She sat at the coffee table with the book in front of her. Drawings of her in explicit detail. Dare she go back to the art school and expose K? Dare she go back and face him? How could she after what happened in the woods?

The waitress brought her coffee without a smile. It was bitter and strong.

The pages burnt her fingers as she flipped through them. Every page was filled with her face and her body. In a different era, the gesture might have been somewhat flattering and romantic, but now it is downright creepy. Why did he draw her? All the while she thought that he might have been making notes or that he read from his many philosophical books. But no, he was drawing her, taking her clothes off with his pencil with every sketch.

She drank the coffee too quickly without appreciating it. It did not fill the void. The hands on her watch ticked by slowly. Money on the table, the book in her pocket, she walked across the street. The door was open and the music was already louder. The cold glass of wine soothed her troubled soul. It chilled her throat and the buzz calmed her.

Could there be any clues in the book? From the first page till the last, her drunken eyes searched for clues, but with every page, she scanned and with every sip of wine she took, the threads she managed to make seemed to disappear. Nothing made sense and some of the images even changed form; it was no longer her face on the bodies but those of family members and friends. The book sucked her in and the movement of the figures dancing on the pages lured her away from reality. Her mind totally encapsulated by the movement on the pages, she put her head on the book and dreams took her over.

It was almost an hour. The bartender woke her up and asked either for the money or another order. She ordered another glass. She slumped back into the seat and looked at the now-closed book in front of her. What now? Where to from here? The wine did not help in answering the questions. The book seemed to be shrouded in her own created mystery. It made sense, but it also did not make sense.

The only answer was to confront K.

But how could she? Why would she want to understand the random drawings? Was it not better to leave it where it was now? Mindlessly paging through the pages, she did not know what to do from here on. K is supposed to have helped her and now he has become the enemy like so many others in her life. For a moment, she thought about her sister. She allowed herself to sulk, to feel the tears burn her face, and to get lost in the empty pit of solitude. But not for long. Sip after sip the memories faded into the darkness. All that remained was the book.

Postscriptum, or That is All for Now

The story has ended, I think. For now, I will not continue it. I might sometime in the future rewrite it if I find time. I might paste all of them into a word document and print them and add it to the pile of other manuscripts. But I am not if this will ever make its way to publishers. Maybe after some extensive polishing, it might read a little better.

That said, I really enjoyed writing this story. It went in strange directions I did not think it would venture off into. But that is the fun thing about writing. You begin with something and auto-cruise takes you into directions you never dreamt of going. It was such a fun journey.

If you read some of these installments, thank you so much! I hope that the journey was worth it.

For now, happy reading and stay well.

All of the writings and musings in this post are my own. The photographs used are also my own, taken with my Nikon D300 camera.