It’s the end of the semester and grades must be done. This week I’m going to post an excerpt from my first book-Stepchild. Because I know you have to market your works. And I’ve done quite a bit of posting from my latest effort and even talked about what I am hoping will be a new edition. Hold on- Dee GET AWAY FROM THTAT WINDOW! Anyway gentle reader here we go with a love letter to a girl from a boy which also symbolizes the reverse migration of Blacks from north to south.
Alonso got up and left her to read the letter. He had been talking to Josh because he sounded just like him. She didn’t know what to do. She still loved him. Of that there could be no doubt. She knew it when they talked a few months ago. Her anger made her curt and cold, but she could hear how sorry he was in his voice. Why did men have to act like that? Why did this man, her man, have to act like that?
She opened the letter.
Now I know how Napoleon must have felt at Elba, banished to a life of exile, separated from his beloved France—a victim of his own misbehavior. Death would have been a kinder punishment. I know because I sit here heartbroken on this desolate isle we once called home, separated from you, a victim of my own misbehaving, and I wish with all my heart I could turn back the hands of time and relive the moment I so cavalierly tossed away my life with you. I would not have invaded Russia; I would have spent my every waking moment with you.
For life without you is a life not worth living, like revisiting the agony of Prometheus bound only to have my heart eaten anew every morning, chewed upon every waking moment by this unbearable life I now live—one where there is no Adrienne. My North Star has slipped behind a cloud, my compass has gone awry. I wander aimlessly along the cold shoreline, the wind blows, whistles through the trees, and Adrienne, Adrienne, Adrienne . . . the branches whisper your name.
I see your face, your loving smile, the glistening light dancing in your beautiful brown eyes. I reach out to touch you, my love; your image disperses, drifting off to the distant reaches of my mind. I miss you, my love. I think of you my precious one; I want to speak French, mi amour, when I think of you simply because it is the language of love and I want only to speak of love when I think of you.
You are my Audrey Anne and no one else can. Touch me in those special little places, fill in those pain-filled spaces. No else can, not like you, my Audrey Anne. You can make my heart sing, you can make my mind race; with just a simple smile, you bring oh so much joy to me, making a simple little face or holding me in an enchanting embrace. Yes, you are my Audrey Anne and no one else can, not like you, my Audrey Anne.
You are my golden flower gliding effortlessly through my heart, scoring at will, crashing against the boards of my mind, wrecking it just for the fun of it. You touch me and I know there is a heaven. You become angry with me, I see the gates of hell. And the day you walked out of my life, the best part of me died and went to find its proper place in the ninth circle of hell, leaving a shell of a man to suffer and contemplate the depth of my loss.
I think back to the first time I saw you. You skipped through the hallways of my mind, snuck through a door marked Do Not Enter; tip-toed down a stairway and stole my heart.
Funny, you don’t look like a thief. Then again, I guess you can’t take what already belonged to you.
I want you to come home. I know the Midwest is where you grew up, but the South with me is where you belong. There can be nothing or no one there that loves you the way I do, that needs you the way I do, that wants you the way I do. I miss you so much. Please come home. Please come back to me where you belong.
I have always been Thoreau’s man who walked to the beat of a different drum, staggering through life a little off-center, always just out of step. Then you came into my life and heard my cadence and chose to march in lockstep with me, and my life became one big parade filled with brass bands and wind ensembles and yes, even a concert section where violins strung together sweet music for me to march to.
You left, my North Star, so now I again wander directionless through this life. Where there was once darkness, your smiling, vibrant face shone a special light. Now that you are gone, like the old war tune says, I have once again slipped into darkness. I want you. I need you. I love you. I miss you so much. Please come home, back to me where you belong.
For Elba is such a cold and lonely place. There is no Adrienne here to warm it with her smile. I sit in my undistinguished little hut, contemplating a return to the sunshine. I plot an escape from this terrible place where the birds won’t sing, the skies are always gray, and the temperature is always below freezing.
I must leave here. I must know the warmth of your love again. I must escape and return to a life with my beloved France. Return to a life lived in the arms of my Guy, my golden flower, my North Star, my Audrey Anne simply because no one else can; not like you, my Audrey Anne. Please let me become a part of your life again.
I shiver, stand next to a fire that provides no warmth. I rub my hands together, thinking about a time when my world was filled with wonder, dreaming of the girl who rocked my world. I think about the wonders of the world. The seven ancient wonders and the seven modern wonders, and I think of the eighth wonder of the modern world—the Gibson smile. Its glow is as ancient as time, its warmth as old as the sun. I love you. I miss you. I want you. I need you. Please come home.
I kick a pebble on my daily stroll, listen to the ocean, consider how I drove our life together aground, dashing it against the awful sandbars of lust and the stones of apathy for what was so important to me. Tears form an ocean in my eyes to match the stormy seas that constantly wash up on this beach, ever remonstrating me for my crimes. I gather together the wreckage, turning over each piece again and again, ruminating on how to turn these ruined pieces of my life into a better, stronger ocean-going vessel so we might continue on our journey together once again.
This journey, this saga of the Gibsons—Adrienne and Josh—for me is an adventure tale, a love story for the ages, a love story I want to be without end. So I toil with the idea in mind of reconstructing our future so we might set sail toward the horizon once more. I dream of this every day, and it is my hope we will find our way back to one another and my fear you can never forgive my unspeakable breach of your trust. I fully accept the blame if we can no longer be. Please forgive me, my love. Please come home.
Napoleon left Elba, but never made it to Paris. Something about a man named Wellington at a place called Waterloo. Me, I’ve got to make it to Paris—that’s you.
Or put another way
I wish I could write love songs
With lyrics so inspired
They’d manage to explain
What joy your presence in my life brings
I wish I could write love songs
So often I’ve tried
Jotted down poetry
Beautiful verse
But they would not do
Somehow
They always fall short of my feelings for you
I wish I could write love songs
Typical of how I really care
Trumpeting out beautiful thoughts
Of how great life was with you here
One day I’ll write love songs
Sprinkled with many gentle remembrances
Thoughts and smiles
In consideration
And appreciation
Of how many times
I’ve been amazed
By the incredible happiness
You brought to my daze.
Tu es l’amour de ma vie.
Your modern Bonaparte
Josh[