The Love Letters: A Novella

by Ashley Pullo

  Claire’s chest starts to flail. Oh, fuck! I did something to hurt her. But as her breathing steadies, she smiles and taps her hand against the rail. I place my hand on top of her frail fingers as she mumbles a few words—

  “Il t’adore. Sa femme, Natalie.” Claire quiets to silence, and the only noise is the pressure of the oxygen tank filtering in clean air. Her eyes close, but her chest is still inflating. Goosebumps invade my skin while I contemplate holding a mirror under her nose.

  “Natalie? Are you ready to go?” Zach asks. “You did a great job. She’s happily resting.” I release Claire’s hand and join him. He leans over and kisses her delicate hand. And then, whispering at a volume I, too, can hear, Zach says, “La vie est un interlude au salut.”

  Life is an interlude to salvation.

  On the train ride back to Manhattan, I snuggle into Zach and think about the peculiarity of what I witnessed. Claire speaks French. Zach speaks French. And I still don’t know what’s going on.

  “Claire said you love me,” I blurt.

  “She’s on morphine.” Zach smiles playfully so I jab him in the stomach.

  “Be serious for one fucking second! Stop patronizing me. Stop protecting me. Stop giving me things to distract me. Stop making me assume you’re full of secrets.” I cross my arms and remain firm. He cannot actually think he’s the one saving me.

  “Natalie, have you ever wanted something so badly that you would sacrifice a life in order to save one?” He yanks my hand from my chest and pulls it close to his heart. “Can you feel what you do to me? You’re my pleasure from the pain, my distraction from the voyage and the best friend I will ever have.”

  I mumble and shake my head, “I don’t—”

  “That day we met on the train, I wasn’t visiting my mom or taking her to a treatment, I was getting my things in order. I went to see my physician, update my passport and take care of my trust with the family attorney.”

  “Oh God, no! Are you sick? What’s happening?” I cover my mouth, gasping in fear.

  “I’m not sick. I’m a Marine.” He strokes my hair and kisses my forehead. “I’m leaving for duty. Tomorrow.”

  “What?” My blood-curdling scream echoes through the train car. Every passenger stares in our direction, wondering what could be so horribly wrong between two young lovers. “No! No, you cannot leave me. Absolutely not. What about your family? What about me?”

  “This was decided long before I met you. Nat, I didn’t realize I would fall so deeply in love with you. But I need you to be okay with this, Natalie, please. Those fuckers terrorized our lives, but I refuse to let them take our dreams.”

  “You’re wrong, so wrong. I’m selfish! I’m a selfish, selfish baby and I need you here. I’m not built like you, Zach. I have no honor, please Zach, stay with me, be with me.” My sobbing and hyperventilating muffle my plea, but it doesn’t matter.

  Zach is leaving tomorrow. So that a girl he barely knows but wants to love, can drink Diet Snapple and interview for high-paying jobs and sleep with as many men as she wants and buy expensive shoes and say Shit and Fuck whenever she wants and watch crappy television and search for fucking camels to rent for a desert-inspired party. Irony is a bitch.

  October 24, 2002

  It’s a gorgeous October day in the city that I love. The leaves are changing to copper, and everything smells like an apple orchard – except the subway grates and the dirty water hotdog cart. Autumn fashion is probably my favorite because I look fantastic in jewel tones and boots. My job is enjoyable, all things considered, and I even pulled off that desert party for The Russell family. Molly and Mr. Ross are officially a “shield your eyes” item, and she’s slowly scaling back on her event commitments, leaving me with plenty to fuck up.

  Zach has spent the past month in training somewhere in Germany. Soon, he’ll be dropped front and center and stationed somewhere in Afghanistan. I’ve always hated geography, but now I spend my evenings at my parent’s house looking at maps of the Middle East and watching the news with Dad. I hate geography even more.

  After my Metro North meltdown, Zach and I spent the entire night in each other’s arms, talking and laughing . . . ignoring the pain. I shaved his sandy locks to a military-approved buzz cut while we planned for nothing and everything, but promising to never say goodbye. And as the sun was rising, we made love one last time, honest and real. It was all so perfect . . . I wondered if I imagined him – like a little prince that fell from the sky in search of a friend.

  Arriving at the office late, the UPS guy meets me at the door with a small package and annoyed frown. Noticing the Deutschland stamp, I quickly sign the clipboard and then rip open the box. Inside is a single key – I know exactly where to go!

  I run down the six flights of stairs and out onto the street. I’m booking it down Broadway and leaping over anything in my way. Zach said he would get a short leave, and he’s here! I shove past some tourists and work my boots like Nancy Sinatra . . . I’m almost there.

  Out of breath and flushed, I take the elevator to the fifth floor and nearly attack the door to 5G. My hands are shaking, but I manage to finagle the key into the hole. Hurried and excited, I swing open the door to find . . .

