Surrender
by Tahlia
Short and sweet. Just like I like 'em. *insert shameless advertising plug* Go over and read "The Rules Have Changed."
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The electric keycard rests between my fingers as I stand in the empty hotel room. Not empty, I tell myself, as I spy all the trappings of a room occupied by a particular male. I can hear my own ragged breathing, the humming of the mini-bar, and the dull roar of the traffic several stories below. Never in a hundred years would I imagine our meeting to be here.
To say I know why I'm there is to lie to myself. The force that had whisked me from the false security of the concrete building and barbed wire where I worked was foreign to me then, and, hours later, stills make no sense. No, I correct myself; I'm only lying to myself. Twice before I've felt this force. Once I had been eleven years old and had the excuse of naïveté as I had leaned over and carefully pecked him on dry awaiting lips. And then I had been forty and had no excuse for spending spring days lolling in bed with a man whose life was in danger every moment he breathed.
Maybe, I told myself then, maybe there was a reason those memories would stay fantasies, locked away in parts of my brain I had forgotten existed. Maybe that kind of happiness, bliss, security I had felt in the arms of those two men, wasn't meant to be.
I inspect the specimens of uninterrupted living when I hear the locks clicking on the hotel door. I whirl around to find the object of my pursuit standing calmly in the door. I must have an expression of being caught red- handed spying, as his face quickly twists into a small grin. But he does not flinch; his huntress standing alone in his hotel room seems not to faze him. Nonchalantly he shuts the door with his foot and sets the brown grocery bag on the floor. He simply stares.
"You came," he says, his voice hinting at the innocence his isolation has bred in him. He seems happy to see me, a reaction hardly natural for him.
I turn away from him, assuming the air of my indomitable personality. At least we can pretend for a while. After all, it was what he does best. "I couldn't pass up a lead," I reply with a hint of a smile, eager to play the game.
---
No one questions my absence that day, the rest of my team simply directing sideways glances in my direction when I come in the next morning, bright and early and ready to work. Maybe they suspect the hunt is a rouse now, that I'm as much the prey as I am a hunter now. I don't really care anymore; I've stopped caring what others think of me.
This doesn't bring me happiness; hell, it doesn't come close. What we have isn't natural, it isn't right, it isn't meant to be. Or maybe it is, and that's why it hurts so much, every time he greets me with that same innocent smile. One day, I tell myself, one day I simply won't come up anymore. One day I'll throw the keycard he sends into the fire. One day I'll run away and never speak to anyone again.
This morning the plain white envelope came for me. I hold the card in my hand, a handwritten address accompanying it. Tonight we're going to Boston. We've haven't been to Boston in so long.
I stare at the fire. Today is not that day.
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C'est finis. janeway602@aol.com
Short and sweet. Just like I like 'em. *insert shameless advertising plug* Go over and read "The Rules Have Changed."
---------------------------------------
The electric keycard rests between my fingers as I stand in the empty hotel room. Not empty, I tell myself, as I spy all the trappings of a room occupied by a particular male. I can hear my own ragged breathing, the humming of the mini-bar, and the dull roar of the traffic several stories below. Never in a hundred years would I imagine our meeting to be here.
To say I know why I'm there is to lie to myself. The force that had whisked me from the false security of the concrete building and barbed wire where I worked was foreign to me then, and, hours later, stills make no sense. No, I correct myself; I'm only lying to myself. Twice before I've felt this force. Once I had been eleven years old and had the excuse of naïveté as I had leaned over and carefully pecked him on dry awaiting lips. And then I had been forty and had no excuse for spending spring days lolling in bed with a man whose life was in danger every moment he breathed.
Maybe, I told myself then, maybe there was a reason those memories would stay fantasies, locked away in parts of my brain I had forgotten existed. Maybe that kind of happiness, bliss, security I had felt in the arms of those two men, wasn't meant to be.
I inspect the specimens of uninterrupted living when I hear the locks clicking on the hotel door. I whirl around to find the object of my pursuit standing calmly in the door. I must have an expression of being caught red- handed spying, as his face quickly twists into a small grin. But he does not flinch; his huntress standing alone in his hotel room seems not to faze him. Nonchalantly he shuts the door with his foot and sets the brown grocery bag on the floor. He simply stares.
"You came," he says, his voice hinting at the innocence his isolation has bred in him. He seems happy to see me, a reaction hardly natural for him.
I turn away from him, assuming the air of my indomitable personality. At least we can pretend for a while. After all, it was what he does best. "I couldn't pass up a lead," I reply with a hint of a smile, eager to play the game.
---
No one questions my absence that day, the rest of my team simply directing sideways glances in my direction when I come in the next morning, bright and early and ready to work. Maybe they suspect the hunt is a rouse now, that I'm as much the prey as I am a hunter now. I don't really care anymore; I've stopped caring what others think of me.
This doesn't bring me happiness; hell, it doesn't come close. What we have isn't natural, it isn't right, it isn't meant to be. Or maybe it is, and that's why it hurts so much, every time he greets me with that same innocent smile. One day, I tell myself, one day I simply won't come up anymore. One day I'll throw the keycard he sends into the fire. One day I'll run away and never speak to anyone again.
This morning the plain white envelope came for me. I hold the card in my hand, a handwritten address accompanying it. Tonight we're going to Boston. We've haven't been to Boston in so long.
I stare at the fire. Today is not that day.
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C'est finis. janeway602@aol.com