All For The Girl

He sat at the grand desk, staring off in to space. He shifted around in the chair, irritated by the numbness spreading up from his ass to his leg. It reflected the numb feeling he felt in his mind. The grandfather clock dong-ed the time; it was 2 AM. 2 AM, and he still hadn't sorted himself out. The coffee beside him was cold, had been for hours. Dan Ward, successful writer, poet, musician, and artist. None of that mattered now – Gina was dead. Gina – oh, how he had tried to put her face from his mind for years. Gina, his high school sweetheart, lost in a skip, found in a beat, and wrenched from him once more.

"It's not fucking fair," his hollow voice mused, directing mostly at the fire. He had burned a photo of them, in despair, when his wife had heard about him attending the funeral. You love her more, I know it, you bastard. Selene would never understand; Gina had been "the girl", "the one".. so on. Selene? Selene was a compromise, when he'd found out that Gina had gotten herself knocked up, and married. While Gina struggled through a decade of separation, divorce, and child custody battles, Dan had been idling in ski resorts, meeting women – like Selene. Selene was a little fluff of whipped cream, picked up in Canada, while she visited from Sweden. Her wicked accent distracted him, daily.

He half expected the fire to reply. Behind the mantle portrait of Selene, he still kept a snapshot of himself with Gina, back during prom. He wanted to sneak over, and peer at that photo; drink in their youth, once more – the passion, and intensity he so missed. He snuck a glance up at it, feeling vaguely guilty. "Stop kidding yourself, ol' boy," he muttered.

He sighed, propping his legs atop the desk. His leather shoes squeaked a little on the wood. His father had made this desk, clever ol' carver that he was. It was handsome, but bulky. Toting this around the world had been an amazing pain in the ass; but, like the hidden snapshot, sometimes items are the last things a person has to remember loved ones by.

He'd done it all, all for Gina. And, look what it amounted to – a brief fling, hot but quickly spent. He'd spent a week courting the woman, at a hot spring. Then, a month later, her asshole convict boyfriend drove them over a cliff. "Aw, fuck," he hissed, scrunching his face up. Oh sure, now the tears would come.

Looking over at the walls surrounding him, he sneered at promo copies of his work. All, but all for nothing. It didn't impress her, Gina, that he'd spent 20 years devoting his mind to sorting her as a muse. That was why it never carried past the week they had. And – not surprisingly, the PI that tracked ol' Genie-Gina down was none to inconspicuous. She'd known that he'd looked for her. Why she agreed to the week away was a bloody mystery.

Selene walked in to the room, shotgun in hand.

He lifted his head to acknowledge her, his eyes feeling dry and dead. "Well then, come to do some business?"

"Fuck you," she said, cocking the shotgun. Her accent was still strong, even after 10 years of active living in Canada. Her white nightgown was going to be splattered with red, he thought.

"Here you are, sitting, 2 AM. Dan, you – asshole – moping over girl from past. You wouldn't mope over ME half much." Selene stepped closer, getting the shotgun up to his face. "This make much mess."

I was just thinking that…

"And, YOU, Dan – you cheated on ME, with HER. Fucking bitch from past. School. You think I not find out? Well, I do. And, fuck – I pissed off."

Spanish accents. Always odd. She lived in Sweden, Canada, and Ireland. Always kept that accent.

"You have no defense, no? Well, fucko – we end this."

He sat back properly in his chair, folding his hands across his belly. "I never loved you, Selene. I did it all, all for the girl."

Selene blinked, and that was all – she pulled the trigger too fast to register the gore that launched forth at her. The kick of the gun threw her back. She screamed a little, a squealing, angry scream of defeat. "You fucker, you won." She stayed on the floor, half-sitting. Soon the cops would come.

Soon it would be over.

She made her way to the mantle, took down her picture, and tossed it in the fire.

Yes, soon it would all be over.

I did it for you, Dan – I did it all for you…