanied by my wife's friend Sasha.

I was developing a crush on Michonne. It was weird. I hadn't felt like that since Lori in high school.

There were only two people I could talk to about it. What I was feeling was beginning to become too much to conceal. The two people I had were Shane and Daryl. I mostly chose Daryl. Shane was my last resort due to his ability to make me feel like I was being welcomed in some club or fraternity of no goods, cheaters.

"Man, what kind of shit you trying to get yourself mixed up in? You know damn well you are supposed to follow the routine. Go home, eat whatever is cooked because it is better than the ship's food, relax, then go to bed, fuck your wife, sleep, and wake up to do it all over again. Anything else is complicating your life when you don't have too."

Daryl and I kept pace dressed in our PT gear that morning as we jogged the perimeter of the military sports and recreation field.

"I'm just asking if you ever had a crush or found someone more attractive than Sasha? That was all."

'Naw. I ain't looking."

"Really?"

"Looking is to entertain bullshit. I ain't about bullshit."

I shrugged my shoulders finding no kindred spirit in Daryl. I felt Daryl wouldn't understand.

"Are you checking out someone you think is better looking than Lori?"

"Yeah."

"How long this been going on?" Daryl asked.

"For a while."

"A while?"

"A long while. We officially took it there in Hong Kong."

"What happened in Hong Kong?"

"I had never cheated on my wife so this is foreign to me. I had never expected to ever meet someone like her and I did."

"You bullshitting me? Something happened?"

"No bullshit. Yeah. Something happened. It happened all night and into the next day. I don't know how to think about it, and it-her is all I think about. I need someone to talk to about what happened. I was hoping it would be you."

"Sounds like you doing it now. I'm asking questions. I'm listening. I don't plan to tell no one what you tell me either. If shit went down for me I think I would hope to expect the same from you."

"Surprised Shane didn't tell you."

"Tell me what exactly, when the shit you are telling me almost got me winded?"

"I had almost missed Ship's movement."

"What the fuck?"

"A week later we met up in Singapore and did it again."

"Lori knows yet?"

"No."

"She will. Let me be the first to tell you, women have spidey senses when it comes to shit like what you talking about. Trust me. In due time she will find out if you don't plan to stop."

"I don't know what I'm doing right now. I mean I stopped. But I can't stop thinking about her."

"What I want to know is why ain't Lori meeting you in some of those places? Money tight?"

"There is always an excuse with Lori. I think the worse thing for her was to move here."

"There could be worse things."

"Plus, she's envious of the officer wives. If she were an officer wife, she wouldn't have to be on a beer budget. She could easily take Carl and Judith with her on port visits if we had more money."

"What's wrong with a beer budget?" Daryl asked.

"She wants things. Nice things. I got her a purse from Hong Kong made of real leather. She didn't like it. Told me so straight to my face. I wasted money buying her a knock off. It wasn't branded at all just a plain purse."

"Lori doesn't ever seem like she is happy about anything. I don't mean no disrespect, but after Judith, she just seems pissed off. Have you ever asked her what's wrong?"

"I can't because I am supposed to know. She didn't have to come to Japan, and she won't let me forget it every day that we are stationed here. She always says she could have stayed in Georgia."

"Lori in Georgia? You here? You would be out of control with your bullshit if that were the case."

"Bullshit?"

"She's miserable, and you are obviously unhappy if you fucking around with someone else."

"I can't remember the last time Lori and I kissed. I'm not talking about a peck on the cheek, I'm talking full blown kissing. I missed that. I miss kissing."

"Kissing, huh?"

"I'm a man that doesn't ask for much."

"Instead of asking your wife to tongue you, you go elsewhere. What sense does that make?"

"Lori's not interested. Said as much."

"What's kissing the other person like?"

"Fucking amazing. Different."

"Different?"

"A good different."

"She's Japanese?"

"No."

"Don't make much difference since you plan to stop right? It ain't happening again, right?"

"That's why I need to talk about it."

"Here's some advice-do not keep in contact with her. You have a family dependent on you to do the right thing. Two kids. Lori ain't working anywhere and if she is anything like 75% of these wives, she ain't planning on working anywhere. Secretly happy to cut and share coupons and compete with scrapbooking. The last thing you need is the other woman showing up at your house or calling your wife out of the blue to inform her of something she wasn't yet aware of about what really went down in Hong Kong."

"Shit."

"What's wrong?"

"She's jogging up toward us."

"Only one person is coming our way and-"

"It's her."

"You're fucking around with my wife's friend Michonne? She's an officer's fucking wife? The officer that works on the same fucking ship? You fucking kidding me right? Right?"