"The Embrace"

I was Fernand jiro marantal The story you read today's story is one of my friend, lice mae Ramirez, I wrote it to be added to my invention.!
May you lay.!

"The Embrace"

In the soft moonlight they met. Arms reaching, they wrapped themselves in each 
other, melting into the curves of the embrace. Below, the river swept on, dark 
water glinting under the silvery light from above.
Draped in a hazy gauze of clouds, the moon watched, its brilliance diffused by the 
veil. Such soft light was perfect illumination for the lovers as they stood upon 
the bridge, lost in each other’s arms. Faces pressed close, their cheeks rubbed, 
Jill’s soft skin soothing the scrub of Michael’s shaven chin. Their mingled breaths 
misted in the cool night, clouds of white quickening in time with their hearts.


Hands groped in the half-light until they found fellow fingers in which to entwine. 
Locked together, the couple stood silently, simply being in their lover’s arms. 
ll’s face turned, tilted slightly upwards, and Michael bent his neck; and 
their lips smoothly fell together, soft and sweet.


The caress, lip to lip, was tender at first, affection and love flowing with every 
slight movement. As the motions grew in fervor, however, a new passion was 
lighted—or simply rekindled. Tongues joined the fray, adding a delicious moisture 
to the kiss, until finally, reluctantly, they pulled apart.


Lifting herself on her toes, Jill raised her lips to Michael’s ear. “Michael,” she 
whispered, an intimacy that sent shivers up the young man’s spine. “Michael, I love 
you!” Jill squeezed her companion, and he returned the tight, affectionate 
embrace.
Their eyes met, glittering in the moonlight. From beneath fair brows, his pale orbs 
met her dark eyes, drinking hungrily the image of Jill’s gorgeous face. A 
smattering of freckles dusted her nose and cheeks, barely visible in the night. Her 
lovely visage was completed with a frame of hair, darker than the night—an exotic, 
and thus all the more alluring, image of beauty.




Jill continued, voice rising to a normal volume, free from the confines of small 
Ernburg where young love was disparaged with dour stares and mutterings. “When I’m 
with you, Michael, I’m so incredibly happy. When I’m in your arms—o! I can’t say 
how much I love it, how much I love you! Words fail . . .” She grasped for more to 
say, to release the bounding ecstasy in her breast, but instead found Michael’s 
lips, pressed against hers, passionate, loving. It seemed a kiss eternal, so sweet 
and intoxicating. When at last it ended, it was all too soon.


“I love you, Jill. I want to keep you safe forever—to hold you forever.” Michael’s 
arms encircled Jill, strong and fast, and pressed her passionately to his body. She 
melted against him, absorbing his warmth and love. Her hand found its way to his 
cheek, and she stroked his face tenderly.


Closing his eyes, Michael leaned into Jill’s gentle ministrations. “How nice it 
would be—alas you cannot.” Jill laid her pretty face against Michael’s breast and 
listened to his heart pattering through the fur of his jacket. The rabbit lining 
tickled her face, soft and warm from their shared space.


“But Jill—it can be. You can be mine forever. Forever beautiful, forever loved, 
forever safe.” Michael cupped a hand under Jill’s chin and lifted her face to his, 
so that the intensity of his eyes locked with her soft gaze. “Together, forever. I 
love you, Jill.”


Suddenly, Jill realized how tightly Michael’s arm was pinning her to him, and as he 
wrapped the other about her again, she felt him crushing her to his side.




“Ow! Michael, you’re going to hurt me. You’ll bruise my sides if you keep hugging 
me like that!” Her tone was jovial as she tried to push away, and her hands pale 
against his chest in the silver light of the moon.


“I love you, Jill,” was his only reply. There was a strange note in Michael’s 
voice, an intense undertone that she had never heard before. He repeated the 
intonation, as his arms pressed harder, like iron bands closing around her body. It 
was as if he were trying to convince her of his sincerity, while his arms forced 
the breath from her lungs.


“Let me go! Let me go, you brute!” Jill began to struggle. She twisted; flailed her 
arms and legs wildly; scratched and bit at arm and face. Michael—no, this was not 
Michael, this was some fell thing wearing his skin, some foul nightmare given 
life—the doppelganger remained stoic, as quiet as the river flowing unceasingly 
below. He suffered her abuse without a word, squeezing ever tighter.


