 |
||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|||
|
My friend calls as usual, when daylight begins to fade, his voice mellow, yet the command firm. “Let’s begin.”
I call home to warn my wife of another late return.
She listens to me, meek as always. After a moment’s silence, I hear her soft voice. “Why don’t you make it a standing instruction?” Her sigh emits through the receiver like a wind’s swoosh. “You’ll save on official phone bills.” A pause, a click, and she cuts me off the line.
A sinking sun brightens the edges of rain-clouds with a pale orange hue, as I watch from behind curtains that rustle in a breeze. She always sounds overwrought.
I wonder why she doesn’t flare up. Maybe, she emulates Mother Earth’s patience. Maybe, her loneliness only inspires resignation.
“I must ignore his invitation,” I mumble to myself.
A cold gust sweeps back the curtains. He calls again, impatient, his voice coarse like rainwater gurgling in a storm-drain. He’s so much unlike her, never allowing me an opportunity to contemplate. Keen to be with me, eager to take control, and always diluting my determination.
I light a cigarette and take deep drags. The cold breeze leaves me shivering. I place my hands on the desk and watch my fingers twitch. It’s not the frozen air, I know.
“We’re late, friend.” His whisper resonates in my ears.
“Yes… I know,” I mutter. “Late for home, late for her… Late for us.”
Rain sprinkles inside my office through open windows as the wind picks up, sweeping leaves and papers down the street. I suffocate in the smell of sodden earth.
“Can you ignore me just like that, friend?”
“Stop it,” I retort. The effort leaves my lungs yearning for a heave of air. My mouth feels dry, and a buzzing sensation hammers the inside of my head.
“You can’t desert me, friend.”
I straighten my fingers, bend and stretch them. The veins in my forearms swell taut beneath my pale skin.
“Stop torturing me,” I yell.
He quits pushing. My cabin falls silent except for the faint hum of a ceiling fan. The rain stops. The breeze ceases. A crescent appears, clad in white bridal attire, illuminating the rain-drenched roads with a feeble light.
I close the windows, lock the door and walk into the moonlit yard. Pain clutches at my stomach, and gnaws through my intestines as I get into my car.
#
The streets are deserted, except for stray pedestrians and occasional traffic that sways to steer clear of puddles on the road. In the distance, a bar’s neon sign glistens.
She may be waiting, not knowing how late I’ll be; eyes cast on the driveway, hands clutched against her bosom. Tonight she’ll be happy. She deserves that.
“You know you can’t avoid me, don’t you, friend?” He resumes prodding. I slow down, sliding a breath-mint between my lips, as I approach the bar. The knot in my stomach tightens.
How will she deal with my pain, something that she never knew, something that I can’t explain to her? Won’t it hurt her as much it does me? Yet, she’ll be happy, I suppose, to hold me and ruffle my hair. Just to have me with her early, and to smell mint in my breath.
As my foot presses the accelerator, another car swerves past, and a guy in the rear seat leans out and hurls a bottle. I slam on the brake. The bottle hits the front side roof, and bursts, splashing the windshield with a frothing liquid.
“Son of a bitch!” I yell.
The car shoots forward; its taillights blur and then disappear into the darkness ahead.
“See, it’s a sign. You gotta turn your car around, rethink your decision.” My friend’s voice coaxes me.
The smell of beer invades my nostrils as I heave in a sigh and shake my head. “No way!” I shift gears and move forward.
I slow down, lighting a cigarette, as I approach a junction, and the lights turn red.
“You’ll not discard me, will you?”
As the lights turn green, my foot presses the accelerator. At the next turn, I see red through a haze of gray. I look left, and then right. My grip on the wheel steadies. “Son of a bitch!” I shout into the damp night, and surge ahead.
“You ran lights. You gotta come back to me!”
I jam on the accelerator, jump another red light, and feel the heat.
“Wrong direction, pal…” The voice fades as I switch on the air conditioner and speed away.
#
Even in the unlit bedroom I see her lying prone on the bed, her lustrous hair sprawled on the pillow, washed in the moonlight from an open window. I lean to kiss her. Lines of tears stain her cheek.
“Wake up, honey.” I whisper into her ears, and kiss her.
She sits up startled, and then leans against my chest.
“It’s adieu forever to my friend.” As I caress her face, and the sting of salt dazzles my lips.
“Aren’t you…a bit late?” She makes an effort to hold her head straight, and look up at me. “He visited me.”
I smell whisky on her breath.
The End
|
|||