FRIDAY ROMANTIC CHALLENGE_THE NIGHT I DIED

Due to my work schedule, Thursday has become Friday!

Don't you hate when work does that to you?

Denise and Francine have given us the theme, LOVE HURTS :

http://fridaynightwriters.blogspot.com/

My 399 word entry is from CREOLE KNIGHTS :

Samuel McCord is walking deep into his club to face what he believes will be his last showdown. Before he dies, he wants to say goodbye to an old friend, Oscar Wilde.

Sam is wearing the spurs of Hephaestus. The first artifact the Olympian made. A gift for Aphrodite. A gift which maimed him. Finding them long ago, Samuel had given them back to Hephaestus, hoping the Olympian could undo the past.

Not even Olympians can do that miracle. And so, Hepaestus both loved and hated Samuel for the attempt.

In the chamber which is Wilde's eternal party, Samuel finds him speaking to the courtesan Cora Pearl and Count de Morny, old friends from his days aboard the cursed DEMETER :

I walked into the chamber. The piano changed tunes mid-chord. Beethovan's Moonlight Sonata began.

I turned to see who was playing. I saw grim features under shaggy brows. Hephaestus.

Oscar Wilde was bending his head next to the cold sunrise of Cora's hair. He laughed. Then, he smiled and spoke to both the courtesan and Count de Morny in low conspiratory tones.

"You ask what I stole from Samuel. Why his words, of course. One evening I spied what he was writing to his beloved Meilori."

Cora hushed, "You actually read one of his love letters to Lady Meilori?"

"Indeed. What were the words? Ah, yes :

'What can I tell you by letter? Nothing that I would tell you in person.

The heart of love travels not by pen and ink. Your presence here would not make you any more real, for I feel your fingers in my hair, and your cheek brushing mine.

The air is full of the music of your voice. My soul and body seem no longer mine but mingled in some strange way with yours.

I feel incomplete without you.

Always and Forever, Samuel.'"

Hephaestus glanced at my spurs as he played. The Olympian's fingers sparkled magic.

A day seven years dead echoed around me. The night Meilori left me. The night I died.

Hephaestus had been playing the Moonlight Sonata then, too. He must truly hate me to make me relive it.

Once again I smelled her jasmine perfume, looked into jade eyes narrowing in rage, heard her velvet voice becoming ice.

"You are leaving my side for her?"

"I'm only trying to make sure the adoption goes through, Meilori.Eve is Mossad. I'm having to pull every string I have left in Israel to insure ..."

" ... your whore has a family for you."

"No, Meilori. You're my family, my world."

"I ... I cannot give you children -- so you make that wanton ..."

"You know Eve's not that way."

"I know? I have seen how she looks at you. You must think me blind. Kiss me, Samuel. Kiss me the liar's kiss that says 'I love you' but means you only love yourself."

She slapped me and stormed out of the chamber and into the night, taking with her my soul.

I jerked at the memory. The pain jolted me back into the present. Hephaestus smiled.
***