26 SKIN HUNGER | ANNE ROYAN
ANNE ROYAN is a graduate
of Savannah College of Art &
Design (MFA), Brown University
(BA) and the Columbia
Publishing Course at Columbia
University. After leaving a job
in the fashion department at
Harper’s Bazaar in New York
City, she spent many months
traveling solo through the
Himalayas. She taught English
and poetry to monks in the
Dalai Lama’s temple and to
Tibetan refugee children. She is
currently completing a memoir
based on notes from her travel
journals.hen i want to get out of bed at 2 am and walk down to the
bar because I can hear music from the band that is still playing, the
sounds drifting across the flat surface of the lake and into the window, he
says, Ye s.
I sail my bare feet over the edge of the bed to hit the floor and then
shuffle around to find my flip-flops in the darkness. He rises from the
warm sheets and blankets and the slumber of strangers sharing a space,
and his feet find their footing to follow mine. He takes my hand and
smiles.
He says yes because that is our thing. He says yes because that is where
we meet. Because I say yes and yes and yes. I deny him nothing. He says yes
to me also because his wife says no.
His wife says no because she is tired. And no, because of the kids. And no,
because he is always traveling and she is left alone with the responsibilities
of their life together. No has slowly, over time, become her mantra. And
now, her mantra fuels the fire of mine. I give him everything he asks for,
and so he takes me dancing at 2 am.
I have never been a wife. I can imagine that it is both wonderful and
difficult, and that passing years and children make it all the more gratify-
ing and all the more complicated. I wear the term mistress like a necklace.ANNE ROYAN
Skin Hunger
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