I was sitting there at my desk, staring hopelessly bored at the terminal. Whatever I had to have done for the day had already been done, and now I was sitting, feeling the electro-chemical connections in my brain cool off, and one by one quit firing all together.

My feet were about asleep. I stood up, and blacked out for a moment before I caught my footing. I looked around at the maze of cubicles around me, none of it registering in my consciousness, anymore. The steady drone of the woman in the next cube bragging about her shopping prowess faded into a distant buzzing, then nothing at all.

A sensation washed over me, like lying on my back in a secluded swimming pool, and as I sink up to my nose, the rest of the world simply vanishes: sound, sight, and any sensation at all.

At once, the buzzing and droning of a dozen senseless routine platitudes meshed into one faint noise, and it became a whisper. Incomprehensible, at first, but steadily taking on distinct characteristics. Feminine, it seemed, and slightly younger. Even more, it became familiar, an audible apparition speaking a well-known tongue.

"Come to me," it said.

I couldn't tell if I was dreaming, going insane, or being haunted by some phantom of loves lost, but the sweetness of the gently impassioned plea was more than inviting, and far more engaging than taking root in a cubicle farm.

I got up, and in a single, continuous movement, I shut down my PC, grabbed my office gear, and drifted purposefully toward the main exit. If anyone tried to stop me, they didn't try too hard. I surely heard nothing as the "Exit" sign sailed over my head, the doors courteously opened, and I slid straight for my waiting car.

The belongings I had in my hand tumbled into the passenger seat as the magically plunged into the ignition switch, and in a moment, I was on my way.

Destination: unknown, but my late-model American beast knew the way, gently caressing the heaving roadway, breathless in the summer heat with desire, and shimmering it's own seductive dance.

My eyes were fixed on the road ahead, nothing in the way, only cars that parted like waves as I glided down the Interstate, following this specteral beacon, holding me, dragging my by the psyche.

The voice, ever clearer, was louder still, trembling anticipation, quivering every aspiration and vowel in her voice. "Come to me," was all she said.

I began to come to as the familiar sites got scarcer. I glanced at the needle that read, "85." I began to lift my foot off the gas, but the breath brushed the tips of my ears, and rustled through my hair, until the hairs at the back of my neck stood on end, and even in the record heat of the day, I was awash in goosebumps.

The last point of civilization came and went, and a hint of alarm arose as the car seemed to coast more than it drove, and I felt a gross upwelling of tension in my gut, rising in my chest, as my trusty rig came to a stop there on some stretch of road.

"Come closer," said the voice, barely able to contain it's own excitement. I got out of the car, and was at once immersed in the damnedest heat I've ever known, the late afternoon sun baking every square centimeter of my exposed flesh.

"Yesss... come to me, please," the voice begged as a cooling breeze kicked up and propelled me off the road and in among the sage brush. Some several yards away from the car, the heat became unbearable, as I peeled the layers of clothing off, until I realized I was in a state of nature as pure as my surroundings. I walked a little further, neverminding the risks of the wild.

At last, I came to a non-descript spot in the middle of... nothing, and I was bathed all over in this gentle, chilling, and comforting breeze. I felt exalted, standing there in the sunset with outstretched arms.

"At last, you've come back," she said... and dope slapped me across the back of the head.

"Would it have killed you to call once in a while?"