Not being George
The legs stretch out before my face like two pieces of pale marble.
The woman seated named on the bed squints down at me in the dim light.
My parachute chords are still stretched through the shattered window behind me like some perverted aftermath of birth.
She says, “Come on, George!!!!”
Her voice is so sexy I can’t bear to tell her I’m not George.
All has gone wrong that can possibly go wrong.
I meant to land in the farmland north of the city.
I landed in the city.
When I realized my error, I aimed for the roof top of the hotel.
I landed on a ledge, the parachute drooping over the side threatening to drag me down 14 stories to the street below.
So I smashed the glass to escape the crumbling ledge and crawled through the shards to find myself between her legs, she moaning for George who I cannot see, some expected lover she apparently expected to crawl to her through broken glass the way I have.
But I’m here to kill a terrorist, not act out a beautiful woman’s secret fantasy.
Although I know which I would choose if I was given a choice.
Not far outside, the sounds of a siren rises, a wail telling me that my arrival has been discovered by the authorities.
Radar might have detected the plane.
Some resident may have seen my chute.
Someone in the hotel might have heard the thumb of my landing on the ledge, then heard the crash of class and called the police to alert them that I crawled in here.
I stand.
The squinting naked lady – a model for some classic Greek or Roman statue – gasps.
In a shocked voice she says that I’m not George.
No, lady, I tell her, then with as much dignity as a parachute can give me I stagger towards the door, unhooking myself with each step.
The door opens just as I reach for the handle.
A squat- Middle Eastern bald man eases in wearing only a towel.
He bumps into me.
He looks at me.
I look at him.
I wish him luck and eased passed him into the hall, knowing that if I survive the next few hours I will eventually live to regret not being George.