Dear Charlie,

I've been going to your grave every week, I hope you like the flowers. I always get the ones you kept in the backroom. The blue ones. Each florist calls them something different, but I just describe them like you did.

I haven't told Check, Laurice or Glenn where I've gone, I figure they'll start getting worried. I tend to visit you more often when I'm worried about something, but I'm not concerned about anything worth as much as it was before. I can't be doing that.

I still miss you every single goddamn day is all.

Madison

I got your letter. Yes, I was in Lofton, but I couldn't stay.
Da, I'll visit soon to help you with the house.
Ma, please let it go.


Madison.

Elison,

Ma is sending a trunk of our things out from the West. I'll collect them from the waystation in Ridge, so see her before Thursday if you want to add anything.

Trust that the days are treating you well.


M

Dearest Glenn, the deserter, the forsaker, the bastard.

I relish writing these words. Is that petty, or is it worse on the scales, to threaten a good friend with what you'll not fulfil? Maybe you can answer that tonight, if you're not sticking a gun in my face.

I'll meet you there there and not a second later.


I must say this, that I am getting to the hoping that you might come unarmed. Wright discloses little, and your words to me at the Shoppe even less. I wonder why you want to write the story this way.

It's a bigger man who can greet his friend with a gun that he means to shoot. Unless, of course, you're scared of not being able to pull the trigger.

You walk in circles, round and round.


Without affection,

M

Ho Miss Madison Rye,

I'm due for Rhy'Din in the next six moons. I'm delivering the trunk Elison arranged from the way-point at Ridge.

If you will be wanting anything taken back, have ready so I can collect.

Elison sends his regards.

Mabel sat back in the squeaking chair and licked her fingertips, which she pinched around the flame on the wick that sat beside the ledger. Her eyes blinked at the sudden darkness and she rose, nudging the chair back with a heel. Around her, the room was fragrant with smoke and the richness of the ink she procured for her telegraphs.

"You done it yet?"

A gasp, she turned and looked towards the chesterfield in the far corner. A match illuminated the swelling dark, and the pony-tailed man who sat there. His hair was bleached with sun and a beard obscured half his face. But she could see he was smiling. She smiled as the smell of his tobacco reached her, and walked over. She was a small woman over-dressed in men's clothing. Thin hand-me-down denim, and an old kerchief at her throat. The elkskins were the only thing that fit her well. The hat was absent, dangling from its hook by the door. Ash-blonde hair tumbled carelessly down over her shoulders in broken braids. The day had been long, and most of the plait was undone.

"I just finished. When you sneak in?"

She moved to plant herself on a corner of the sturdy, low coffee table that settled the distance between seats. Her hands clasped on one knee.

"Been here the whole time. Waiting to see if you would see me."

He smoked leisurely, teasing her with the scent and the smile still loaded on that incorrigible face. Soap, dust, tobacco. She glanced to the window, and the passing people outside on the dirty street. "Lost my edge."

He sat forward then and tilted his head at her, his eyes keen. He traced her profile as he had a million times before. Even in the absence of light she shone. She kept some to herself, in her smile, and the way some women radiate. Something that isn't beauty, but implores with their sheer nature, and confidence in who they were. Nothing to prove, nothing to sell. Before seeking her touch, he'd admired her carriage, the disposition. Something that you can only feel. It went beyond the skin with Birdy.

Watching her in his quiet marvel, he wondered why he hadn't seen it when he first met her. He supposed, his head had been full of Madison still. The Madison he knew, and the one he'd come to know - the one so far removed from his tutor in a white-paint peeling house in old Loftontown.


His torch for Birdy had been slow to grow, but was unwavering. Even when things got tense and frustrating as was the way of the business, even when they were at odds with their approach, that flame burned strong, and still, and didn't flicker with the wind. It was a match he cupped in his hand, protected from the world. She was facing him again, and he took a while to come back to focus on her face in full. Funny how memory went. Pulled you down and made you relive the world.


"I'm wanting to keep us to us." He announced it softly, though his eyes and manner were firm. The statement held question.

"I did figure it. Much to be done with known affection. Rather we hide it for as long as we can."

He smiled, his face bright despite the sun-ruddied features, the beard, the chipped stone eyes. "I'm pleased." He frowned at the thought of anything interfering in what they shared, though taken time to bloom, being threatened before having a real chance to begin.


They rose there, at the same time, and walked into one another. A tight embrace. Fingers clenching shirts. A brush of whiskers to her brow, and a quick inhale of the soap, dust and tobacco. Together, they walked out into the night. Mabel idled only to lock the door with a twist and push of a thick, brass key. Side by side they moved, between them secret warmth, a sly and knowing glance, the invisible flame.. and they parted for separate ways for their errands in the dusk. Not a soul nearby to know better.