A Slice of the Story

This four day weekend has afforded me the opportunity to relax and enjoy the unofficial kickoff to summer. Memorial Day weekend has also allowed me to focus my attention on my second favorite activity (tennis is tops): writing. I began writing a new story this weekend that I would classify as a mystery. I have absolutely no experience in writing mysteries, nor do I often read them. It should be interesting to see where the story goes, but I am keeping it light-hearted as opposed to the more serious tone of my current work-in-progress.
Speaking of that work, I'm throwing this slice of A Way For The Rain out there to my blog readers. It's one of the more dramatic scenes and highlights the romantic element of the story. I think perhaps it won't make sense outside the context of the story's plot, but it's a very short, straighforward scene worth sharing.
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I want to grab his arm and demand, “Don’t let me go”. It is too late now. Dylan slowly turns to face me. We volley some messy words over the messy bed. The tone of our voices is imputed to the gray night, the unplayable conditions.

Then he stops speaking and looks back out the window. He catches hold of the curtain like a captain grabbing his sail. I hold my eyes on him until he turns to face me. This time his speech is matter-of-fact and friendly. He is my old tennis partner telling me his available time to play a set.

“You’re too good to me,” he calls out as if an actor in a play. I notice for the first time his hands are shaking.

Startled myself at his boyish jumpiness, I listen intently as he goes on.

“I just need to get away for awhile. We’ll see what happens,” he says, leaving our relationship suspended in the air and hanging by a thread.

Tears are ignited, burning the back of my eyes. They fall from my eyelids until they reach my cheeks. There they remain cold and hardened candle wax.

“Don’t you love me?” I plead with a trembling tongue.

Dylan scratches the side of his face. “No, I don’t think I do,” he stiffly emits.

His timid eyes show remorse. I always thought Dylan had mettle but this conversation changes the image of my tennis partner. When the water was tough, I thought Dylan would still be swimming. His final words stay with me, cornering me forever.