FLASH FICTION: Road to Perdition.....

She raised her head, looked at him and said, ‘I’m pregnant’ 

Blood rushed to his ears and made a sound like the rushing of the waters at the beach on a windy day. ‘What?’ he screamed. ‘Pre-what?’ he asked. In a semi-automatic manner in which she sometimes completed other peoples’ words, ‘nant’ she said. He stood up and walked to the window. 

He was certain this was a bad dream from which he would awaken soon. The scenes that flashed through his mind had nothing to do with the beautiful woman who stood before him. In actual fact, he would not have thus described her as he had stopped looking at her a long time ago. Mostly, he looked through her, relying on the memory of the person he had grown to hate immensely. He shook his head at the visions of the laughing stock he would become all over town. 

How could she do this to him? It had immediately become about him. His friends, those who looked up to the careful image he projected and maintained no matter what. What would they think? He paced towards her and she turned and half-smiled, knowing exactly what bothered him and wished she cared enough to help lead him out of the maze his mind was headed for as she used to. 

She cared nothing for the man who stood before her though. He had used her and taken her innocence and she was done being bothered by how he felt about anything. She owed him this one last favour though. She knew hearing about this from anyone else may drive him to thunderous rage and cause him to react typically, so she came herself to let him know and help him choose a sane course of action.

 
‘I know you don’t need a soothsayer to figure things out. You and I were just an accident waiting to happen. You don’t know him and hopefully you will never have to meet. He is kind and loving and I am just so thankful for the compensation’ she smiled now. He looked at her, he wanted to scream and shout but something in her eyes stopped him. 

He knew she could be ruthless and had a streak of madness in her but she had loved him and never directed it at him but he had seen it in action against those she pitted her immense mental strength against. There was a cold warning in the depths of her smile that seemed to say, ‘Please, try something. Give me the pleasure of making you suffer’. 

He backed down and shifted from one foot to another as he usually did when he was nervous. She reached out her hand as if to touch him, changed her mind and raised the hand to her hair, smoothing down one of the locs that stood at an awkward angle. 

‘I’ll be seeing you then, we will work out the details later, if that is agreeable to you?’ He nodded, not trusting himself to make a sound. She left and took all of him with her. His mind was playing tricks on him because as she turned to go, he caught a glimpse of a beautiful young lady, slim and well endowed, glowing skin and elegant posture and felt an ache deep within his belly at how he had foolishly walked the road to perdition.

His wife shut the door behind her as she left and the sound seemed to be the death knell of his sad and miserable existence, he just knew it!