by Kris Koments

Created on: August 20, 2010

It wasn't unusual that no one noticed as she entered the dimly lit cabana and made her way across the familiar but faded, red carpet.   It was late.  

The little man behind the bar greeted her with a gruff “Whiskey, straight up?”  

She nodded.  She had never been much of a drinker, but tonight was the exception.

Nothing had changed since her last visit.  The faces were still familiar, the laughter still loud. And the odor. . .still foul.

Grabbing her glass, she grimaced.  “Whiskey straight up.” she repeated.  The last time she had ordered anything stronger than coffee was eighteen years ago, sitting at this very bar.  She grimaced again.  She had been twenty-seven then.

- - -

He stood in the shadows waiting while the church bells chimed in the distance.  She had been at the bar for well over an hour. . .  

Not surprisingly, she was more beautiful now than she had been all those years ago. But her time was running out.   

- - -

He had been watching her since she first arrived.  She knew he wasn't going anywhere.  He never did.  

Reaching beneath the heavy, dark cape she wore, her fingers brushed against the steel of the 7.65 semi-automatic Luger before latching onto a tiny piece of paper.  It was crumpled and yellowed from age.  The edges were torn, but the letters in red were just as bright as they were the night she signed it.  That had been eighteen years ago.  

With what might have been a sigh, she straightened and turned her stool back to the bar.  Knowing the answer already, she gestured towards the door.  “Is this the only way out?”

The bartender raised an eyebrow ever so slightly and nodded.   

- - -

Judas uncrossed his legs and made to stand just as the cabana doors swung wide.  Pushing himself up from the stool, he straightened to his full six foot nine inches.

- - -

It was time.  Crushing his unfinished cigarette, the man in the shadows made his way towards the cabana.

- - -

Slowly,Mary reached for the Luger hidden beneath her cloak.  Easing her finger onto the trigger, she raised the pistol, fired the shot, and watched as her son’s six foot nine inch frame crumpled to the floor.

Turning one last time to the man behind the bar, she laughed a bitter sound and dropped the piece of paper she had carried with her for over eighteen years.  “Never make a deal with the devil, but if you do,” she paused, “ there is always another way out.”  

Soon the sun would come up and the street lamps would fade.  For the first time in nearly nineteen years, Mary said a prayer.

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