Novel Journey Critiques - Week 3

We're changing the format this week to shorten the posts. Each week, one of us will do the intense critique, and the other two will make obsevations. Here is this week's original post:

“My wife is dead,” he said.

His left hand reached out to her neck while the fingers of his right hand slid down her side slow and soft. He paused for a moment to savor the anticipation; and worked his hand back up to her neck, following the curves with delight

He laid his right hand her. His eyes closed as she neared his lips. His nostrils flared when the scent of his former lover reached him. His tongue, expecting satisfaction after so long, slid across his cracked lips.

His mouth watered, eager to experience her almost forgotten touch once again. When she touched his bottom lip he flinched. In other time, she was all he needed. To have her back, to taste her again, to smell her, it was almost too much pleasure at such a time. He should be grieving, but the scent of familiarity and comfort surrounded him He exhaled as he felt her warmth in his mouth. It had been so long.

He heard his wife called out his name and he froze.

But the heat of his temptress took over, bid farewell to the plans; to what was his wife; to his life.

Again, his lover drew near, she was silk to his lips; he lingered over a touch he’d almost forgotten.

He looked over at the fireplace, the flames reaching up begging for mercy. They showed him how they wrapped their arms his wife and suffocated her. Her voice rang out again. She was screaming so loud. Screaming his name over and over.

“Michael!”

“Help me, Michael.”

“Where are you, Michael? I can’t see you.”

“Please, Michael. Help. Its hard to breathe”

The flames danced and swayed and a different voice called him. A low, sultry voice. A voice that knows where the secret places are. Knows what passion tastes like. Smells desire. A voice that drowns out all others with her whisper.

Michael caressed the smooth curves beneath his hands. He drank her in. The velvet voice of the seductress wrapped his soul. She was singing the lullaby to him.

He closed his eyes again, letting his mistress have her way.

A noise, almost inaudible came from near the piano. Michael’s right ear instinctively rose, his breath stopped; his eyes shut tighter. Again, the soft sound whispered from across the room. It sounded like a picture frame sliding on top of the…

“What the…” Michael forgot the bottle in his hand and whiskey sprayed over the tile floor. He jumped towards the piano, stretched his arms out, and caught Beth inches from the floor. He held her tight. Tears again, hot down his cheeks when their eyes met. His legs went numb underneath and he fell to the floor hugging the picture frame, sobbing.

“I love you,” his chest heaved and his voice quivered. “I tried. I tried to find you. I heard you. Oh God did I hear you.”

“Then they grabbed me, they grabbed my legs. I was yelling at them ‘No! I gotta find Beth!’ and I kicked one of them. I think I hurt him. He let go and then I didn’t hear you. And I kept going and did you hear me? Did you hear me calling your name? You stopped yelling for me and I thought they found you. They grabbed me again and I don’t remember anything else. Just waking up in the hospital and they said…they said…you were…gone.” His body folded over the picture he held tight against his chest. “I don’t want to remember you that way. I want you back. Please, please come back.” He rocked back and forth still holding the photo to his bosom like the way he held the baby just a year before when he was born still. “I want both of you back. I can’t live like this. It’s too much. Too much. I can’t.”

Michael held her picture out, stared at her precious face. He let the tears spill again, a year to the day that his baby boy came but was already gone.

You don’t deserve either of them.

It was the same voice that taunted him as a child telling him he didn’t deserve a daddy. Only good kids have real dads. Only kids who follow the rules have real fathers. The same voice that reminded him who he really was. The bastard child of a bastard child. No grandfather, no father. No siblings. A dead grandmother, a crazy mother. The father of a dead son and a dead woman’s widow.

He was alone. Again.

How quick one is to fall back into the arms of a mistress. He took another drink that emptied the bottle. She didn’t take away the pain this time, though. He sat for awhile just staring at the fire in the dark. He thought the whiskey would take away her voice. He thought it would make it go away if only for a little while. He just wanted a break, wanted a little bit of time that he didn’t think about all of it. And sometimes it hurt worse because he didn’t have a dad he could turn to. He wanted to be able to pick up the phone and say, “I really need you, dad.” He cocked his head to the ceiling and whispered, “Dad? Where are you? I really need you now.”
Everybody’s dead, son. Daddy. Gram. Beth and baby James. Poor baby James. Never even got a breath of air. Just like sweet Beth in the end, she couldn’t get air either, could she?. Why stay alive? You got nobody except me, son. You know how to end it. You know what to do.

“Don’t call me son!” Michael screamed to the air.