My Valentine Is Deadly


Smoothly, swiftly Georgina's car spun past the leafy quiet of the sorghum farms on the pleasant road to the beach. Past marshland, old oilwells and sand dunes, to the Gulf. White tipped waves rolled in with a dull roar, the salt wind blew, gulls flapped overhead on strong gray wings.

She was thinking of a drive to another beach. The night she met him at his mother's house. She wished she had never gone to Mrs. Cheney's. Better never to have known him than to...suddenly a man walks across the road directly in front of her...Oh noooo...blackness rolls over her...

The two of them are rushed to the hospital, and both are admitted. The man is badly injured. They are put on the same floor in rooms next to each other.

After Nouri painfully settles in, he crawls over to Georgina's room.

"Yes, Mom, they took tests...I have to stay overnight so the doctors can examine the results. I am sure that everything will be fine. Go back to sleep and I'll call you in the morning. Tell Daddy I love him. I've got to go, I've got company...it's the man that I hit with my car. 'Night, mom."

"Well, I'd have to say you're the most beautiful woman that ever ran me over."

Tears form in her eyes as she stares down at him on the floor. She tries to push her hair back. "I'm the prettiest woman who ever almost killed you?"

He struggles to reach up to push her hair from her face and then strokes her cheek. "You look pretty good to me." He stares into her eyes for a few seconds and continues, "I don't get it. I know we've only just met but I feel like I've known you forever." He pulls his hand away quickly and says, "Sorry. I'm being forward with you. I should drag my crippled body back to my room and let you get some rest."

She takes his hand and holds it and looks into his eyes and says, "You're not being forward. I don't know why, but I feel the same way!" Her voice gets husky as she whispers softly, "Please stay a while longer."

He is so kind, so good. It will be so empty in this room without him. Without his comforting hand, his pleasant smiling eyes. If only there was some way of keeping him...some way of making him understand...surely he would understand...

He smiles up at her and realizes the floor is cold as they hold hands.

He tries to raise himself up and she moves...fast. The phone in her other hand smashes against the side of his head and he crumples back to the floor. He is still aware enough to realize that she has dragged him out of the room and that he is now falling down stairs. Then he thinks about how he should never step into blind alleys, but because of a pretty dame in a car, he's suddenly forgotten all about it.