“Marta, you and John come by the house in about an hour for some dinner, okay?” Steve said, as he and Rachel sat on one of the picnic tables watching the sun set.
The western horizon offered a beautiful reddish hue, graduating to blue, purple, and finally darkness to the east. The perfect ending.
Crickets chirped excitedly and insects buzzed busily as they began their nocturnal lives. Sounds and voices carried in the thin evening air. There were still a few people on the grounds, and some actually picked up the volleyball to get a few more sets in.
“I’ll be there,” John replied, then turned to Marta. “Will you?”
“Of course,” Marta said, smiling sweetly as she pushed some hair back behind her ears.
“Hey, I have something for you, wait here,” John said.
She took a seat on the table and rested her feet on the bench. A few minutes later John returned with some magazines under his arm. “Here, I thought you might like to catch up on the latest.” He saw her notice the old dates. “Well, almost the latest,” he chuckled.
Marta looked up; her big eyes sparkled with appreciation. John loved how she looked at him just then, and memorized every second of the glance. It seemed as if the world had stopped turning, and nothing else mattered.
“How sweet. I can’t wait to look at them,” Marta said.
“I meant to give them to you before it got dark.”
“This is just fine. I’ll glance through them tomorrow,” Marta gave him that look again, before thumbing blindly through the magazines. She felt quietly through the pages until she found what she was looking for. The sweet fragrance let her know she was at the right spot. Even after all this time, it still smells good, she thought as she rubbed the fragrant card along her wrists. She pretended to pull her hair back as she brushed her neck with her freshly scented wrists. She wanted to smell like a woman.
“What was your day like at the hospital?” John asked. “I know it was nowhere as fun as ours here.”
“It was horrible.” Marta said, sobered from her thoughts. “I hope I never have to experience that again. The poor kid had no idea what was going to happen to him, and I didn’t have any idea for that matter. I mean, he rides in a plane, a make-shift ambulance, and experiences high-tech equipment for the first time in his life. If that wasn’t stressful enough, they set that fracture. It was horrible!” she shivered noticeably.
“You were there for that?” John asked.
Jeffrey W. Bennett, ISP is an author of non-fiction books, novels and periodicals.
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