The Sea at Sunset

The Sea at Sunset

Arthur ran until he got to the elevators, then stopped and tried to act normal. People were already emerging from their rooms to see the commotion taking place down on the street. He would ride the elevator to the lobby and leave the hotel via a back entrance, making a clean get-away.

Meanwhile, Constance stood at the pawnshop counter waiting for the clerk to process her paperwork and give her the gleaming, silver-handled 44 she’d just purchased. She was eager to get back in the red convertible she’d rented and head up the coast to the hotel where Pia and Manny were staying.

Ambulances and police cars zoomed around her as she drove northward. She was puzzled but her intuition told her that something wasn’t right.

As she neared the hotel, she could see hoards of people lined up along walkways noisily chattering over the din of sirens and policemen shouting. She parked the car and began walking toward the commotion.

“Hi, what’s going on?” she asked a woman in blue shorts.

“Some guy just fell off a tenth story balcony,” the woman answered.

Constance moved closer still and approached a policeman. “What’s happening?”

“A man just jumped off his balcony.” She waited. “A woman too, but I don’t think she jumped. They’re saying that she fell accidentally while trying to stop the guy from jumping.”

“A woman? Were they both killed?”

“The man was, but the woman’s still breathing. They’re rushing her to the hospital now.”

Constance turned to see a white ambulance squealing away from the hotel curb. She was dazed and confused now, and had so many questions. Who could she call? Who would help her figure out her next move?

Arthur walked briskly down the alley at the back of the hotel, trying not to appear nervous. Within moments, there would be police everywhere, asking their questions. But he would be long gone by then. As he walked, he kept his eyes on the ground and nervously went over every event in his head a time or two until he was certain that he hadn’t left any clues for the police to find.

When the police arrived in Manny’s hotel room, they found exactly what they should have…a normal hotel room where it appeared that a man and a woman had argued and then scuffled on the patio outside, both falling over the side of the railing. Arthur was certain both Pia and Manny had died in the fall, so he smiled to himself and whispered, “No witnesses,” as he rounded the corner and headed for his car.

Later in his apartment, he flipped on the news, trying to see exactly what the police knew and didn’t know. He quickly discovered to his dismay, that Pia was still breathing.

Constance crawled back into her red, rented convertible and began to drive around the streets of San Francisco. She still carried the gun in her pocket but her head was full of questions. For one, who had beat her to Pia and Manny? How could someone deprive her of killing them? Tears formed in her eyes. She got angry just thinking about what they had done to her.

Revenge and anger had been the driving force in her life since the incident two weeks ago. Constance knew that the only way she would ever have any peace is if she killed them both with her own bare hands. Now the radio was saying that Manny was dead and Pia barely hanging on by a thread.

After another hour, Constance decided to drive to the hospital. She knew Pia’s room would be surrounded with policemen, but she still felt drawn there, as if maybe there was still some means of salvaging and completing her mission. Her thirst for revenge had to be satiated.

Arthur paced back and forth in front of his television for a while, praying that the news would announce that Pia had died. He was shocked that she had been able to survive the ten-story drop from their patio to the sidewalk below, but the news was gradually filling in details, such as how Pia had struck an awning on her way down. Her fall through the hotel café’s white awning had mostly broken her impact, resulting in critical but not life threatening injuries.

In spite of his prayers to the contrary, it looked like Pia would recover. And when she did, she would tell the police exactly what had happened in the hotel room that afternoon. It wouldn’t matter to them that both Pia and Manny had deserved to be thrown off the balcony. They were the scum of the earth; the worst human beings he had ever had the misfortune to know. Arthur had done the world a favor by killing them.

And now they weren’t both dead.

Arthur pulled up to the curb a half a block away from the hospital and watched silently. People were scurrying in and out of the building. Occasionally an ambulance would pull into the emergency area with passengers. Police cars lined the street, a few pulled into a back parking lot.

“Damnit Pia, damnit!” Arthur yelled smashing his hand against the steering wheel.