For The Thrill

Prologue

When she kissed him for the first time it felt like a storm, loud, and strong, and it sent a loud thud to her ears. She wanted it to stay like that forever, a never-ending, triumphant storm that washed away the corpses and bodies of every thought that settled into her. And to feel as if she was a part of that storm every time she kissed him, waiting for the moment her mind would go quiet and her heart would scream instead. But the storm ceased. 

So she reached out to hold his hand across the table. He didn't move. He looked back at her with the same intensity as when he first met her. Lustful and collective. The silence grew between them and he looked away, waiting for her to gather her words and call out to him. She squeezed his hand before she hesitantly pulled back.

"I want to end things," she whispered, just loud enough to be heard over the bar's radio.

"You do?" He took a sip from his drink.

"It is not the same. You know that."

"But is the same," he reasoned.

"The excitement, it's gone. Things feel normal, too organized." She licked her lips. They were dry, her red lipstick sticky and stiff.

"You love me." He stated, eyebrows drawn upward where they almost meet.

"I meant it. But it doesn't feel right." She avoided his curious eyes and looked around the small, delicately shabby bar. The walls were lined with prints of colorful paintings and cheap brown wallpaper. Tall skinny girls in their short dresses danced with their hips swaying and arms linked with their friends or lovers. The shorter, unpleasantly looking girls drank at the bar and giggled together when a free drink would make their way. They came from older men, younger men, perverted men, and mysterious potentially dangerous men. Those were harder to recognize.

She was sitting on the opposite end of a sharp, square table on stools that made too many sounds. But it was their table, she told herself. Where else were they supposed to sit? 

He tapped his short fingernails on the table and breathed in deeply. He said, "You don't have to leave, though. You don't. I've grown used to you."

"Don't be dramatic, sweetheart." She smiled, searching his features for something before she relaxed her body and released the tension with a firm exhale.

She stood up and kissed the top of his head. His hand hovered over her waist, unsure what to do with it. "Farewell, then," she said.

"I'll miss you." He warned, a smile on his lips.

"Yes," She laughed. "You certainly will."

When she left the bar, she thought it really was over. Things would roll back into her miserable routine and she'd focus on finding work again. She didn't expect to meet him the night after, tying her up behind a dumpster.