Hurricane Jane

a story inspired by a writing prompt in Stephen King’s “On Writing”

Dick covered his face with his arms, vainly trying to avoid the fists that pummeled him repeatedly. Oh God, not again, he thought. This can’t be happening again.

As he struggled to twist away from Jane’s fury it was as if he was caught inside a silken bag that softly brushed his face as the punches eventually slowed. He opened his eyes to bright morning sunshine filtering through his bed sheet and a tiny voice in his ear “Daddy, no hiding.”

He pulled the sheet from his face. Jane was gone, she had never been there, and it was just another nightmare. His 3-year old daughter Nell was standing beside the bed, her face bright with morning, her hair a wild halo around her head. Nell pulled the sheet further down the bed, announcing, “Wake up time! Wake up time!”

Dick reached out and rubbed his daughter’s tousled head. She had curls so much like her mother’s it was sometimes painful for him. Each night he prayed that a physical resemblance was all she had inherited from her mother.

Their courtship had been whirlwind, a chance meeting at a seminar, an invitation to dinner and three weeks of unrelenting passion that threatened to kill them both. Jane was energetic and wild in bed, very much in control, and Dick found that surprisingly to his liking. After…