＜I took the plunge and attended a reunion of my high school class. It was the first local gathering in a long time for Masami, who had been living in Tokyo since moving to Tokyo for college. There she met him again&#8230; <a href="https://friday.kodansha.co.jp/article/263049">Part 1: Regrets of a Married Woman Who Had a &#8220;Reunion Affair&#8221; in Her Hometown</a> Continued from Part 2 The horrifying &#8220;reality&#8221; that one night&#8217;s event brought about&#8230;
<figure id="attachment_263177" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-263177" style="width: 1920px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="3e798315"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2022/09/man-g5bb4ae863_1920.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-263177" class="wp-caption-text"> She fell in &#8220;adult love&#8221; with a boy she used to admire, whom she met at a class reunion. What changed her seriousness&#8230; Torn between joy and anguish&#8230; How did the affair end?</figcaption></figure>
<h2> After leading a &#8220;perfectly normal&#8221; and serious life&#8230;</h2>
 We asked Masami about her &#8220;past&#8221; as she plunged into the &#8220;reunion affair. She was 28 years old when she married a man three years her senior at work. It was a &#8220;normal marriage from an ordinary in-house romance. When she became pregnant with her first child, she quit her job and gave birth to her first daughter at the age of 30 and her first son at the age of 32.
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 My parents live far away, so when we had two children, we moved closer to my husband&#8217;s family. When we first became newlyweds, we lived a short distance from my husband&#8217;s parents&#8217; house. My husband thought it would be too uncomfortable to live so close to his parents-in-law. But the truth is, it was closer to his parents&#8217; house and closer to his office. After we moved, my mother-in-law helped us a lot. She would push her old-fashioned child-rearing theories on us, and there were times when I couldn&#8217;t stand it any longer and argued back, leading to a big argument, but I still had to ask for help from my mother-in-law. My husband didn&#8217;t help much.
 Masami herself had come to terms with her relationship with her mother-in-law, saying, &#8220;That&#8217;s just the way it is. When her youngest child turned 2 years old, she left him at daycare and began working part-time. I wanted to have money that I could spend without hesitation with my husband.
 My husband is a good man, so I told him, &#8216;I can work outside the home because Masami is taking care of the housework and childcare. But I couldn&#8217;t bear the burden of being supported by my husband. So I took a part-time job. It was important for me to work outside the home and earn a wage, even if only a little.
 By the time her children started elementary school, Masami was appointed chief of staff, even though she worked part-time, and she began to enjoy her work more and more. Of course, she admits that she did her best for both her family and her parents-in-law.
<h2> I like to think of myself as a hardworking person.</h2>
 I always felt I had to do my best. I didn&#8217;t want to be rewarded. I just liked myself for trying my best, and I couldn&#8217;t imagine my life without trying my best.
 However, the harder Masami worked, the more things started to go wrong for her family.
 The older child stopped going to school when he entered junior high school, and the younger child, who had been watching him, became ill&#8230; I am the type of person who tries to do my best. I am the type of person who tries hard, so there was a part of me that couldn&#8217;t tolerate a child who didn&#8217;t try hard. My husband said he would watch over her anyway, and my mother-in-law said, &#8216;This is what happens when you work. I felt as if I had been denied my life until now.
 It was during this time of confusion and distress that she received news of a reunion of her high school class. My parents sent me a postcard that arrived at their home.
 I rarely went back to my parents&#8217; house. My parents were fine, but my brother and sister-in-law didn&#8217;t look good when I returned. I tried not to go home too often because I knew how they felt. But at that time, I felt a strong desire to go back to my parents&#8217; house and attend the reunion.&#8221;
 Fortunately, the eldest daughter was able to go to school little by little. Although she was attending school in the nurse&#8217;s office, a firm relationship of trust was beginning to develop between her and the nurse. At home, she talked about the health teacher all the time. Her husband listened and accepted her expressively. Masami tried to smile as much as possible, and their eldest daughter began to talk to Masami as well.
 She said, &#8220;Then my eldest son started feeling better and started going to school. I am sure he was scared of something. The atmosphere in the house, the tense feeling between my parents and my sister. But thanks to my husband, I learned to &#8216;watch and wait.
 As things improved, she asked her family if she could go to her parents&#8217; house, and all three of them said, &#8220;Sure, go ahead. Masami says she felt a little lonely, thinking that maybe everyone could stretch their wings without her once in a while. That is how she ended up attending her high school reunion.
<h2> It was a natural progression, and I went.</h2>
 At the reunion I attended, I spent the night with him, whom I met again. Two weeks later, he contacted me to say he was going to Tokyo.
 He said, &#8220;I was lost. But. just the thought of not seeing him made me cry. In those two weeks, I already missed him so much. weeks, I already really missed him.&#8221;
