My Flash Fiction, "In the Heat."

 

Copyright Glo Lewis 10/1/2023

 

Dear Readers of My Blog, 💚

 

I have decided to share my Flash fiction, “In the Heat” with you. Here is the story below (As usual, God bless, and I'll be in touch soon):

 

 

In the Heat

Copyright Glo Lewis 10/01/2023

 

 

 

   Victor checked into the Sol Melia Hotel in Havana at mid-morning. It was spring, and brilliant fuchsias and greenery of a sort unknown to him burst from huge terra cotta pots in the marbled lobby. A burly Cuban porter with beefy tattooed arms quickly approached him. He had thick dark lips. “Seňor, allow me to carry your bag,” he said in rapid Spanish.

   “No, no.” Victor waved his arm abruptly, and a shaft of sunlight glinted off his gold cufflink.

   When Victor had gone up in the elevator, the porter turned to his co-worker, the deskman. “He’s a sleek one, is he not? A wealthy American, I venture. Italian shoes. Good looking too, do you not think so as well?”

   “Why do you trouble yourself with such matters, Diego?” the uniformed clerk said with an air of impatience. “He will not be interested in any of your mangy female pursuits. Such a man is in a class by himself, no?”

***

   Alone on the balcony of his room, Victor paced and smoked. He was shirtless now, but he began to sweat. Across the red adobe rooftops, he observed a young woman with a dark mane of hair stroll out onto her patio in the nude. She carried a thin white scarf. It billowed as lightly as a ribbon on the gentle breeze when she raised her taut arms as if to stretch. That was the signal, but Victor took a moment to admire her full breasts in the warm day.

   Only yesterday, he and the woman had lain in bed. He had held those creamy breasts, and their fairness had seemed to make his hands look darker. He would kiss her once again, as he had done last night, all along the swells and turns of her body if God would do him this kindness. Briefly, he considered that he might love her, but soon all that might be lost anyway.

   There was a soft knock at the door. Turning sharply, Victor rushed back into his room. “Un momento,” he called out as he slipped into his white shirt.

   Shortly, he opened the door and Allejandro, a small, thin Cuban entered the room. Victor glanced up and down the hall to make sure that the man wasn't followed, and then shut the door quietly.

   “Sit,” said Victor, pointing toward the bed. “So tell me, what is your story? Why didn’t you meet me at the café yesterday?”

   Allejandro began to weep. Tears rushed from his eyes down his pockmarked face. “Carlos knows,” he sputtered, wiping his nose with the back of his slender hand.

   “How?” Victor paced in front of the man. “How did he find out?” he demanded.

   Allejandro sobbed into his hands.

   “Answer me, damn it!” cried Victor. “How does he know?”

   “I told him.”

   “You told him. You told him.” Victor went to his suitcase on the bed and retrieved his revolver with silencer. He leaned over Allejandro, who now placed his hands together as though in prayer. Victor wasted no time. He shot directly into the man’s head. Blood splattered around the room, and Allejandro fell back onto the white coverlet where the rose of his body now spread out like new wine.

   “He’s dead,” Victor said grimly to himself. “He’s dead.”

   Until dark, Victor had stayed with the body of Allejandro. Finally, he raced into a thunderstorm, ahead of los malefactoris—the evildoers who now chased him. He was afraid and unsure of his direction. He had committed murder, so who would believe him when he said that he had not killed the others or that, having executed Allejandro, that he had nevertheless done so for something decent and elusive. It was a thing ground as purely as powder and was as powerful as cocaine. His fight was for truth, but no one would buy that. He was on his own as surely as if he flung himself off a cliff.

 

 

The End