More Than Love

A man tiptoes out of a ceremony of frilly decorations and an assortment of white chairs. He escapes from the ostentation with his beloved by his side. They walk along the beach until they settle next to a patch of tall grass on an elevated dale of black sand quite a ways from the bridal party they had just left.

“I’m sorry I invited Ted,” he said as he shot a quick glance at a seemingly vacant chair, “it’s just…I love to see you sullen.” He smiled.

“This whole day was just amazing—like some sort of euphoric dream. My body tingles with excitement, from my head to my little toes below, every inch of it in love. In love with you, my dear.” He smiled again at his beloved and held against his bosom in a warm embrace his true love, his “little Annabel Lee.”

“Did you love it when I kept saying ‘will you marry it, marry it, marry it?’ at the ceremony?” He chuckles a genuine chuckle. “I bet the priest thought I was crazy! He doesn’t know you like I do…Nobody in the world knows you like I do.” His look was serious as he held his “sweet, dark angel” at arm’s length. 

“Tell me,” he said as he let his darling rest on the black sands of the shore, “do I too have a Meinkampf look?” He stood as solemnly as a soldier as he swept his knotted tufts of hair across his forehead and remained stolid, eyes piercing.

“Just joking! I’m kidding, I’m kidding!” He assured as he deftly slid into place again alongside his “princess of doldrums.”

“You know I could never treat you like him. I would never bite your pretty little heart into fourths—we both know the state it’s in now, thanks to him!” He shot a glance of fury once more over his shoulder. “If only I could shower his blackness, his demonic aura, with dagger upon dagger, each one landing in its own special spot on the surface of his wretched brain, I would!”

He sat, fuming. His chest pumped furiously, moving in and out in tandem with the waves that slashed the coast. Each crest reached its peak and lunged for the two lovers as they sat in a prolonged state of gloom.

“He tortured you! Left you in tatters! That black marauder…that filthy panther. He sucked the life out of you and left you speechless before me: a man who you can trust, a man that will take care of you!”

He wiped away a solemn tear with the thumb of his right hand. He sniffled slightly.

“He sure did a number on you, my darling. But, it’s all over now. You put it best when you said he had ‘a love of the rack and the screw.’”

“I’ll tell ya, I know you’ve loved one man, but if you love two, I promise to you all that I’ll love is the screw!” He laughed most heartily as he cocked his head back and held his seizing midriff.

“You see! I have a knack for it too! I have a way with words!” He chuckled lightly as he poked and teased his beloved.

He sighed a sigh of relief and looked off toward the sunset at a volleyball court roped off in the sand where a game was in progress.

He prodded his beloved once more and pointed gently to the court, “You know they don’t want us to be together. They think it’s unnatural what we’re doing. They don’t understand true love. They don’t understand anything. All they do is watch TV and play dumb games in the sand. I feel sorry for them! I really do…”

“Forget them. All I want is this moment. This moment, to contemplate eternity with you and you alone, my sweet, sweet, black angel.”

He lay down alongside his beloved. He closed his eyes and held his sweet Annabel Lee closer and peppered his “dark mistress” with kisses.

Off in the distance about 50 meters away sits an old man on a bench along the boardwalk. His blistered and chapped lips clamp down upon a robust cigar. The smoke his cigar emits lazily trails off in a winding trajectory above his head. He is reading the local newspaper. From the corner of his eye he notices a man rolling around in the sand near a patch of lengthy grass, hugging a book tightly to his chest. The old man recoils in disbelief and the side of his mouth becomes a snarl.

“Nutjob,” he says as he snaps the newspaper into place in front of his face once more. The front of the paper faces the shore, staring out into the depths of the sea like a great probing eye. The headline reads:

“MAN MARRIES DEAD POET SYLVIA PLATH.”