  Nothing.

  Not one piece of furniture. Not one tack left on the wall. No Zach. Nothing.

  I walk to the middle of what used to be the living room and stomp my feet. I jump up and down and scream and curse, and then throw the fucking key at the window.

  Fuck! Shit! No!

  And then I see it, Le Petit Prince, resting on the kitchen counter. It’s calling my name, so I go to it – that stupid book I will never fully understand. I open the cover and run my fingers over his handwritten addition to the title page.

  La vie est un interlude au salut.

  ~Zacharie Pascale Parker

  There’s also a note.

  Ma femme,

  First of all, stop carrying on and be quiet. The walls are thin, and I can’t have the neighbors thinking the new resident in 5G is an emotionally-disturbed crazy lady. That’s right – the apartment is yours. The lease was transferred to your name and the rent has been paid until 2004. All my stuff is in storage; ask Wayne (the doorman) for the key, and then help yourself to anything you want.

  Secondly, I bet your tits look great in tight sweaters. Oh yeah, I promise not to bore you with long letters from the battlefront. From what I hear, times can get pretty bleak, and there’s no sense in documenting that kind of shit. However, I can receive mail, and I expect full-frontal pictures at least twice a week.

  I leave Germany early November and fly straight to Kabul, Afghanistan. If you’re a very naughty girl, maybe I’ll surprise you in December. I won’t know the exact date or how long I have to visit until the day I board the plane, but I promise to fuck you nonstop for x amount of days sometime during the month of December.

  One last thing. You should really read this book.

  xx Zach

  2002-12-15

  New York City

  Operation Eggnog

  1900 hours

  The mission is simple: retreat into the darkness and then attack.

  The extensive training back at Camp Lejeune prepared me for every type of combat. However, what my training officer failed to mention was how difficult it would be to keep quiet and focused during my first mission. I’m anxious and a little nervous, but I’m also smiling like a dumbass.

  Shivering in the corner, I try to perfect a realistic smoke stack with my hot breath. My training officer would be impressed right now. Good ol’ Captain Blowhole . . . he was always yelling at me for being too tall and goofy and relied heavily on nonsensical name-calling like: sausage gobbler, pencil dick, fanny fucker, and my personal favorite, homo-retard. How could I not laugh? But I bet that pompous prick would commend the stealth-like tactics that I pulled off tonight. Sneaking in here without being detected by any guards or civilians – maybe Lt. Pussy Parker would be more of an asset doing covert ope
rations instead of reorganizing the unit’s pharmaceutical distribution with the Navy geeks.

  Operation Freedom is an entirely separate war from my fucking assignment – I like to call it: The War on Drug Dispensing. I’ll be stuck in Kabul at Camp Hammond for another five weeks taking inventory, labeling, administering placebos, implementing a complete computer overhaul while wearing a fucking lab coat – exactly like the one I vowed never to wear again. Eventually I’ll be moved to Tora Bora to defend the Afghani mountainfolk from the Taliban fuckers, which I hear entails a lot of goat-herding. But being a part of the Marine Corps, no matter what my task, is an honor and a job I take very seriously.

  Shit. Someone’s coming.

  I bunker down among the shadowy confines of silence and control my rapid breathing. Adrenaline is such an intense rush, but I’ve waited too long for this precise moment to screw it up now. Keep quiet. Be still. And don’t knock over the stack of DVDs.

  Booted footsteps tap against the wood floor.

  A key jiggles in the door.

  The door swings open, announcing the target of my mission. Her foul mouth ejects her go-to sentiments, rousing my attention and forcing me to swallow back my laughter.

  “Fucking shit. Fucking cold,” she mumbles.

  I rise from the corner, excited that my mark will be easy to overtake. She punches the light switch, illuminating a string of white Christmas lights dangling from the mantle. I smile, comforted by how warm she makes me feel.

  I reach out my arms and calmly say, “Hey, Natalie.”

  Before I can give her the embrace I’ve been dreaming of, her large purse swats me in the head. And in the arm. And damn, she’s a lot stronger than I thought. She squeezes her eyes closed as she digs inside her bag, her hands trembling, a raspy cough taking over her body like a spastic maniac, and her legs firmly planted in some sort of girly defensive stance.

  “Ma femme, put down the weapons.” I hold my hands up to surrender (I am half-French after all) and she instantly opens her gorgeous blue eyes. That suspended moment of recognition and longing is better than any television reunion because a) she’s fucking hot, and b) she’s my fucking hot piece of ass.

  Tears cascade down her rosy cheeks from what I hope is a sign of happiness – or maybe she’s pissed I surprised her? Thankfully, she drops her bag and throws herself on me. I hold her tightly, bringing her legs around my waist to spin around the foyer of my former apartment, knocking over a few picture frames and an empty wine bottle.

