Heart Splinter

Jasmina had sleepwalked her way from the bedroom to the painting above the fireplace in the living room. Though the fire roared with heat and crackling amber, a storm raged and pounded the shore of green pebble beach.

Her husband, Antonio, sauntered in. The light of the flames kissed his oak skin with a welcoming heat. He was a handsome man with a jaw sharp enough to cut glass without shattering. His luscious chestnut mane smelled of smoked almonds and cinnamon. With every gentle step he took to his wife, his rugged muscular physique built by years of manual labor and a clean diet of meat and potatoes (with the occasional bowl of vegetables he took willingly by Jasmina's wifely plea) reflected darkly through his thin satin cream shirt. Being clothed during slumber was a real bother for him. However, during Jasmina's sleepwalking spells, he had to be prepared for rescue.

Tonight's rescue would be different.

Jasmina didn't feel Antonio's callused hand gently holding her by the shoulder. Nor did she smell his musk or his honey and cinnamon scented hair. But she did smell something else. Something more powerful.

Her wandering eyes, though not truly looking at anything around her, seemed to be staring through the painting. Which was gifted to her by Antonio's father, Emiliano Montoya. Before passing away due to a freak accident with one of his prized black stallions, accidentally bucking him off so hard his head hit the anvil he used for the horseshoes, he gave her a painting an English man sold him.

The painting was called: I Bleed For Her.

On the left side is a gaunt pale man slumped on an emerald Victorian chair facing a dying fire. In his right arm that crossed over his chest, was a bleeding heart. Which soaked his shirt in blood, pouring down his sky blue corduroy pants and dripping off the white frilled bowtie on his black dress shoes.

His eyes were glazed over as they looked dreamily into the fire. Despite the morose sentiment his face was palpable with, Emiliano told Jasmina that the painting was about a man who loved a mail-order bride that loved another man. Which did not ease her mind and infuriated Antonio. Thinking her father was trying to send a message. A blatant threat that may as well be: If you hurt my daughter, I will kill you. I'm sure there's a much better man out there for her.

He hated that painting, but for some reason Jasmina loved it. To the point where she saw different details than he did. Causing many an argument. Some nights when they argued over the painting, he would get up in the middle of the night to rip it off the wall and throw it in the fire. But he failed every time. As if it was part of the home.

"Lavender," muttered Jasmina, before turning on her heels.

She headed towards the front door in the pitch black darkness of the foyer. Antonio was about to follow her but he noticed something strange about the painting. For just a moment, the blood of the heart pulsed violet. He slowly reached for the heart. Not realizing that the woman this man in the painting bled for, whom in the other half danced with her husband in the neighboring kitchen on the night they got married, had a violet hue during the same moment the blood of her heart turned violet as well.

He heard the door close and took off after Jasmina without a second thought.

Jasmina's feet touched sand before her husband could catch up to her. Her soft purple and rose embroidered night gown fluttered against the vicious winds of the storm raging on. Hugging her Amazonian warrior body. A body the first time Antonio laid eyes up on it had to suppress his male gaze from drinking the bottle of lust too deeply. For being blind from who or what he saw in her electric blue eyes made him sick to his stomach.

No matter how much his rough hands wanted to pull her into him firmly at the waist, no matter how much he wanted to sear her mind with a kiss burning with passion of a thousand Black Baccara Roses, rendering any desire of resistance from her completely futile, it was the power of an unstoppable lioness that made his heart pump blood so ferociously that he succumbed to her power.

Every day he counts his blessings that they live on a lonesome land. For he doubted no man could resist her. That any man would be willing to go to the ends of the earth to be with her. A feeling that boiled his blood from time to time whenever he past the painting. It wasn't just a painting to him, it was a constant reminder that her father still saw him as a common man. Not one of power. But the love he has for her is far greater than the judgement that haunts him from her father's grave.

A gust of wind from the storm hit him in the face. Making him see his beautiful wife march dreamily along the shore.

"Jasmina! Jasmina wake up!"

She couldn't hear him. Nor knew he was there. But she was certain the smell that pulled her out of her home like arms of steel scooping her up, throttled her into the storm was real and had an unforgiving power. Begging her to bare the sea's power and accept it as a binding gift that even Antonio could see.

There was a man in a torn wedding tuxedo lying on the sand. From the hips down the sea frothed hard hitting waves over him. Jasmina, however, slowed down to a stand still. Staring vacantly at the sea. Antonio, though always afraid to wake her during sleepwalking spells, came up to her. Hoping in her state she'd respond.

"Jasmina, Jasmina we have to go. This man is none of our business. He could be dead anyway. I can check for his pulse. If he's breathing I'll call an ambulance for him."

She didn't move.

He sighed in disappointment then walked over to where the man was. In which a big wave crashed over him. Throttling Jasmina back. Terrified at her choking on water and being pulled in by the sea's storm, he left the man and went over to her. Holding her firmly by the shoulders. She gasped and coughed up water.

"Jasmina? Jasmina are you ok my peach?"

Having finally woken up, she looked around in a panic.

"What...what are we doing out here? The winds are far too strong. It's not safe my love."

He didn't answer her. For his gaze was locked in on where the man lay. He was gone.

"My love?"

"He's gone," he said, not looking at her.

"Who?"

He looked at her with troubled eyes.

"No one. It's late. Come on, let's go inside."

He helped her up. She moved the hair matted to his face and squeezed his arms in comfort. Frowning in concern at the shakiness in his eyes he couldn't hide.

"Dear, what's wrong?"

"Nothing, peach. Please, let's go inside. I'm quite tired."

"Alright."

She kissed him softly. He drunk in the fire from her lips but it wasn't enough to shake the image of the man who looked as if he had run far from his bride to be with another woman or never again. But he used the heat and love of the kiss to steady himself as she gently pulled her lips from him and they walked back home.

He took one last look at where the man was. The tide had gotten higher and stronger. Erasing any markings of a body lying on the wet sand. The squeeze of Jasmina's hand broke his gaze and he looked forward. Wondering if he was simply imagining things since today was the anniversary of her father's death. It's been five years, but it feels like his grave had just been filled.

However strong the presence of her father was in his mind at this moment, Jasmina coiled her arms into his and he let go. Taking in the sea storm's beauty and the wet sand taking in and releasing his feet. But there was one sound that followed him home. One that he didn't bother with too much because he heard it every day when he went fishing. However this time it felt like it jutted from the floor of the sea.

A jangling chain being tugged by the sea's current.