Dear Alice,
I remember you once told me to slow down. Usually when I do, it is by coincidence though. Yesterday it wasn’t so much slowing down as getting knocked the fuck out.
As the café was closing on a cold autumn night, a group of teens began hurling bricks at the neighbors. Not many bricks, just enough to raise the dust from the agonized cobblestones and encourage the bartender to try and lock the joint up quickly. We watched like fish and learned that there are palm trees in Ireland and a less than temperate violence in Brussels that simply appears to have found its way home. What went around has returned as senseless as a red rubber ball.
I moved to close the front door and a brick caught me in the belly stealing my wind. I gasped and on cue, another clocked me just above the eye and my body crumbled into a waiting chair. A crack to the head is not unlike falling in love so much as it only takes a minute for everything to change. She knelt beside me, held my hand and smiled as if she wasn’t worried about a thing. That this communication comes so easily, almost effortlessly, is for once important. Effortless is important.
Have you ever seen a two-headed dragon? Do you believe in things that fly? I am a man born of two legs, take my hand and watch me try.
I’ve got no blues to pin on you girl. There’s aspirin under the pillow.
See you soon. Keep some bourbon in the closet for me.
H. Beagle
