Hard metal was firmly against my right ear when I felt her behind, her slender shape touching me like breath on a mirror. Her throaty voice piercing my unexpected calm demanding I not move.

Slowly her hand embedded an oily smelling revolver into the side of my skull, deftly she maneuvered me toward the balcony’s glass doors, then using her body as leverage she drove me into the glass pinning me and erasing any hope I had of escape.

The lights from the skyline were a blur, my heart raced to keep up with the anxiety now screaming to be released, fuzzy tones gurgling deeply in my throat waiting for the scream, but it didn’t come and it would not have undone the damage or remove growing feelings of the gun deep inside my skull, probing around touching all my fears, massaging my rage. I wanted to explode inside but there was no outlet to drain off the fury, manifesting into a growing horror within me.

Sensing my conflict and fear her mouth moved closer to my left ear, slowly releasing her tongue and then as shivers cascaded throughout my spine she licked my ear purring with a slimy self-satisfied tone of victory, “tell me” she infused, her mouth now nibbling my ear “how does it feel not knowing?”

Her left hand slid onto my thigh then under my skirt, sending through me the briefest tinge of relief but before I could process it her nails pierced through the stockings, embedding deeply into the muscle. Tears now collected behind my eyes my breathing grew shallow sending a plaintive cry of pain dribbling out of my mouth giving her victory and sending her nails deeper into my aching flesh.

“There’s no room for you” she spat, roughly removing her nails from my carcass. “There no more room for you” she repeated, pushing her body weight harder, grinding me with her pelvis further into the glass. Words tumbled out of her warm moist mouth “There’s no more time for you to breathe” and with the last word she squeezed the trigger sending one screaming hot piece of metal through my skull, through the glass and out into the city skyline.

In one moment my exploding head became one with shards of glass mixing and melding in some dramatic sequence of trick photography. I saw my self expanding with the glass riding the heat trail upwards into the universe, then it all fell back to the blood soaked balcony and the sound stopped, the commotion ceased.

As she fired the gun she pushed herself away from me and now standing and staring at the carnage, she put the gun in her shoulder bag. Pulling out her cell taking just one picture then turning, she walked out the door.