She touches a nerve

The first sound I notice is silence; not the usual rumble of traffic. The pillow is luxuriously soft and yet powerless to relieve the pain in my neck. A wave of curiosity swells, and my eyelids unseal - creating two slits. Brightness and colour flood in. The slits grow larger revealing a large wall-painting. A red landscape of black, spiky trees lies beneath a yellow sky. Where the hell am I?

A geeky man appears, obscuring the painting. His body is tall and gangling. But, oddly, his face is big and round, and smiling, like a Halloween pumpkin. He scrutinizes me through thick-rimmed spectacles. His bizarre appearance seems familiar. A woman appears at his side. She is blonde, pretty and serenely confident. She looks familiar, too.

“He awakes,” the woman says. She moves away but the geek still smiles at me.

“Hello,” he says.

Now I remember him. Last night. I am paralyzed as the scene replays...

I’m in a bar, bruised from the match but celebrating another victory and a match-winning try. The blonde is standing at the bar.

“Hello,” I say.

“I’m waiting for someone,” she replies.

“Not a man, I hope?”

“Yes,” she says, without a flicker of emotion.

The geek appears and stands next to her. She grips his bony arm with both hands.

“Him?” I say, registering his presence with the briefest of glances. She looks away. Eventually the geek pipes up.

“Would you excuse us, please?”

My gaze remains locked on the blonde.

“Can I buy you a drink later?”

The geek removes the blonde’s clutching hands.

“Would you excuse us, please?” he repeats. I slowly turn towards him; our faces almost touching. His breath is pungent. And then… nothing!

As the memory fades, the nerd’s grinning face comes back into focus. I leap from the bed and grip his throat.

“What’s going on?” I say.

His long, skinny fingers gently encircle my forearm.

“You were unconscious. So I brought you here to rest.”

I squeeze a little harder. I don’t know why. I'm confused, and disgusted at the thought of such gratuitous non-violence.

“That doesn’t make sense,” I say. My grip tightens and his face distorts.

“Actually it is entirely logical,” says a monotonic voice from behind me. It is the woman. And as her words register, I feel a pinch on the side my neck.

BUT what happens next?

Yes! go on Ron, what happens next?