They hiked through the tangled and vine-entwined grass, taking care not to step on any snakes that might be hiding in the undergrowth or disturbing the nest of biting fire ants.Dawn, hyperventilating with anxiety, felt a severe yet exhilarating loneliness creep over her as they neared the cross.She looked up into the sunset-stained sky as a great blackbird flew over, flapping his wings noisely.The blackbird then perched on a gravestone a few yards away and curiously observed them, cawing raucously.The hours seemed to speed by quickly as the day waned.But it was still hot and humid and sweat ran in rivulets down both her and Ricky's face.The grave marker,gnarled and pitted by the elements, had turned slightly gray with patches blackened by mildew.Ricky crouched, his head leaning forward,then got down on one knee to try to decipher what was written on the headstone.All the words were written in Latin save for the name of the person buried there,which wasn't father Donahue's.He sighed deeply and shook his head, his brow furrowed by worry. His gaze drifted past Dawn to sweep the headstones nearby.After an exhaustive and methodical search, the thought that looking for the gravesite would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack, weighed heavily on his mind. He looked up from where he was kneeling on one knee to speak to Dawn when he saw her eyes focus beyond him, her mouth slightly open. The look on her face was one of dismay coupled with fear. He turned and both he and Dawn were caught by the sight walking slowly towards them. Things seemed nebulous and unreal as though the manifestation of a dream;a cinema verite noir unspooling before their very eyes. A tall lanky figure dressed in a white guayabera shirt and khaki pants, eyes hidden behind dark aviator sunglasses and holding an umbrella over the head of a woman dressed in a white floral-print, linen baby doll dress, slowly approached them. He was the color of dark chocolate and full of swagger. Chaste-looking and possessed of a poised allure and disquieting eroticism, his female companion was supermodel thin, tall, with a peaches and cream complexion; her lips, voluptuous and cherry-red, and nails done in a sassy Pink Friday shade. Her gently flowing, sheer, linen frock, white as driven snow and embroidered with sweet songbirds and moonlit water lilies and highlighted with a tease of glitter, was pressed against her by a slight Caribbean breeze, revealing the nude skin of a bombshell body, both slender and graceful. The scene was eerily calm, almost surreal, with a certain haunting quality to it. Something just did not feel normal. The swallowed fear and anxiety caused a cold and chilly feeling to run through Dawn's body. The hair on the back of her neck stood up and goose bumps appeared all over her arms. She could feel panic wanting to push its way in as her heart kicked into a gallop.
