Previous Challenge Entry (Level 3 - Advanced)
Topic: SKULDUGGERY (09/01/16)
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TITLE: Love's Sick Victim | Previous Challenge Entry
By Barry Winley
09/08/16 -
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When he met her it felt like that warm breeze after an April shower; his hope could not have been any higher. At age 30 he once again tasted the indescribable flavor of romance: an aroma, an air, a magical moment of mystery and wonder which had eluded him since the early days of puberty, when the sun set on his first true kiss. He had longed to reclaim that miniature measure of happiness even as months and years elapsed, and his memory faded. Her name—Amy—still lingered in his mind as clearly as the heart shaped image he had sketched on his cloth notebook binder when they were 14, uniting them forever; yet, it was naught but an unfulfilled dream until he met Judy, and the disappointment of those months and years evaporated like mist with one blink of her flattering eyes.
Judy’s smile was a flowerbed of carnations. Her laughter was hearty and pure; warm and sweet.
“What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a nurse,” she said. Ah! Of a caring nature, he thought.
“What about your family? Your mom and dad?”
“My dad was a naval officer. My mom a social worker,” she answered. Nice! A background of prestige. She was born in England, but possessed an endearing southern American dialect which she attributed to growing up in Alabama.
Beauty radiated from her essence in towering waves, captivating him, luring him, challenging him; he found himself daring to surf, to risk losing himself in the froth; to tumble, even drown in the maddening rush of this unexpected, unpredicted love affair.
For Randall, Judy was an answer to prayer. He had long endured despair over his previous, recently sundered relationship with unfaithful Lola. He had begged God to change her, or him, or the situation. He had given up hope until the day he saw Judy’s face.
Now, enthralled by her life story, enchanted by her charm, encouraged by her newness, he was incapable of discerning the depth of her deceptiveness. Even after meeting her “Uncle Cowboy”, her “Grandfather Mack” and her “Cousin Jimmy”, men of shady backgrounds that did not fit into the storyline of this refined woman, Randall could not think clearly enough to see the fraud. He had been seduced, and like Samson before Delilah his faith and true strength would be severely tested.
One at a time the lies began to unravel. Judy had drifted through life, unstable, influenced by corruption, greed and envy. Her “cousin” Jimmy was an abusive ex-boyfriend who conspired with her to cheat her way into the lives of other men to steal their trust and possessions. Her “uncle” Cowboy was an old alcoholic who provided her shelter when Jimmy would discard her in a jealous rage. Her “grandfather” Mack was a registered sex offender who had abused her as a child. Randall’s love dream came crashing in like the broken window he found his head thrust through one cold December night when he confronted her, and her anger exploded. His well- being in jeopardy—he would have to leave her presence.
Randall thought long afterwards as to why it happened. It seemed Judy’s motivations arose from a distorted quest for survival. That desperately twisted need brought a tint of destruction into Randall’s superficially well balanced life. It revealed a moral deficit within him that he, for lack of patience, did not previously bother to examine. He felt anger over her skullduggery, but also pity and deep sorrow, that such a resplendent creature could be a tool of malice and deceit, and that he could become a victim. He had been forever changed. Perhaps not as naïve, maybe less self-reliant; but tainted? bitter? morose? Would he be a blemish, a stumbling block in the lives of others, or could he become a beacon? We cannot know, but this we can know: Only Divine Love can heal the lovesick of their mortal infection.
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FICTION
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