Yurari Usuiro

In the end, we’re all the same…we just want to be smothered like babies against another human’s beating heart.

Through a cracked door, heartsick Emi hears a playful growl. Cautiously, she lets her lover in—a wolf of a man wielding a bouquet of roses. His shoulders must have been four inches wider than mine. As I stood behind him, I fantasized about the broadness of his chest and the thickness of his neck…and about becoming his mistress once again.

And so their story goes. For a young woman interested in love without the hassle of a traditional relationship, an affair with someone else’s spoiled husband is just what she ordered—until it’s time to move on.

Then there’s Yuko: with even less time for married men’s shenanigans, she turns her attention to her aging father and the guilt of adultery that has gnawed at his heart for years. Her mother is long dead, yet her memory is enshrined for eternity in their—both father’s and daughter’s—mirrored indiscretions.

Note: Includes four parts of "Second Hand Love."