A Dangerous View

She had left. I had the mountain view, the messy bed, and the empty box of Keurig(tm) cups. At 5:19 am I was awake, alone, and uncaffeinated. There was still the view, though. I propped myself up. My head pounded in the back just above my neck, like I was hungover from the ecstasy. I pulled the feather comforter around me and fished around on the other side of the bed for my notebook and pen.

Draw or write?

Nothing came. I thought about getting up and taking some aspirin. It was a two-hour roundtrip into town for coffee. The snow had stopped. I don’t know how the Uber found its way up here last night in the blizzard. She didn’t slam the door when she left. She left the door wide open.

I don’t remember any fight. The raucous sex had been vivid. Scenes still flashed across my mind as I daydreamed there, trying to get motivated to move. Soon enough, nature called, and I pulled my summer robe on as I tiptoed through the freezing house. I saw the huge puddle inside the open front door. “Fuck.”

“Jump off, jump in, you are a protected individual,” said Henry Miller to a young Lawrence Durrell. That had certainly been my plan for the last few years alone atop this minor alp.

I didn’t want to come down.

Read more Short-Short Stories from John.