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Note to self: always do what the cop tells you to do. When it comes to your security, that is. For instance, she’s suggested you install a Ring doorbell at the very least. Maybe today’s the day you make the move, bite the bullet, and purchase the home security system. You live alone on the farm. You have fans. Some of them might be crazy. Deranged. Who knows when they might show up at your front door?
But I’ve got writer’s block, and I can’t help but be curious about this woman who wants me to write and dedicate a book to her. That’s a big ask, but it takes a certain amount of nerve, or guts anyway to request it. Okay, so that means I’m about to do the wrong thing, and once more, engage with the stranger.
I stare at the smartphone screen and prepare to write a text. Anyone who’s over fifty knows all too well how it’s impossible to text fast or by using your thumbs. It means I’m relegated to texting using my index fingertips, grammatical mistakes, and typos be damned (thank God for spell check).
What’s your name? I text.
Naturally, I realize I’m playing right into the hands of this strange woman, which is exactly what the cop warned me against. Maybe I’m even encouraging her. But let’s just say I can’t help myself.
I wait, my pulse throbbing in my temples providing a suspenseful soundtrack, like 1970’s film, Jaws, maybe. That’s when I spot my breakfast sandwich and coffee still sitting on the coffee table. Grabbing my phone, I get up from the desk chair and carry the phone with me to the couch. The dry wood inside the iron wood stove cracks and hisses. The smell of the burning apple wood is pleasant. I take a bite out of the sandwich and down it with some of the coffee. My doctor warned me off egg sandwiches long ago because of a congenital heart condition that killed my old man when he was only 76. But then, if I make it to 76, I’ll consider it a victory, and something is gonna get you anyway. Am I right?
I’m stealing another bite of the sandwich when my phone chimes and vibrates once more. Picking up the phone, I anxiously open the text.
Jennifer, it reads.
I try and picture Jennifer. In my creative brain, I picture an attractive thirty or forty-something long, strawberry blond, with a chiseled face, and a killer, Gold’s gym body. Maybe she’ll be wearing a short dress over a red satin thing and a matching push-up bra. For footwear maybe leather gladiator sandals. I actually feel myself getting hard at the thought like I didn’t just fuck the cop less than a half hour ago. I’m known for my recuperative powers. They used to drive my ex-wife nuts. She wasn’t into sex like I was. Or perhaps she just didn’t enjoy the sex act with me. It could be she keeps her new man very happy in the hay.
How old are you Jennifer? I type.
I drink more coffee and decide it needs a sweetener. Getting up from the couch, I go to my desk, open the bottom desk drawer, and pull out the bottle of Jameson Irish whiskey that’s a third full. Uncapping it, I pull the plastic lid off the large coffee cup and pour a couple shots into it. Recapping the whiskey, I set the bottle on my desk beside my laptop and go back to my phone.
I eat more of my sandwich and await a reply. When it comes, I nearly drop the phone to the floor I’m so anxious to see it.
Why do you want to know?
I drink another sip of the whiskey-laced coffee. Already the alcohol is going to work on my bloodstream, making me feel less anxious about not being able to create words. It’s also making me more curious about my new friend.
“What’s the right answer to her question?” I whisper out loud. “It’s got to be something that sounds like it’s coming from a responsible adult. What if she’s only a teenager or even younger? What if she’s some star-struck kid?”
Inhaling and exhaling a breath, I type, I’m an adult male and I don’t want to be conversing with anyone underage. That would be wrong of me. It would also land me in jail and get me canceled by all the woke assholes.
Just for good measure, I add one of those annoying smiley-faced emoji thingies at the end of the text. I press send and wait. Drinking more coffee, I stare at my laptop. Every single day that I spend away from it, it feels more and more like my enemy. Like it’s about to transform itself into a living, breathing, creature and attempt to tear me apart limb from limb.
Another text comes through.
I’m in my forties. Would you like to see a photo?
Now I find that my breathing is growing shallow. With every text from this woman and with every one of my responses, I feel like I am digging a hole I might not be able to climb out of.
Note to self: I’ll say it again, do what the cop says. Don’t engage. But I can’t help myself sometimes. It’s a control issue the shrinks once told me. Rather, my lack of control. It will be the death of me, they said. I nodded in complete agreement. Who am I to argue with a shrink? Like I said, something is gonna get you sooner or later.
Sure, I respond.
Again, I wait, and again I drink more of the whiskey-laced coffee.
The phone chimes and vibrates.
I open the MMT or multi-media text.
It is indeed a photo of Jennifer. Or so I’ll have to assume. But it’s not a photo that shows her face. It is instead, a silhouette of a long-haired woman. Correction. A naked, long-haired woman.