Minutes passed, and Jill grew steadily weaker in her resistance. While at first she 
had scraped skin with her nails and thrashed against the Michael-thing’s legs with 
her feet, she quickly succumbed to a profound lack of breath. With the arms around 
her growing ever tighter around her breast, she could imagine that she felt her 
lungs compress under the onslaught until it was an effort to take the tiniest of 
breaths.


As she lay panting in his vice-like arms, barely able to breathe for the pressure, 
trying to regain the breath lost for her struggle, he replied merely, “I love you, 
Jill.”




A strange thing began to happen, Jill realized as she fought for fresh air, breath 
coming in short, staccato gasps. The pounding of her heart, already thunder in her 
breast and head, resounded to new levels of wild pulsing as she felt herself 
seeming to sink into the Michael-thing’s chest.


It felt as if his body were made of mud, of the same soft, sticky consistency. 
Slowly, she was being forced in, filling a cavity where none should be. The 
inexorable arms pressed her in, against all resistance, as slowly Jill felt her 
shoulders sinking deeper and deeper.




The young woman screamed, to no avail. The Michael-thing bent to her ear, lips 
brushing against strands of raven hair. “I love you.”
“Monster! You don’t love me! Dear God, deliver me. Oh God!” The last was a sob, a 
choking plea that no deity felt disposed to answer. Screams were of no use. Ernburg 
was a mile distant, houses dark as people slept. None would be out on the little 
forest path that led to this small bridge. None would hear her cries. None would 
miss her ‘til the morn, when her secret tryst would be rued—yet the true 
consequences unknown.


Jill fought anew, as the terror that gripped her heart granted her a renewed vigor. 
She was slowly being subsumed; already her back and shoulders were engulfed by the 
growing cavity of the monster’s body. Fear pulsing in her veins, Jill beat and tore 
at the obstinate hands pressing her in, seeking some recourse to slow or halt her 
inescapable circumstance.


She sank her teeth into his arms, stripping away flesh with the raw power of fear. 
The iron taste of blood, the warm sticky fluid, filled her mouth, and she spat 
violently, feeling her stomach heave. Blood dribbled down her chin from red-stained 
lips. Her nails raked arms and neck, drawing crimson lines and streaking sanguine 
across her hands.


Every moment, Jill felt herself slipping deeper and deeper into an impossible void. 
The doppelganger’s arms were adamant. Nothing stopped their iron advance, as slowly 
Jill’s head yielded to the pull of the cavity. She could feel the back of her pate 
sinking in. It was like being swallowed by a slow pit of mud, but all the worse. 
She was betrayed! Betrayed to an unthinkable, inevitable doom.


Michael! This thing could not be Michael; it could not be! Michael was kind and 
sweet and loving, always affectionate.


The crown of her head sank deeper, raven hair absorbed into the thing’s chest. Her 
eyes were forced to look to the sky. She focused on the heavens, hooded by clouds; 
only a sprinkling of stars and moonlight shone down upon the dark world of the 
night.


Mike always had kind things to say—a sweet remark about her beauty, a compliment of 
her character.


Soon, Jill’s brows felt the discomforting warmth of the engulfment.
He was so sweet. Michael would never hurt anything; never hurt her; never, never in 
a thousand years kill or imprison her!


In mere moments, her eyes would be swallowed. The dark orbs rolled wildly. Where 
was Michael? He would come riding up, glittering sword in hand, to save her! Jill’s 
last sight before the darkness was of the glittering stars of Orion winking 
indifferently down upon her. Then, all was blackness, and silence as her ears were 
drawn into the abyss.
“Michael! Save me!”


The Embrace ended as Jill’s feet slipped ethereally into Michael’s chest. He sighed 
in contentment, a smile rolling across his lips. Jill would now be forever safe, 
locked away in the vaults of his heart with all the others. They were all so 
beautiful, all so loving, and good. It was right that they should stay together 
with him, for the rest of forever. They were safe and beautiful for all of 
eternity—and best, of course, they were his.






Brushing back his blonde hair with one hand, Michael walked across the bridge. In 
moments his form had melted into the shadows of the forest, off down the worn dirt 
track, away from Ernburg, his path lit by the dim light of the moon.