Letter to a Lost Love

By Alyce Wilson

She tapped her pen on the stationery, struggling for words. Used to e-mail, writing by hand felt strange.

His freckled face had been pained when they'd said good-bye, so long ago. Their friendship might have bloomed into romance if he hadn't been so shy or if her career plans hadn't changed and she hadn't transferred schools.

Mutual friends had kept her informed. He'd grown long hair, a beard, dropped out to follow his favorite band. He became, as his favorite songwriter would say, a rolling stone.

As her failed loves came and left, he'd grown sweeter, gentler, funnier in her memory. Occasionally, she searched fruitlessly on the Internet for a way to contact him.

"I have an address now," she said to herself, wryly, and glanced again at the top of the page where she'd written it: "Cutler County Jail, 140 Main Street." Arrested for selling acid at a concert, his sentence had been harsh: eight years to life. A friend had let her know.

"I'm sorry," she wrote, and bit her pen as she stared out the window of her quiet suburban apartment, "to hear what happened. But if you want me to, I'd like to visit."