Just Take Me Home:
A love story.
The beating pulse of white dashes on black tar. Nighttime. Thrill. Pulse. Pulse. Thrill. The whispering wind whipping over the silver hood ornament. Scattering specks in the headlights, fading into the distance. Blackness all beyond. Beyond that, unknown, uncared for. The chrome strip dividing the hood’s ridge sabering the tar-heated air: a ship’s prow plunging headlong into eternal vacuum.
I take a drag on my cigarette and place my hand on the hem of your black-and-white herringbone skirt. You push it away and stare ahead. I rest it back on the gearstick, then hang it—I stomp on the clutch and thrust the knob forward into 5th, plunging my right foot into the gas pedal. The engine bellows over the turning gyre. The tail of your headscarf whipping in the storm, sunglasses resting on your marble aquiline nose, like an osprey cutting through the æther, wings back: silent, deadly, eager, focused. You go for the kill.
I throw my right elbow into your jaw and watch your glasses tumble into the ethereal night. As you reel from the shock, I grab your hand, pry it off the steering wheel. Spinning. Screeching. Screeching. You. Tires. Sliding sideways into the ditch between the two highways. Nobody around. Just you. Just me. Just this fiery demon driving us to the end of the road.
Silence. Creaking toads. Still. Still. Stillness. Breath. Breathe. Breathe.
“I love you, baby. I’m sorry.”
“I know baby, I know. I love you.”
Breathe.
“Let’s not fight again.”
“Don’t ever do that again, baby. I love you, you psycho.”
“I know. I won’t. I’m sorry. Damn you.”
“Hang it. Let’s go.”
Beating pulse of white dashes on black tar. First light. Thrill. Pulse. Pulse. Thrill.
Follow Quill & Trowel.
