I read this all the way through, as I suspect anyone would. There are many red flags that a poorly written story will wave, any of which will convince a reader that it just isn't worth their time. You raise none of them.

The narrative voice is strong, but not intrusive; it doesn't aspire to near-character status. The dialogue is believable, never prompting the, "Aw, he wouldn't talk like that!" reaction. Nice imagery. And an intriguing set-up.

In short, all the ingredients to guarantee that most desired of responses from your reader: "Gosh, I wonder what's going to happen next." Get your reader to wonder that, they'll keep reading.

And yet, I think your readers will be disappointed at the end, as was I. I had the feeling that you'd been hiding off stage, watching me wade through the various elements, trying to make sense of things, and then at the end, you jumped out with a, "Ha ha! Fooled you!"

The ending is enigmatic, not a flaw in itself, but the reader needs to have been given enough clues for there to be viable options for how one should interpret it. Here, the ending just feels like you ran out of steam. Instead of resolving the issues you'd done a decent job of setting up, you just decided, "Oh, heck. Let's just kill him."

What an ending like this means is that all our efforts to follow along with you as you present this element or that, storing each offering in our memory banks to be brought back out as the story unfolds, turns out to have been wasted effort.

The dissatisfied wife; a marriage on the rocks; an old cathedral abandoned in the wilderness; the phone steadily losing power, possibly a metaphor for the relationship; the hippie-chick; her transformation into a wise muse... all left stranded as we realize none of it meant anything. You really don't want to do that to your readers.

In an earlier review of one of your stories, I observed that you had all the required elements in place; why not go ahead and turn them into a story? That's not the problem here. I think there is a story here, I just don't know what it is. Can you come up with an elevator pitch for it: give it to me in 25 words or less? If not, it's a good sign you're not completely certain yourself what it's about.

What does Herman want? We don't know, only that he seems to be at the affect of two different woman. He's ruthlessly passive, uncertain, and probably resentful because of it. Once he, and we, know what he wants, we'll have a fixed metric with which to chart his progress, and you'll have a narrative arc as he moves to his goal. Whether he attains it or not, you'll have something substantial with which to craft your ending.

Speaking of which, the visuals of the one you now have are truly compelling. But you haven't worked hard enough for it. Don't give up on Herman or your story. Your readers will love you for it.