Author: maleghast (Page 11 of 35)

I can’t see her face. It doesn’t matter how hard I try, how hard I screw my eyes closed, how much I beg and beg and beg my mind to comply. I haev to admit that there has been a long time in which I’ve not wanted to have her cluttering up my thoughts, but right now, even though I know I should not, I want to see her face.

It’s getting colder. The gauges are telling me that it won’t be long now; less than five minutes and the only thing of interest left is whether the batteries will outlast the air supply. Will I suffocate or freeze to death? At least the view is good. Still all I seem to be able to do is think about her. Staring death in the face, no hope at all of rescue and all I can think of is that hotel room, the last time we made love. I can’t remember her face, but I can remember the smile she had as I slid inside her; I can still hear what she whispered into my ear as our bodies touched, all of me inside her. I can feel the air getting thinner and all I can remember is how happy we both were that day.

There was no one moving on the street when I came out of the house. That’s hardly unusual at three in the morning, but I had rather a greater sense of lonliness than normal that night. The bag over my shoulder felt heavy even though there was little in it; the weight was certainly imagined. I locked the front door and then reached into the bag to make sure that the package was still there and still whole. My hand brushed against the Colt as I pulled my hand out again, it’s cold steel body poking out slightly from the hand pocket inside the bag where I had hoped it would be easy to extract if necessity demanded.

I looked up and down the street, trying very hard to not look as though I were looking up and down the street, and then set off into the dark morning. There is something quite magical about that time of day, for me. It is as though the world is off-duty, and one can see it as it really is, not polluted by people or things. It is just quietly being, all alone, like a theatre without a show or audience.

“Morning, Virgil.”

Paul had been awake since sunrise and had already rebuilt the fire started on breakfast and made a pot of coffee. His older brother was rubbing his eyes and groaning, clearly stiffened by sleeping on the cold March ground.

“I’m pleased that you didn’t try to tell me is was good, brother. How is it that you are not suffering the effects of last night’s bourbon, Paul?”

“Why I didn’t partake of any of it, Virg. You know I don’t hold wi’drinkin’. Anyway, you want coffee?”

Virgil shook his head as he creaked into a sitting position, running his hands through his hair trying to flatten it down. He grunted a couple of times, then nodded to the offer of coffee as he started to pull on his boots.

“You bin awake since sun-up then, Paul?”

Paul nodded as he poured the coffee and passed it to Virgil

“Thanks.”, Virgil took a long gulp and then settled the tin mug between his palms to warm his hands, “We have a long way to ride today little brother, eat up and then we need to be on our way.”

“Okay, Virg you bet.”

“You’re in a bad way then, how’d you do that?”

Henry tried to remember that this well-meaning stranger had no idea that this was the fourteenth time he had heard that question since leaving the house. The problem with British society as far as Henry could tell was that there was no reason to talk to strangers unless they were injured or obviously foreigners. He had commuted in the Thames Valley for five years, on and off, and at the beginning he had tried to engage strangers on trains and platforms in daily chit chat. He had quickly learned that one did not speak to one’s fellow traveller except to to express disdainful solidarity over the issues of delays and overcrowding.

Now that he was attempting to thread his way through commuter crowds on crutches, he fell foul of the fact that there was a lot of standing around for lifts and for gates to be held open, and these pauses allowed normal people to repeatedly ask the same pedestrian question;

“How did you end up like that?” or “Hurt yourself have you?”

Wankers.

“You need to actually do some work, when you’re at work, John. You know, you’ve got to stop making up excuses for just surfing the Net all day and actually do your work.”

John nodded and smiled. It looked like his strategy of purposeful deriliction of duty was working quite well and soon his well-meaning manager, Tom, was not going to be able to keep his temper about this and there would be an erruption that led to a firing.

“Okay, well I’m glad that we understand each other. I know that it’s hard to concentrate, so just don’t open up any non-work websites. Be strict with yourself and that way there is no temptation to spend hours reading blogs or posting on web fora. I promise you that you’ll find your day goes a lot quicker if you are busy with work as well.”

“No problem, Tom, and you’re right of course.”

John turned and slouched out of the office and back towards his cube, a soft, barely detectable smile on his face. Soon he would be free of this place and without ever having had to be anything but bone idle.

“The thing is, right, that it don’t seem to matter what I say she still comes at me. I mean day an’night, pal. She’s insatiable!”

