Blowing Smoke by George L. Hiegel - HTML preview

Epilogue

As for me, I’m holed up in a hotel with a woman named Mari Dovetail. She looks as if she’s been through seven different kinds of hell too. She won’t tell me what they are, but I know they’re there. I know the look. I’ve seen it many times in the mirror.

I don’t know how many days we’re actually going to be together, but it really doesn’t matter a damn. It could be a couple of days. It could be a week to ten days. I don’t know. But at this point, I’ll take whatever I can get. Any day that I’m not alone is automatically a better day.

Where I end up and what I end up doing are questions I have no answers for.

Maybe that will change soon. I hope so. Because my mind is still trapped inside a very dark and lonely place. Trapped like a sea captain riding off course and blinded by a raging, coastal storm. A sharp, craggy cliff isn’t far off. There is no lighthouse beacon to warn me off if I get too near. There’s no one on board I trust enough to share my fears with. I am surrounded by people, yet I am alone.

All there is for me to do now is seize the rail, keep my head down and hope the storm passes soon. If not -------. If not, what then? I don’t know. I don’t even want to think about the possibility of it. After all, what good could come of it?