Page 51 of A Very No Strings Halloween
“Should I read them like Lars?”
“You don’t have to. I mean. If you can. Like Lars when he was in his twenties? He didn’t have a strong Boston accent like yours. At least not when I knew him. He traveled a lot.”
“Oh, okay. So don’t sound as unbelievably sexy as I usually do. Got it. Good note.”
“He actually talked kind of like an old-timey movie hero. Just read it like an actor from a black-and-white movie, if you can do that.”
“I shall do my very best,” he says, combing his hair down with his fingers so it lays flatter on his head. It’s usually all wavy and kind of unruly. And he’s clean-shaven. Billy looks so different all of a sudden. I’m realizing he has the same coloring as Lars did when he was younger. He had a few black-and-white photos of himself with Lara around his condo, but I didn’t spend much time looking at them.
We place our fingers on the planchette. I tell myselfnotto manipulate it, as if that will do anything. Clearing my throat, I say, “Good afternoon… We invite Lara to communicate with us… Lara Olander…are you here?”
I barely get the chance to inhale before the room temperature drops and the planchette moves toYes.
“Okay. Hello again. I’ve brought the letters from Lars.”
The planchette moves jerkily toR-E-A-D.
“Yes. We’re going to read the letters to you.”
Billy looks up at me, and I nod at him to go ahead.
He opens up the wooden box and takes out the stack of letters, in their envelopes. “Okay, we’ll just start with this one, I guess.” He unfolds a piece of note paper. “‘My darling,’” Billy reads, without the Boston accent. “‘My scarlet spitfire.’” His eyebrows raise, and he makes a guttural sound of approval.
I roll my eyes.
“‘My Lara, it has been twenty-seven hours since we said our goodbyes at the train station in Virginia. I am back in my home state, but it no longer feels like my home without you here. I have written you five other letters. Three of them were unreadable because I was so frantic to get the words out. Two of them were inappropriate, but very honest ramblings of what I long to do with you. I have been pacing about my flat, thinking of you. Your scent, which still lingers on my fingers and my coat. Your flaming-red hair and alabaster skin. The way your blue eyes dance with deviousness and desire when you smile at me. Theway your lips taunt me with flirtatious words and kisses. That mouth, that mouth… Your mouth will be the death of me, my sweet devil woman.
I am losing my mind here without you. This is the cruelest separation I have ever known. I must return to you, Lara. You are too far away. I can no longer conceive of a life without you in it. Come to me, or I shall come to you. How can we be together? Lara, Lara, Lara. There is only one other four-letter word that means so many different things to me, and it also makes me think of you and what I want to do to you.
I cannot believe your parents refuse to get a telephone.
Write me back immediately.
I demand a response.
I’ll be thinking of you, always, as I go about my business here. I will not come to you until I get word, tormentor of my mind and heart and soul and flesh. Do not torment me for sport. Your claws are in me, but I will not play this game forever.
Yours, yours, yours,
Lars.’”
Well, shit.
I can see why Lara was missing those words.
I had forgotten that my fingers are still on the planchette until it slides across the board to theM. To theO. To theR. And totheE.
“More,” I say to Billy.
“Comin’ right up,” he says, as if he’s mixing drinks at that bar. He reads another short letter, one that obviously came after that first one he read, chronologically. She obviously wrote him back, he went back to see her, and her mouth did another number on him. But she sounds very sweet too. She was probably just young and only knew how to tease men.
As soon as Billy’s done reading, the planchette spells outMOREagain.
Billy unfolds another letter. “‘My darling Lara, my love is building a house for you. It sounds like a line from a poem, but it is simply the truth of what I am doing. For you. For us. If you will have me now and forever, dear Lara, we will live together in this house. We will harvest cranberries and have chickens and goats. We will fill this house with children and love. Please, Lara. Come to me in Middleborough. Let me take care of you. I have rented a small old house in town, and we can live there until this new house is complete. I will come to Virginia again to ask your father for your hand next week if I hear from you. Please. I need to hear from you soon. Your devoted lover, admirer of your mind, and slave to your delightful moods, Lars.’”
Well. I don’t think Lara ismakingme swoon. She doesn’t have to. Lars wrote some damn fine love letters. And Billy is doing a damn fine job of reading them. A little too damn fine. I’mstarting to get a little lightheaded. Or heavy headed? My head feels light and it’s like my blood feels all fizzy or something, but the air feels heavy all around me.
Did I forget to eat today?
