The Crystal Sea

How could a family be so close in proximity, and yet be so far apart? It was a question that Karen Willard often asked herself. She knew what the answer was. It was those damned computers!

Richard Willard had bought enough computer equipment to run a small company. He purchased an expensive desktop unit for the house and three laptops, one for him and the other two for the couple’s teenage children. He had tried to convince Karen that it was for improving their education. She could not imagine how video games and music downloads were going to improve her kid’s grades, but she bit her lip and let Richard have his way.

Over the next year, the Willards became a family divided. Richard would park himself in his recliner and play on the computer every moment that he had available, while the kids would retreat to the solitude of their bedrooms and do the same. Karen felt like she was a woman living alone. She began to spend time on the computer in the den. She was not very knowledgeable when it came to technology but was a fairly intelligent woman. She would ask her husband for pointers here and there, but for the most part, if she could not figure something out then she would just forget about it.

Richard had gotten lost in the world of blogging. He thought that his stories and poetry were so good that people were flocking to his site to read his masterful works. He did not realize that it was more of a social network than an artistic medium, or maybe he did.

Richard seemed to get off on the attention that he was getting from these virtual strangers. The comments were like a drug to him. He had to have them. The higher the numbers, the happier that he was. Soon he was blogging ten hours a day and working forty hours a week. It was his family who had become virtual strangers to him.

One day, Richard was reading through his comments and found a new follower to his site. Her name was Crystal C. He clicked onto her profile and then over to her blog which was entitled : Sailing the Crystal Sea. It was a wonderful collection of poetry and stories, but what caught Richard’s attention was the profile photo on the blog. The woman, who’s name was listed as Crystal, was gorgeous. She was the type of woman that he was naturally attracted to. He began to visit her blog every day and leave upbeat comments. She became a regular on his site, also.

Months went by and Richard’s crush on Crystal grew. She was also giving indications that she was interested in him. He decided to make a bold move.

Richard sat down one night and wrote out a very emotionally charged email in which he expressed his feelings for Crystal. He searched for a good picture of himself to send in the message. He had never posted his photo on his blog, so she had no idea what he looked like. While he was writing the message, Karen came into the living room to ask her husband a question.

“Honey, how do I put something on Ebay?”

“Can’t you see that I’m busy!” Richard snapped.

Karen was blown away. Her husband had never been that short with her before.

“Never mind!” She yelled back and stormed out of the room.

Richard didn’t care at that moment. His mind was obsessed with Crystal. He uploaded his photo and sent his email.

He was not expecting what happened next. Crystal Emailed back saying that Richard was a striking man and that she wished that they could meet. Richard was blown away. The two bloggers only lived about five hours apart. A meeting would not be that difficult.

They exchanged more emails:

Richard to crystalc34@tmail.com:

We could meet, let’s say in Worthington?

Crystal to RichardWWII@tmail.com:

That would work. I have to do it during the week. Hubby is home on weekends.

Richard to crystalc34@tmail.com:

Good for me too. I can call out of work. Wife won’t know that I’m gone.

Crystal to RichardWWII@tmail.com:

How about the rest area on 17? We could picnic in the field there.

Richard to crystalc34@tmail.com:

Next Tuesday okay?

Crystal to RichardWWII@tmail.com:

Good for me. Lets say about 10.

Richard to crystalc34@tmail.com:

See you there!

Crystal toRichardWWII@tmail.com:

Bring wine and condoms!

The last email gave Richard an erection, something that Karen did not seem to do for him anymore. He could not wait to meet his new found girl.

Tuesday morning arrived and Richard was giddy with anticipation. Karen seemed very suspicious of the way that he was acting.

“Why are you in such a good mood, Hon? I have never seen you so happy to go to work on a Tuesday morning.”

“Big meeting today at ten, Babe. Could mean a promotion.”

“I hope that they don’t fuck you around this time. You always get your hopes up and then you are so depressed when it falls through.”

“Well, if I get fucked at this meeting, it will be pretty much what I expect,” Richard said with a smile. “I won’t let it bother me, I promise. At least I get out of doing the same old same old, today.”

He gave Karen a kiss and headed out. He felt extremely guilty, but also excited. Crystal was really on his mind. The two had emailed back and forth all weekend and had set up a game plan.

Crystal would bring the picnic supplies and Richard would bring the wine and condoms. They were supposed to meet at ten, but he was so excited and filled with anticipation that he arrived almost an hour early. The rest area was deserted, as it usually was. Not many vehicles used route 17 since the interstate had been built. Richard reclined his driver’s seat, put on the radio, and closed his eyes, trying to calm himself down. The last thing that he expected was to fall asleep.

He awoke to a woman’s voice.

“Wake up sleepy head,”

He opened his eyes and saw the time on the radio. It was only 9:30. He was still half an hour early. He hated that his first introduction to Crystal was going to be like this.

Before Richard’s eyes could fully adjust, he felt a sharp pain in his chest area. He looked down only to see the handle of a kitchen knife protruding from his chest and blood gushing down his belly, soaking into his expensive shirt. He looked up and saw Karen with a second knife. She plunged that one into his neck. He began to fade from life as he listened to Karen’s rant.

“You bastard! You cheating Bastard! I read your emails to that bitch! You thought that I was a dummy and that I could never catch you, but I taught myself.”

She pulled the knife out of his neck and stuck it in again.

“I’d say you got fucked on this meeting, Sweetheart, and I am going to kill that Crystal bitch too!!”

“Karen….I….am…..sorry,” were Richards last words as he drifted from the world of the living.

Later that night, after throwing the knives into a river and cleaning herself up, Karen walked through the quiet house. The kid’s doors were closed and the rooms were quiet. They were obviously online and had no time for her. She felt like they would probably never even miss their father. She knew that she would probably get caught for killing Richard. Evidence would eventually lead back to her.

She really had flip flopped on what to do with Crystal. Part of her hated the bitch and wanted to kill her, but then another part of her felt that it was not Crystal’s fault that Richard was such a weakling. Crystal had brought about the truth and strangely enough, Karen actually felt a little indebted to her.

Karen sat down at the computer and put in her ID and password and pulled up her own blog. She went into her settings and found the delete blog button. Her finger hovered over the button for a minute but then she had a change of heart. She decided to keep her site. She would not hit delete. Sailing The Crystal Sea was Karen’s creative outlet. It was a place where her stories and poems would exist long after she would be convicted and sentenced for killing her husband.

Crystal would live to see another day.