Surviving Valencia Read Online Free Page A

unexplained on her locker, and I, as another one of her loyal fans, had stuck it to my window where it stayed for years, hence the confusion.) Now and then, my dad would come outside and tell Dougie that he didn’t need to mow our lawn, that we mowed our own lawn, that we had a perfectly good lawn mower, and would he please leave. But a week later he would be back, as if the conversation had never happened. Pulling up on his Cub Cadet, a wagon of clippers and trimmers behind it, tank top with the big number five on it… Dougie the Lawn Boy was relentless.
    We won the Hudson Lawn of the Year award in 1984, 1985, and 1986. No joke.

Chapter 6
     
    A little over two months ago a letter came for Adrian. There was no return address but I instantly recognized it as trouble. First of all, the address was typed, apparently on an actual typewriter, considering that there was an extra letter n added to his name and then struck out with slash mark. Postmarked from Minneapolis. It seemed like the kind of letter that Anthrax would arrive in. Now that Adrian was becoming famous, things were getting trickier. Women he dated once fifteen years ago found excuses to run into him at the Circle K.
    He was in Atlanta for the day, meeting with someone about something (trust me, I have since learned to pay better attention), and as I sorted through the mail I separated this piece out and laid it aside in its own pile. This initial step looked innocent enough: bills, magazines, junk mail, letters to ponder over. That old instinct I associated with Valencia’s dressing table took over. What is it about stalking that is as primal and intuitive as the desire to eat, or sleep, or come?
    I held the letter up to the window, but of course that didn’t work.
    Adrian and I operated our relationship on a level of trust and maturity I had never expected from any union I would be a part of. I could have just asked him what it was when he got home. Instead, I went into the laundry room and found a clothes steamer beneath a pile of linen napkins from a dinner party we had hosted several months back. I still don’t know what made me do this. I especially should know about turning points and the way one day, one moment, can completely change the direction something is going. A steamer can open an envelope and unravel all the trust that two people have spent years building. But if I sealed it back up, and set it back with the unopened mail, only I would ever know. Didn’t I make decisions like this all the time? Paying a little extra on our mortgage when I did the bills, for the good of both of us. Replacing dishtowels once they became stained. Shaving my legs as an expression of goodwill. I reasoned it was all part of being a woman and keeping our life running smoothly. A little practice for motherhood maybe.
    Opening an envelope with a steamer doesn’t work. The steamer spit water all over the envelope, drenching it and making the address bleed like a watercolor painting. I was defeated going into it. Screw it , I decided, and tore the envelope open. We’ll just say whatever this is got lost in the mail. That has to happen sometimes, right?
    Inside was a piece of notebook paper, fringed edges and pale blue lines. The sheet of paper was blank and was folded loosely around some photographs. I saw the back of them first. Food for thought was scrawled in black ink tilted nearly sideways to the right. Scary man handwriting, I decided.
    From within the sheet slid a picture of my husband, wearing the shirt I had bought him just two weeks before for Christmas. He was uncomfortably close to a woman I did not recognize. The next photo was nearly the same. In neither were they kissing, or actually even touching. It could have been anyone, any situation. I tried to decipher where they were but could not recognize any of the buildings in the background.
    The pictures were grainy and blurry, as if they had been taken with a crappy phone or some really old digital camera.