R.Charleston

By Burton Gray

A sharply dressed man stepped out of a sparkling blue sports car.  The license plate read: PRTY GRL and had a pass on the mirror.

Meanwhile, a woman reading Cosmopolitan Magazine has inadvertently fallen asleep while waiting to give a surprise Valentine’s Day gift to her boyfriend Charlie. She is awoken by the unfamiliar sound of drawers opening and closing.  She calmly puts the magazine away, dims her reading light and lay on top of the covers. She excitedly poses in a provocative manner. Waiting patiently she arranges flower pedals around her. She stiffens as the sustained silence indicates he could enter at any moment.

Her heart collapses when she hears the front door open. Afraid he is leaving the impulse to call his name and spoil the surprise is suddenly dampened when she hears the familiar clank of his keys on the oak table.

Momentary relief is snapped by the sudden realization that she has no explanation for the sounds she heard earlier.

Scared that too many details don’t add up she swiftly roles off the bed and tip toes to the door and listens.

POP... POP. A muffled metallic sound reverberates through her senses. Perspiration beads form on her brow; she raises a quivering hand to the doorknob and hesitates. Putting her ear to the cool door she listens and waits. Something is terribly wrong. Faint sounds of murmuring are fallowed my muffled moans, then sliding movements.

The doorbell rings. The door opens, closes.

She hears no movement from the other side of the door. Icy sweat is winding down her leg as she twists the knob and in an adrenaline fueled exaggerated impulse, throws the door open.

The room smells smoky. She scans the room and is hit in the face, figuratively, by what she saw. The back of a figure in a dark suit twists and stares her down. It’s Charlie! Smoking a cigarette. Calmly turning towards her, he shows no sign of surprise at her presence. His innocent sympathetic expression shifts to a subtle smile as he looks to the right. She follows his gaze to the mirror wall and sees her sparkling moist form brightly lit by a pear shaped lamp. She forgot to put on her robe.

This oversight was enough to divert her attention from the fact that the cigarette he was putting out, as she looked back at him, had never been lit.

The End.