Flight to Darkness Read Online Free PDF

thirsted out his days in a scorpion-infested shack with his
cryptic, startling collection.
    Whenever I thought of home I had to push away
the memory of another girl. Norma. My girl. It was like denying
your name. I hadn’t written her and she no longer wrote. I wondered
if she still wanted to open a photography shop, if she still
thought of me, if she would be there, when and if I returned. And
thinking of Norma, the circle would flash around, completing itself
with Leda. Invariably I would compare them—then think of Leda’s
breasts and thighs outlined beneath white nylon, in a savage effort
to forget the girl who’d said she would wait. Because you do those
things. . . .
     
    My light was out and it was past two in the
morning. I heard the door open, the hiss of movement, and I smelled
her bending over me. I felt her breath on my cheek.
    “ You’re awake. Don’t trick me
again.”
    “ Leda—”
    “ I’m sorry,” she said softly. “It’s
just that they all try. I didn’t want that from you.”
    “ I’m special?” I needed her and
knew it. She had become the something I had to have to endure, to
flash back out of the hell I was in.
    “ I think you’re special. I’m not
sure yet.”
    “ How long will it be before you’re
sure?”
    I listened to her breathe and it was dark in
the room. Her breathing was like her voice. It was very still and
lonely and cool in the room with the wind outside the window and
the shadows on the wall and her shadow beside the bed. It was
always like that in the hospital at night; cool and lonely and very
still and the room was longer, high-walled, and sometimes not
secure.
    I reached for her hand, found it, and she
moved toward me. We kissed and this time it was all the way with
her giving, then we parted, our breathing warm and nervous and
shaking.
    “ Listen,” she said. “We’ll have to
be careful.”
    “ Don’t go.” I held her waist, felt
the swell of her breasts, the fine line of her waist. I could see
the outline of her long legs and how her hips flared. She put her
hands over mine, pressing. “Please don’t go, Leda.”
    “ Good night.”
    “ Leda—”
    She went out softly and closed the door. But
it was as if she was still in the room and I was sweating beneath
the dressings.
     
    She came every day then. We would talk and
occasionally she read to me. I didn’t read any of the
books.
    “ But it’s all right, darling,” she
said. “I don’t mind bringing you books. Maybe sometime you’ll want
to read them.”
    “ With you? Who wants to read if he
has you?”
    It was getting so I couldn’t stand it when she
came close, or when we kissed. I needed her around, too, because it
was worse now when she wasn’t with me. I thought too much about
Frank and what was the matter with me. I kept remembering Mother
alone with Frank, unwell and unable. Normally she could handle
Frank, anybody—but with her heart, I didn’t know. And I never heard
from her. I had ceased writing.
    “ You’re big enough for a sculptor,
Leda said. “Are you bold?”
    “ I don’t know.” Maybe she was the
bold one.
    “ Have you ever loved
anyone?”
    “ No.” Norma’s bright laughing face
flashed across my mind. Why did I push her out?
    “ I’d be a liar if I told you I’d
never loved anyone.” It was in her eyes, like always.
     
    “ How do you feel today?”
    “ Mean as a snake.”
    “ Any dreams?”
    “ Yes,” I said. “You. A bad dream of
you.”
    I reached for her and her lips were soft and
warm and my hands were in her hair and it was wild and
hot.
    “ You’re not well,” she said,
sitting up.
    I pulled her down. “I’m all right.”
    “ You’re not sick, or
anything?”
    “ No. I’m fine. Don’t go
away.”
    “ Eric,” she said. “I love you. I
knew it would happen this way. I didn’t want it to.” The excitement
in her voice was rich and impatient. The rustling of her uniform
was maddened. “I’ll have to be careful of your legs.”
    “