Ruthless Creatures by J.T. Geissinger

N A T
W
hen I come to, I’m lying on my back on a
leather sofa with a cold washcloth on my
forehead. Some time has passed, because the
sun has set and crickets are chirping outside.
The room is large and airy, decorated in a tropical Balinese
style. The polished dark wood floor gleams. Ferns, orchids,
and palms nestle beside carved teak tables and smiling stone
buddhas. Sheer white linen curtains sway in the breeze from a
pair of open French doors. I smell salt air and hear seagulls
crying somewhere far off, and try to remember how I got here.
David sits on the sofa opposite mine, watching me.
His tanned legs are crossed. His feet are bare. His gaze is
fixed on me with unblinking intensity.
When I sit up too abruptly, the washcloth drops to my lap
and the room starts to spin.
“You have heat exhaustion,” he says quietly.
His voice. That low, rich voice I’ve heard so often over the
past five years in my dreams and cherished memories…here it
is.
Doing nothing for me.
A square wooden coffee table separates us. On it are
artifacts from his life: travel books, a glass bowl of pretty
seashells, a small bronze sculpture of a reclining nude.
I’m seized by the urge to bludgeon him with that sculpture.