The Muse
And as Rick stares at the glass, the whole room seems to be shivering. Rick's heart does something unpleasant. It quakes or flops. And as Rick leans back in his room's desk's chair, closing his eyes to make two great peachdark caves behind which the lamp's light almost moves, he remembers something.
Rick remembers that he didn't put a whisky bottle in his drawer. He'd thrown it out the window in the middle of the night, last week. And though, when he saw it sitting snug and cheerful in there, this morning, he'd assumed he'd misremembered... Rick was now absolutely certain. He hadn't bought another bottle. The drawer had been empty. Yet now...
(Or was Rick imagining this instead?)
Rick opened his eyes. And as he did so, a sound came from the corridor outside. The opening of lift doors, the scraping of a foot across a corridor's concrete floor. Someone was approaching the office.
This had to be a client, surely. He was due one, that's for sure.
And yet - Rick had a bad feeling about this presence in the corridor outside. A feeling that somehow connected to...
The scraping foot's steps stopped outside his office door. Rick thinks, pushing his mind back into the shape he needs it as:
Rick remembers that he didn't put a whisky bottle in his drawer. He'd thrown it out the window in the middle of the night, last week. And though, when he saw it sitting snug and cheerful in there, this morning, he'd assumed he'd misremembered... Rick was now absolutely certain. He hadn't bought another bottle. The drawer had been empty. Yet now...
(Or was Rick imagining this instead?)
Rick opened his eyes. And as he did so, a sound came from the corridor outside. The opening of lift doors, the scraping of a foot across a corridor's concrete floor. Someone was approaching the office.
This had to be a client, surely. He was due one, that's for sure.
And yet - Rick had a bad feeling about this presence in the corridor outside. A feeling that somehow connected to...
The scraping foot's steps stopped outside his office door. Rick thinks, pushing his mind back into the shape he needs it as: