Stranded On A Tropic Isle...

It all started with your hair up my nose.

I flinched and inched away from you, but it was my pillow. You were nowhere to be found and if you were to be found, it would be in the darkest reaches of the Louis the Saint.

Yet it was still there: the sensation of your hair tickling my nose. I sat up scratched my nose and looked at the clock: 3:39 a.m.

I reached out and grabbed my mobile, on which is a photo of you resting your beautiful head on a pillow. I smiled contentedly…

…then remembered.

We were on a beach and you were wearing your very best shell bikini and I was a poor, helpless survivor of a shipwreck. It was an island, white sand beaches and plenty of coconuts. Which I hated but that was ok because I had you.

I had to get back to the dream. I had to.

I walked around, trying to get back to sleep hoping the exercise would put me back to sleep.

I wrote a splash post to try and encourage my slumber.

I took a hot shower and drank a beer.

And then…

ZzzZZzzzZZzzZZzzzzZzzzzzZzzzZZzzzz…



“Where were you?” she asked, her blond and blue hair curly and draping over my face, the sun a halo highliting her smile. “Where did you go?”

“No where important,” I said, stretching out on the warm sand.

“Tell me a story,” she asked.

I groaned. I had already told her a hundred stories of life on land.

She slapped her tail in the water, sending a plume of clear water showering over me.

“Gah!” I shrieked, she laughed. Such a lovely laugh that came from that smile, that wonderful smile. Her laugh was like a warm summer rain.

“OK, but just one more,” I said, I promised.

She pouted, “Is it almost time? Do you have to go so soon?”

I smiled and nodded, and she was sad but still in the most incandescent of ways. She brushed a stray lock of hair from my eyes and leaned over and kissed me, the cool shells against my chest and I kissed her back.

“I love you, my mermaid.”

“I love you too, Greg.”

“Eh? Who the fuck is Gre…”

BUZZ!

6:30 a.m.

Where is she? I can still taste her honey in my mouth, my skin tingling with the touch of her hands, the smell of her body like a cool breeze. I feel refreshed, but also consumed with need, for I truly need her.

My mermaid.

No One's Gonna Love You

"What are you doing?"

I flinched. Caught. Fuck.

Of course any sane person would realize that I was doing nothing wrong. However, this was not any sane person. Far from it, clearly.

Her vegan diet was a mystery to me. Indeed, I had no idea how a human being consumed bean curd and tree bark like a bloody koala.

Except that she was just so beautiful when she did. Did anything, really. Even when she was cross.

She stood there in the doorway, her strawberry blond hair curled into plaits around her brow like a victory laurel. She had a look on her face that brooked no cheek.

I was, after all, making a mess.

"Cooking" I said, though the statement came out less of an answer as it was a question. Was I cooking? Really, is that what this was?

"Oh, and what are you cooking?" she said, hands on her hips. Her orange and red summer dress made her hips sing.

"I'm cooking... well... you know... a vegan dish," I sputtered.

"Why?" she asked, the hint of a smile pulling up on the corner of her mouth. That smirk was a familiar, and welcome, sight.

"I wanted to make you a special breakfast," I shrugged. The sodden whole-wheat bread in almond milk lay flaccid on the griddle. I looked at that piece of bread with undisguised hatred. I knew the day would come when bread would betray me.

"The only thing you are making is a mess!" she declared and reached for towel.

I caught her wrist and lifted her hand to my face, opened her hand and planted a long, lingering kiss on her palm.

She smiled and the sun came out.

But that's what happens when she smiles, the sun cannot help but smile with her.

And neither could I.