“Am I s’posed to have pity on ya? I mean seriously, ‘ave you ‘eard yourself, you prick? You know I’ve not been gettin’ any since Deb left last year, an’ now you want to bend my ear about your old lady hankerin’ after yer cock?”

“Oh, I’m sorry mate, it’s jus’it’s been preyin’ on mi, you know what I mean?”

“Yeah, yeah. So, anyway, what’s the problem? I mean you’re not tellin’ me that you can’t get it up or nuffin’ yeah? I mean seriously, you an’ Mish ‘ave bin living together fer six years and she’s still after you in that way and you aren’t ‘appy about that. What’s up wiv ya?”

“Well, it’s not like there’s any problems, ya know, down there, but I get tired. I mean a couple o’nights without the full eight hours in the name of love, and I’m on board, but every night? I’m genuinely knackered, bruv.”

“Well, I can relate to that, but I can’t ‘elp thinkin’ that if it were to change, you know?”

It was getting cold in the deserted jetway; Gethin shifted in the wheelchair, trying to get some circulation going in his now sleepy backside. There was a time when he had been preparing for this mission that he had tried to make himself ready for the periods of time that he would be left alone in restricted areas of the airport. It amused him that people in general seem to trust people in wheelchairs, as if a disabled person would not do anything dangerous or confrontational, and that was why they had decided to have him masquerade as a paraplegic. Still the temptation to break cover and complete his objectives now that he had a good chance of making it to the plane before the assistance guy returned was really strong. Of course the empty wheelchair and discarded crutches would raise a red flag or two. Better to stick to the plan, to patiently wait for all the pieces to fall into place.

A voice from behind interrupted his thoughts:

“Ah, monsieur, tu es prêt?”

Gethin nodded without turning around;

“Oui, merci.”

“What do you want?”

I stared at her, unsure as to where this dominant styled submission had come from. It was not that I was upset by her desire to please me, to serve my desires, but she had previously been pretty clear about the fact that our physical relationship was about me pleasing her. I had been very happy about that; for all of the potential baggage I am sure that represents, and while this unexpected sea change was a good thing it was a curve-ball.

She could see my confusion;

“Don’t think about it, Paul. Tell me what to do. I’m horny as hell and I want you, but I need to hear that you want me and what you want from me, yeah?”

I nodded and stopped thinking. I let my eyes wander across her body and then back to her eyes, which I fixed in a stare;

“Let me taste your pussy. Don’t move to me, just open your legs more.”

She smiled and did as I requested. I slid off the bed and knelt before her; staring into her eyes. I laid my hands on her thighs and slid between them, pushing my mouth up to meet her wetness.

“How long have we been laying in this ditch, Chief?”

“Shut up Mankowsic, you want those dirtbags to hear you?”

Mankowsic smiled, only Chief Tillman could dead-pan such a ridiculous statement, after all they were a sniper detail over eight hundred metres from the ranch house that they were covering; unless the perps were pointing a laser mic right at them, his low whisper was not going to be detected.

He checked his notes again, re-measured the range, re-calculated the wind shear and then turned back to the Chief, who was checking his sights and double checking the rifle’s action. He was about to crack a joke when the radio crackled in their ears;

“All positions, target exiting North East Corner. Fire Team Alpha provide cover as required, extraction team are going in for snatch and grab.”

“Mankowsic. Ranges for the North East Corner.”

“Aye Chief. Eight hundred, twenty-nine yards, three degree shift for wind. Sights free, Chief.”

Tillman flipped open the sight covers and settled into the firing position.

They waited.

As the band struck up another cover classic and the gentle, partial buzz that he was nursing was amplified by the company and the sing-along spirit in the bar he felt himself let go and really experience the lyrics to song after song of timeless classics that he was in now way ashamed to have on his iPod.

It was only as the set got deeper and deeper into nostalgia and cliché that he started to veer away from the feel-good vibe and start to focus on the person who was not there. He had tried to drive her from his mind before he even left on holiday, but now, in the midst of a good time the only thing that he saw when he closed his eyes was her face, and more to the point the only thing that he could think was that more than anything he wished that she was there.

He knew in his heart that she was never going to be with him on trips like this or in fact in any way other than the friendship that they already had. Why could he not simply enjoy the fact that they had a connection? Why was context, as ever, king?