Life in a Flash (Part 7)

Love. My love. Let me into your dreams. Open your heart again and hear me. Randy, I need you so. Don't turn from me now, or all is lost. I am lost. Love. My love. It was half past midnight and he still could not get a hint of sleep, not even its echo. The house was engulfed by a deafening silence as his parents had already retired to bed. He shifted restlessly in sleep, turned his face into the pillow. Felt her there, somehow. Her scent. Definitely her witchy smell that had Randy enslaved under its spell; Skin, soft, warm and dewy; hands, gentle and soothing and all then drifted into dreams of cool and quiet mists, hills of deep, damp green that rolled to forever. And the witchy scent of woman. He thought he would just be leaving with his parents for only a month upon completion of his graduate studies as he looked for something useful and entrepreneurial to do, but the short period had turned into several months and now a week to completion of a year. If only people could get paid for doing nothing and having to tolerate the annoying parents who appeared to get more intolerable over time. He was damned, he thought angrily. Six months prior, he had been dumped by his girlfriend of two years. Something to do with him not living up to his standards, the thoughts brought rage in him that he found himself out of the sheets smashing everything he came across as he stormed to get a bottle of whisky, which had now turned to be his number one refuge at such moments. Kevin hurriedly ensured all the evidence had been wiped off before leaving the scene. This had gone a bit too far than he had intended and he knew just how to avoid a possible jail term and given his US citizenship that was still pending, an immediate deportation. Thoughts kept criss-crossing his mind including just how his friend of years was lost, in a bad state, and he knew of no way he could be of help. He hated that feeling of helplessness. Up ahead at approximately 270 degrees from where he stood Eminem’s castle rose atop a cliff, silver stone spearing into stormy skies, its base buried in filmy layers of fog that ran like a river. He still did not like staying in Hollywood despite the numerous fancy shopping stores and eateries and a plus for the higher probability of running into a celebrity compared to other parts of the world. Today being thanksgiving he had preferred to take his horse to avoid the jam that lately seemed to arise in the evenings in order to get to his client on time without soliciting unwanted attention with his brand Lamborghini. The sound of his mount's bridle jingled battle-bright on the air as he rode, leaving the green hills behind and climbing high on rock. Here he could clearly see Hollywood. “The city of lost angels” he thought as he let a wide smile spread over his face as he realized that he too was lost. Thunder sounded in the west, over the hills and echoed in his warrior's heart. Had she waited for him? Had someone been watching him? His eyes, gray as the stone of the castle, shifted, scanned, searching rock and mist for any hole where a foe or anybody for that matter could hide. Even as he urged his mount up the rugged path cleaved into the cliff he knew he carried the stench of death, that it had seeped into his pores just as the memories of it had seeped into his brain. “Neither body nor mind would ever be fully clean of it”, he murmured as he hurried back to catch up with Stella. His heart longed for peace, something he now realized he knew very little of. The horse's hooves rang musically over the rock until at last they traveled to level ground. He dismounted at the foot of his house just as lightning cracked the black sky with a blaze of blinding white light. And she was there, just there, conjured up out of storm-whipped air. Her hair was a fireball over a dove-gray cloak, alabaster skin with the faint bloom of rose, a mouth just curved in knowledge with sky-blue eyes as a living star. She looked damn exhausted as she approached him wading through the knee-high mists, her beauty staggering. Kevin’s heart leaped, and his blood churned with love, lust, longing as he tried to speak, “you waited for me”, before she could say anything, he pulled her onto himself and kissed her on the mouth. The kiss started off warm, soft and delicate and drastically turned to hot, hard and hungry with each desperate to accept what the other was offering. "I waited for you," she said with a catch in her voice as she pressed her face to his shoulder. He drew her away and they stood there for a while. Kevin’s feelings and thoughts were everywhere now; he could not afford the luxury of companionship with this gorgeous woman at the expense of his friend’s. Despite the fact that the woman now claimed to be in love with him and not with Randy, he did not see the worth in even dating her. I mean the relationship had started as a mere flirtation and he had no plans of actually ever dating her but all had changed that night of New Year’s Eve. Let’s just say Kevin lost it. The scent of them was everywhere, heady, intoxicating but not in the manner he now wanted. He wanted his friend back. And the storm wanted to explode above them. Stella felt hopeless, she had risked everything just to be with Kevin yet from his facial expressions and quick change in his mood, she could tell that she had not won his heart yet. I mean what was wrong with her, all she ever wanted was to be desired and loved by a man who could provide for the both of them. I mean Randy was just lazy and selfish and such a drunk, she thought. "You must come. Kevin, you must come to me. Destiny can't be denied, I love you. Without you with me, he'll win" she decided to give a try in persuading him. He shook his head, started to speak, but she lifted a hand to his face. It passed through him as if he were a ghost. Or he was really high on something. "I have loved you throughout time." As she spoke, she moved back, the mists flowing around her legs. "I am bound to you, throughout time. Come to me Kev, Find me. Or I'm lost." The earth trembled beneath his feet, the sky howled. And all went silent and still. He awoke gasping for breath. And reaching out.