Undefiled Queen

“What happened?” He looked at her with the same furrowed brow and got out of the car. The cool air passed by making his soft hair swerve with the breeze. There was a pull in her to run her fingers there and comb his hair back in place.

He opened the door of the bonnet and she stood behind seeing what had happened. “Damn it!” He muttered as negativity and irritation occupied him.

“What happened?” Merlyn asked him again and he looked at her as if her head popped off. Zipping up his leather jacket he walked a few steps ahead to find out the road was blocked with glaciers and ice. And shortly there was going to be a snow storm.

She could decipher he wasn’t going to tell her anything. The cool wind blew over her making her fingers frigid and with pain. She quickly got back into the car.

Leaving her again in the car he walked to the other side and ten minutes later came back.”There is a tyre puncture because of icy roads and there is a problem with the engine too. I found out through google two miles ahead there is a car servicing center. Stay here, I will be back in a few minutes.”

Before he could take a step ahead, she clung to him like dead meat. “I’m not staying here alone. I will walk with you.”

Walking a few steps ahead, “you forgot to give me your phone. I have yet to call my aunt.” She reminded him. He groaned and dug out his phone from his pants pocket, handing it to her.

Just as she heard the hello of her aunt, she found herself giddy. “So you haven’t boarded your plane?”

Merlyn told her everything about her journey starting from grounding of her flight to the tyre puncture. “Oh honey, I’m so sorry to hear about this. Drive carefully and keep us posted, we can’t wait to see you.”

Just hearing the words of her aunt she felt a knot brewing in her throat. “I can’t wait to see you guys.”

Stephen honestly wondered if the woman would ever cut off her call with her aunt. They kept laughing and talking about how they were going to celebrate the vacation together. Just how long could she talk like that? The amount of conversation she had today, he couldn’t have with his mother in a lifetime.

“Thanks” she finally handed him the phone and he immediately ducked it away into his pants pockets as if it was something which should never go in her hands again.

He looked up towards the sky in dismay when darkness surrounded them. The clouds continued to gather and blacken, promising him a storm of epic proportions.

He was trying to walk in the snow as fast as he could to reach his destination, the repair center before the rain caught him.

The hysterical woman’s antiques had held him up in the airport longer than he needed to be and now he wasn’t sure if he could beat the storm. He needed to be at the meeting by evening. It was crucial and very important for the growth of his business, the merger of the European market with American and Chinese. But here he was struck up with the weather where he could hardly expect any positivity.

And of course Merlyn continued to be the pain in his ass. She talked to her aunt for at least fifteen minutes. With every exit he passed by, he wondered if he could drop her off, just leave her in the gas station, call a cab to come and pick her up. But there was a part of him that was still worried about her safety. What happens if the driver tries exploiting her? He wouldn’t be able to forgive himself for a lifetime on that.

He took out his phone from his pants pockets in a desperate plea to nature to let him find the signal on his phone so that he could call his right hand man and brief him of his possible absence at the meeting. But Alas! There was not even a single tick for him now with the upcoming storm.

Merlyn connected the ear buds to her ears as she bobbed her head to the most awful rendition he had ever heard – Vacation by Dirty Heads. How could she find a streak of happiness even in the most unfavourable situations like this?

He remembered the time the album was released. It was the busiest period of the year for him. The time he really threw himself to work and prepared for the next year. Attending important phone calls, wrapping up meetings and doing the final paperwork for submission of tax returns. But for people like her it was the time for vacation. A time for smiles and reliefs.

People might call him a Grinch, a scrooge who did not take weekends off or take time for vacations but that sure as hell didn’t make him a heartless person. He wasn’t cruel. It’s just that his tastes did not match with others.

The music kept ringing to his ears though she put on earphones because she seemed to know the lyrics of every song that played there and she was a horrible singer. It was another way to grate his nerves. His hands went to tight fists as he kept walking ahead hopelessly in search of the fuel house or a car mechanic.

He sure as hell couldn’t tune his heart to leave her nowhere in the middle here and definitely will not risk opening up his mouth as it would prompt her to continue asking questions to him. However, not a second had passed that the thought entered his mind and the worst luck hit him. There it was!

“How much longer should we be able to reach the mechanic?” She asked, dragging her feet, unable to catch up with his pace.NôvelD(ram)a.ôrg owns this content.

There was a single drop of rain that fell on his phone screen. Slowly one after the other, raindrops fell in a slack deluge brewing into a storm. He gave her a glare. Suddenly took a cellotape, by opening the bag that hung to his shoulders and put it on her lips and hands so that she cannot talk and can’t remove it either.

As he closed his eyes, droplets fell on his face and  body drenching him in a matter of seconds. He kept walking ahead hastily in search of a shelter when he noticed it. She wasn’t there beside him anymore.

He turned back and looked around anxiously in search of her but she was not found anywhere. Shit! He doesn’t even remember her name. The rain was pouring incessantly, the clouds continued to darken in the habitat surrounded by snow.

Pensiveness warred his stance like crucifixion. Chattering his teeth his eyes moved around the area in helplessness and in fear. “Chatterbox, this is not funny anymore.” He shouted severely.

His voice echoed between the glaciers and snow but there was no acknowledgement. “I swear to lord, if you don’t answer me now…” He threatened with tears brimming his eyes and then ….