Interesting...

I finished reading the book In Bed We Cry, by Ilka Chase yesterday, and as I was reading, I suddenly stopped and checked the copyright date.

1943.

Why was this an interest?

Because part of the plot involved a young cosmetics designer whose husband decided, for whatever reason, he needed to concentrate on his own projects for a while and moved out. He was a chemist, and felt smothered by his wife's company.

So while they were still married and living apart, she had an affair.

Their friends soon realized it; the husband soon realized it....but there were no jealousies exchanged; no heated conversations with friends over the morality of it. Everything was pretty matter-of-fact, as if this happened all the time.

Not exactly a storyline I expected out of the 1940's!

The reason I brought this up? I have a controversial manuscript I've been working on, and it deals with infidelity. Not the usual, "oh, I've met someone else and now I don't want you anymore" type; not the mid-life crisis type; more along the lines of "We were meant to be together, only our timing sucked, so let's correct this problem and see where it leads" type.

The only problem? It seems to be mirroring one of my friend's life. And I'm getting scared to work on it; every time I get the urge to write another scene, several weeks later she calls me and I find out what I've written is dangerously close to what is going on in her world!

I didn't plan on writing her history; it just happened. I'm also afraid this story will never get a chance to be told, given the subject matter. Or that I'm orchestrating an epic that will only end in heartache.

Fortunately, I've neither written anything on it, nor heard anything from her in the past several months.

I don't know if this is a good sign or bad.