Write me a Letter

minishorts she loved to wear, he skidded to a stop and almost fell over.
    ”So you are human after all, eh, Doc,” I said. ”I always wondered. Yes, it’s me, Victor, Mrs. Daniel’s eldest. Any more problems since last I was here?” He’d had a series of petty pilfering one time that I’d helped him with.
    ”One,” he said, when he finally finished shaking Evonne’s hand. ”Someone’s been lifting Mr. James’s copies of Penthouse from his mailbox before he’s had a chance to read them.”
    ”Hmm,” I said. ‘A tricky one. I’d look for a man who’s got a faraway look in his eyes. A sort of bemused expression.”
    ”Also extremely listless,” said Precious, to my surprise. Doctor Don’s teeth gleamed through his bushy black beard.
    ”How’s Mom?” I said.
    ”No miracles yet,” the doc said.
    ”Ah, shit,” I said.
    ”Right on,” he said. We made our good-byes and off he ran. Evonne and I sat for a moment on a bench under a magnolia tree, which we shared with a ruddy-cheeked elderly lady with a walker, dressed in a T-shirt that said, lie no. 371— life begins at 40, shorts, and sneakers with no socks. She was industriously working away at something in an embroidery hoop.
    ”Ah, I see we’re busy at our needlepoint,” I remarked.
    ”I’m tatting,” she said. ”Which isn’t the same thing at all, as anybody but an ignoramus would know. Now go away. Your emanations are muddy.”
    We went away. As soon as we were out of earshot, I said to Evonne, ”What was that all about?”
    ”I don’t know, sweetheart,” she said, taking hold of my arm. ”But they are muddy.”
    ”Yours would hardly be crystal clear, whatever they are,” I said, striding along, ”if you’d been through what I’ve been through this week. Some fucking old Nazi is dead and so is Solomon, who I never even met, and I’m alive and Benny’s in the hospital getting reinflated. And Fats is doing God knows what, and who knows or cares what the twerp’s up to and her heart throb is having it off in the snow with Tits McGurk and I don’t know what else.”
    ”And your mother’s dying,” Evonne said, tugging me to a halt.
    ”Well, there is that too, Evonne Louise Shirley.” I enfolded her in my arms in the middle of the path. An old man in pajamas and slippers, using two canes, passed us by.
    ”Sure could use a little more of that around here,” he said.
    ”Around anywhere,” I said. After a minute she raised her face toward mine.
    ”That’s new,” I said.
    ”What’s new?”
    ”That freckle on the side of your nose.” I touched a finger to it and it came off. I showed it to her. ”See? It was just a mote after all.”
    ”Maybe a spore,” she said.
    ”I like that idea better,” I said. We walked back, arm in arm, to the reception area, found Feeb, and went home. Young Doctor, I am being sorry about the relapse that followed. It was all my fault. See, I didn’t sleep on my back that night. I slept on my right side, as close as I could possibly get to Evonne Louise Shirley without inhabiting the same epidermis.

Chapter the Last

    Well, it started with her, whoever she was and still is, I hope, so it is only fitting that it end with her, if only for neatness’ sake.
    Salmon was the color of her blouse, pitchblende the color of her hair, forest green her skirt, short jacket, and shoes. Her earrings were a still-darker shade of green jade, her lipstick and hair clip, scarlet. Me? Open your paintboxes, kids, and color me any color you want to.
    I was sitting in my office trimming my cuticles and waiting for a client who was late for her appointment when she walked in. It was on a Monday, almost two weeks to the moment from her first materialization into the life of that well-known Studio City boulevardier, V (for Victor) Daniel.
    ”Miss Braukis, as I live and breathe.” I stood politely to greet her. She proffered a hand. I pretended I didn’t see it.
    ”Mr. Daniel,” she said in her throaty voice.
    ”Please be seated,” I said. ”Anywhere you like.” She sat demurely in the only other chair in the office aside from mine. ”I am awaiting a client,” I said, sitting down myself, ”at any minute, one of Burbank ’s leading society matrons, so please be brief.”
    She let me have one look from those unfair eyes; one was enough.
    ”I would have come sooner,” she said, ”but I’ve been sitting shivah.”
    ”I used to dog-sit myself,” I said. ”A beautiful Labrador puppy she was.