Cheesy, cringe-worthy, romantic, sweet... you decide

on this romance excerpt from C. M. Donaldson

The author of 
The AL-EX Project

This is the romantic scene from Chapter 45, shortly after Alex has recovered from his near-death experience. All his vain efforts to win back his wife had all been in vain...until now.  By some miracle and completely by accident he is back in the company of his estranged wife, Kayj.  He is beyond thrilled to realize that his nearly dying has in fact brought them back from the brink of divorce.

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She had planned to sleep in the spare room, but this night Kayj felt a slight chill and as Alex let out a faint snore, she curled up on the sheets beside him, relishing the warmth of him beside her, and closing her eyes, within seconds she was out like a light!

But Alex wasn't really asleep.  He peered down at Kayj’s sleeping face.  He couldn’t help thinking way ahead of himself at the amusing thought that crossed his mind and made him smile, along the lines that the best way, if one were lacking in the powers of persuasion, to progress with someone you were in romantic pursuit of, was to nearly die on them, be literally on the brink, then come back hale, whole and hearty, and strike while the iron is hot so-to-speak, since their gratitude that you are still alive would more than sing out that all was forgiven and would surely move the most stubborn, most frigid and coldest of potential conquests, therefore fast-tracking to his heart’s desire. He amused himself at his flippant thoughts.  He looked at her again and his heart did a flutter.

Not that Kayj could in any shape or form be described as a ‘conquest’ nor was she particularly cold or frigid –stubborn certainly - but he had been trying hard to perfect his methods to get back into her good books for months, afraid to overstep the mark and end up at square one, since they had a steady friendship going, which, over time became apparent that it wasn’t just to aid the potential of any experiments they carried out together (friends rather than enemies work better together, don’t they).  They genuinely had missed each other while they were apart (they had admitted as much during occasional heart-to-hearts) and had, in Alex’s mind, turned a corner. 

And he hoped sincerely that it wouldn’t be too long before they were able to start again as a couple and, if not carry on where they left off, then at least re-lay the foundation they originally had (a work in progress admittedly) and with tiny steps, grow closer from there. He felt it in his bones that she was starting to feel the same way, but she was cautious and he let her be cautious.  There was no hurry and, for that matter, no guarantee of success in any case. 

But now, although this wasn’t the first time she had ‘stayed over’ (on a half dozen or so occasions, prior to today - purely for convenience of course - it had usually always been a separate-room affair) so he was extremely grateful to at least have her under his roof, if not yet back in his bed per se.

And yet there she was, on his bed at least, close enough to touch, and she yawned as she opened her eyes and pushed herself up on her elbows leaning up and over him, and her eyes said it all. With no more notions of dozing off, he leaned over and took her easily into his arms, and they looked seriously into each other’s eyes, reading accurately the mutual longing, before their lips met, gently at first and then more urgently.  She didn't shy away this time. 

He sunk into her open arms and wrapped himself around her, and whilst once they had been strangers they began exploring each other as if for the first time and for Alex, the familiarity of her touch and her scent and her skin overwhelmed him and brought back luscious memories of greatly missed intimate moments. When she slipped easily under the sheet beside him, there no longer a poly/cotton barrier between them, and he slowly and expertly undressed her. The mood was sizzling! 

And but for a fleeting thought - for a second then it was gone - that if this one act finished him off, (his heart and all that) then it would be a glorious way to go, Alex wouldn’t have broken their embrace, thrown back his head and laughed out loud! 

Then Kayj wanted to know what was so funny, pulling away from him startled, and when he told her, describing the thought, capturing the humorous side of how ironic it would be to have escaped the jaws of death after such a major incident, to then succumb to a cardiac arrest and expire during the throes of love-making, in his lover’s arms, (his wife’s arms he then corrected himself), she burst out laughing too, and before long they were giggling fit to bust at probably the funniest thing either of them had heard in a long, long time. 

All the stress and tension came out in that laughter during ten whole minutes of pure hilarity.  And it was one of those things which, if you took the time to think about it, wasn’t even all that funny and it could have been an entirely different story at the opposite end of the spectrum with tears all round, but they were tickled by the sheer irony of it nonetheless, and any tears were the result of side-splitting honest-to-goodness, pee-inducing amusement. 

When their laughter had subsided sufficiently to render them serious again, the previously blissful intimacy restored, and with renewed vigour, they resumed their former positions and with any kind of heart attack except the sweetest kind completely vanished from their minds, they blew each other’s minds as they made up for two years separation during the following one hour, twenty-three minutes and forty-five seconds.

The AL-EX Project 

(ALternative EXistence) 

It's all a great adventure - in his dreams Alex can be a lottery winner, a secret agent, he can talk to animals, and he even thinks, at his darkest hour, that he's looked into the face of God Himself as the dreams take Alex into a different realm - an alternative existence - and quite literally he is testing the limits of dream control.
Described as science fiction in its lightest form with fantasy elements, this is a science-thriller with a touch of romance and humour thrown in.  What if there was a means to fully understand your dreams? Wouldn't you like to know why you dreamt what you dreamed?  Who are the mysterious characters that appear whom you've never met before but who apparently seem to know you?  And what if you could re-enter your dreams at will? Spurred on by these questions, Alex's experiments become an obsession and he means to find out who is drawing him into this alternative existence towards certain calamity ...and maybe even death!

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About C.M. Donaldson: London-based she is an independent author, and an avid reader who loves science fiction, detective stories, murder mysteries and courtroom dramas. Always having kept diaries over the years, the first work by this author was the real-life humour tale about dieting struggles, as told from the point of view of a hapless, no-hoper yo-yo dieter, amusing and relateable (under the pseudonym of Pearl Barley).

Although a humble medical secretary, C.M. Donaldson discovered the pull of the writing bug and began writing in sci-fi mode, thus creating The AL-EX Project (Alternative Existence) which came about through having an interest in dreams, dream interpretation and the mysteries surrounding the dream state.