 After much hesitation, Masami decided to wait until she met him before deciding whether or not to continue this relationship. She decided to go with the flow. With that in mind, on the day of the meeting, she picked out some fashionable underwear. Would she put her true feelings first, or would she take a risk and stay put? The truth is that when one decides to wait until they meet, they are already in love, but those who are in the middle of a relationship like to think that they are cool.
 I told him I had to work overtime that day and went out because &#8220;I work overtime sometimes, even part time. When I saw his face, I realized I couldn&#8217;t stop myself. I cried at his chest that I shouldn&#8217;t have come. I complained that I was in pain, that I was falling more and more in love with him. He said, &#8216;Me too. &#8216; We discussed the idea of getting a divorce, but that didn&#8217;t seem realistic.&#8221;
 It burns because it is not a marriage. Even though she knew this, Masami could not help but cry when she saw him. But she also laughed, saying she was glad to see him. He hugged her, saying she was busy laughing and crying.
 &#8216;Eventually, the relationship continued. I became mentally unstable, but after about six months, I could tell that we were both doing our best to put our families first. We came to be able to say to each other that we would do our best to put family first. It was a time when we looked at reality and decided to continue the relationship nonetheless.&#8221;
 There were times when they could not meet due to conflicting schedules. Even so, her feelings for him had not cooled. Looking ahead, when her youngest child became a junior high school student, Masami decided to become a full-time employee, a decision she had been urging for some time.
 He congratulated me,&#8217; she said. He congratulated me, saying, &#8216;I knew you were a hard worker, Masami. I was doing everything I could, everything I had to do. I was doing everything I could. He always surrounded me with warmth. I think I was able to do this because I thought that if I worked hard every day, the day when I could see him would get closer.
 He often gave me &#8220;little gifts. He would give me a beautiful scarf because he thought it would look good on me, or a pen that was easy to use. It was not a big gift, but she felt his &#8220;feelings.
 I had heard that he had two children about the same age as ours. I didn&#8217;t ask about his wife, and he didn&#8217;t talk about her. But I was talking on the phone with a friend from high school and the subject of him came up, and he said, &#8216;Yu-kun, I heard you dated a junior high school classmate for a long time and got married.
 Her friend&#8217;s comment that it must have been a very big love affair fell on deaf ears. Even so, she was unable to break off her relationship with him.
 Even during the COVID-19 crisis, he came to see me, though less frequently than usual, and he faked a business trip. I trusted his feelings.&#8221;
<h2> A phone call at night </h2>
 But about six months ago. About six months ago, he called me at a time of night when he usually did not call me.
 &#8220;My husband and children were there, so I pretended to be calling from work and went out into the hallway and said, &#8216;What&#8217;s wrong? Anyway, I can&#8217;t see you anymore. After I heard his voice on the other end of the phone, he said, &#8220;My husband was never interested in you in the first place. You forced him into a relationship with you, didn&#8217;t you? Do you want to be sued? I&#8217;ve been found out, ma&#8217;am,&#8221; the woman&#8217;s screeching voice said. Your wife found out.&#8221;
 With trembling hands, he hung up the phone and returned to the living room, but the difficulty of &#8220;behaving normally&#8221; was too much for him. The next day, I tried to contact him, but his phone and messages were disconnected. I tried repeatedly to call his office, but was told that he was out of the office or in a meeting. He seemed to be using his answering machine.
 I was vaguely confident that if push came to shove, he would choose me. If he divorced me, I would too&#8230;&#8221; I was even prepared to do so. I was even prepared for that. But in the end, he listened to his wife and abandoned me. I couldn&#8217;t stand that fact, so I thought about moving to his company in the Kansai region.
 Every day was a struggle. I was afraid I was going to do something terrible. Although she was determined to make it to Kansai tomorrow, Masami was suffering from insomnia and loss of appetite, and felt that she was losing energy and strength.
 I think my family knew there was something wrong with me,&#8221; she said. I didn&#8217;t want to worry my children. That was all I could think about.
 Then one day, a moving truck was parked in front of a house in the neighborhood that he was close to. Another neighbor told me in a whisper, &#8220;The family has been separated because of your wife&#8217;s infidelity.
 I broke out in a cold sweat, wondering if this was going to happen to our family too. Thinking about it, I was probably lucky that my husband did not find out. Perhaps it was for my own good that he immediately cut off all contact with me. Of course, I think he was actually protecting himself, but I want to believe that he still loves me. I will see him again someday. I just have to get through it thinking that.&#8221;
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 She said this and held back another tear. Whether you are prepared to say goodbye someday or believe that you will be together someday, an unconvincing &#8220;sudden breakup&#8221; is hard. She wondered when this agony of tears would end.

 Sanae Kameyama

 ＜I took the plunge and attended a high school reunion. It was the first local gathering in a long time for Masami, who had been living in Tokyo since moving to Tokyo for college. There she met him again... Part 1: A local reunion party... "Alumni affair" ignites into flames.

Hell Began with a “Sudden Phone Call” from a Married Woman Who Fell into a Reunion Affair

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