Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2: PS, I LOVE EWE
9/8/11

Darla Lovhay hadn't seen a man naked
Since 1995.

All that was about to change: David Hagg was courting her.

The proof was all over the rec-room floor; months', and months' worth of letters to/from her beau coated the faux-Persian rug. She'd met this one on a trip to Bombay; they'd hit it off over a talk about penpals. After swapping their addresses, and initial tentative greetings, they'd spent months corresponding, blossoming in to bosom buddies. And, possibly more...

It'd started about 4 months ago, the actual romance part. David was quite the little sweet-talker, always a beautiful phrase at the tip of his pen – he wrote with a fountain pen, and insisted that she wrote longhand, as well. His letters dripped with flowery, verbose flattery. At first, she'd thought it cheesy, but essentially grew to join the mood; of course, she spent hours poring over sentences – he probably wrote the whole letter in about an hour.

They hadn't branched in to phone calls much; the idea of paying the long-distance bill for 4-hour/4 AM calls seemed implausible for either of them. Darla rarely used the landline at home – Callista was constantly tying up the line with some chatty bullshit with her friends. Her cellphone wasn't equipped for anything more advanced than grainy pictures; she hadn't upgraded to the latest Ipad doo-hickey. The internet seemed like more of an option, except that all they did there was email pictures to each other – but, really, they both preferred mailing each other real prints.

David was a photographer. They had plans for photoshoots, when he came back to Canada. Right now, he was somewhere in Eastern Europe. She mailed her letters to an address in England, for a while; he'd lived there for a while, post-Bombay. At the moment, there wasn't a fixed address for her to mail things to; her only contact with him for the past 6 weeks had been the odd postcard from him. She was expecting 2-3 mid-sized glossy prints from wherever he was. Her bedroom was filled with framed prints, all taken from the interesting places David wandered to.

Was it love? Possibly. It was hard to say; they'd only met in person for about a week. She loved the feeling she got, from reading his 12-page love letters. Were they love letters? Did they ever write, 'love' to one another? She couldn't remember; all she knew was that the tone of the sentiments were loving, and sweet.

Darla shot a glance at the hallway, from her perch on the couch. It was getting late, and Callista was still out. She sighed; at least Todd and Nadine were easy – they were much, much easier children to deal with than Callie. Callie had a habit of sneaking out, all hours, to see boys, and that silly Zane kid from next door. She knew from experience that Callista would study, when she felt like it; she would work, when she wanted.

In one pile, she had all of the little regular-sized photographs. The one closest to the top was one of a sheep; it stood atop a craggy cliff, caught with its shaggy head uplifted towards the pre-sun dawn. She wished that David had sent her a bigger one of that one. There was something uplifting about that noble little fluffball.

She toed a pile of decorated envelopes. Sifting, she uncovered one with small inked doodles of plantlife from somewhere exotic. She stared at it, spacing out.