Karen sat up with a jolt. Frank was furious with her! She could feel it in her bone marrow. It reminded her of sitting on a hill above Sausalito at sunset and feeling the mist that seemed to swirl about not just around but inside her.
Frank inside her…
She blinked, trying to take in her surroundings. They were at Frank’s place, weren’t they? Hadn’t they just made love for the first time? Hadn’t her climax been so thunderous that she both screamed and wept? And even started to laugh, manic, until he pulled back and locked eyes. Then, transfixed, she imagined new dimensions opening before her, one after another, like flower petals. A fourth dimension. A fifth. A sixth.
Martin. That shallow nobody. No, that wasn’t fair. Martin was a nice guy and her friend. But Frank was furious at her because of Martin. So furious that he must have killed Martin.
That thought was like a bucket of cold water dumped over her head. Her eyes had been open already, but now she saw. No, they weren’t together in Frank’s apartment in Sausalito, looking through his huge windows at San Francisco across the bay. She was alone in a tiny storage unit in Brooklyn with no windows at all.
Karen whimpered and started to sob as she looked down at herself then, insanely, started to laugh.
She was sitting up.
She was alive.
She laughed and laughed as a whole lifetime of memories washed over her. She was alive. Whatever her present circumstances, she would find joy…and beauty…again.
She started to scramble out of her storage unit but almost fainted.
Not that alive, she amended. Not yet.
She sat back, surveying her surroundings. Her stomach clenched when she remembered mistakenly dipping the French fries in Martin’s blood.
Poor, poor Martin. Who was she to think him shallow or to use him for sex that would be free of emotional pain because, truth be told, she couldn’t love him. Poor, dear Martin. He had been her friend. More importantly, he had been alive and was no longer. Karen was so very sorry.