  “Motherfucker! You scared the shit out of me – I was prepared to chop off your balls with my nail clippers,” she says in a deep, dry voice. Natalie coughs into my shoulder as I caress her back. She feels so warm and natural in my arms that my temporary leave may result in permanent desertion.

  “What’s with the cough, Nat – are you smoking again?” I ask as I lower her legs to the ground.

  “I don’t smoke! It’s called a cold, ya jerk. Besides, my voice is,” cough, “super sexy, n’est ce pas?”

  “Mmm, very,” I tease while rubbing her ass and moving us toward the bedroom. I have exactly forty-four hours before I report back to duty, and I plan to spend most of that time screwing her brains out – and possibly a quick stop at Virgil’s for some brisket. That’s all I need for the rest of my life – Natalie, Virgil’s, the Giants and beer. Shit, I also need my Playstation 2 and the Die Hard movies, and then I’m golden for the rest of my life.

  Natalie painfully coughs into my armpit, and although I know it’s nothing serious, she’s making me uncomfortable.

  “I’m so sorry Zach. I look and feel horrible,” she apologizes. I kiss her forehead and squeeze her tightly.

  When we reach the bedroom, I gently move her toward an iron bed – damn, that would have been fun to explore with some light bondage – I sit her down and lower to my knees. She blinks slowly with red, swollen eyes, but there’s also a glimmer of lustful sexuality. Typical Natalie, always the tease – even with phlegm and irritated nostrils. That’s it, it’s decided – I need to take care of her so she can take care of me.

  I remove her boots and ugly wool socks and help her into her flannel pajamas. “Natalie, why is it so cold in here?” I ask, draping the comforter over her weary body.

  Cough, hack, choke. “I don’t know how to work the thingy,” she whines. Jesus, she’s been going to bed in the cold every night because she’s too stubborn to ask anyone about the thermostat – tenacious seductress, that’s what she is.

  “What am I going to do with you?”

  “Don’t leave me,” she begs.

  I lean over to kiss her cheek but her arms wrap around my neck so tightly that I lose my balance and land on her delicate chest. She flinches in pain and pushes me off. “Nat, let me get you some medicine. I’m going to Duane Reade – I’ll be back in twenty minutes.” I take her hands and place them by her side. She closes her eyes and snuggles under the top layer of the bedding.

  “Zach, I need some pistachio ice cream. And your cock.” Natalie smiles without opening her eyes.

  2300 hours

  Natalie is snoring loudly in my arms. After I fed her two bowls of ice cream alongside my special blend of Vitamins B, C and Nyquil, we cuddled on the couch to watch A Christmas Story. She barely made it to the Fra-gi-lee scene before her eyes closed and she was drooling on my neck. Fuck – it’s going to be impossible to leave her.

  I turn off the television and carefully stand without waking her. She looks miserable on the small sofa, so I scoop her into my arms and carry her to the bedroom. Natalie’s eyes flutter open and a sly smile invades her peaceful face.

  “You’re so strong,” she purrs.

  “You’re so beautiful,” I respond.

  I place her on her feet and rest my hand on her cheek. It’s not as flushed as before and she hasn’t coughed in over an hour. She moves her hands to my wrist and peels my palm off her flesh, taking her time to kiss the inside crease of my thumb. Her supple lips glide along each of my fingers until she lingers on the middle one, sucking it slowly . . . “Natalie, I—”

  “Shh . . .” she whispers as she moves her hands to my chest.

  Natalie lifts my t-shirt over my head and tosses it to the floor. She kisses my chest, licks my nipples and bites my ribs, making me shrill like a ticklish little girl. I unbutton her pajama top (the one with the tiny bulldogs) and run my hands underneath the warm flannel to massage her tits. Fuck – I love her nipples. Women think that men love boobs no matter what, like we get horny just by the cover of National Geographic or paintings of naked women, but perfect breasts? Natalie broke the mold.

  I run my finger over her hard nipples while raising my eyebrows like Groucho Marx. She smiles devilishly and reciprocates. We’re both rubbing and tweaking each other’s nipples like blind people discovering a new object. “Ow, shit that hurts, Nat,” I say, pinching as hard as I can. She’s so fucking feisty and I love it.

  A police siren wails on the street below, reminding me that time is in fact real outside this room. But I will never get enough of her, and it’s my job to make sure that inside this room, time doesn’t exist.

  I lower my sweatpants in one swift tug to reveal the giant impact her naked body has on me – Nat salutes my crotch and curtsies. “Stand down, soldier,” she teases. “I’m a Marine, not a soldier,” I state, while taking a fistful of her hair in my other hand and yanking gently. She exhales in pleasure and mumbles something inaudible. “Shh,” I demand.

  I slowly drop to my knees, kissing every inch of her body on my way down. My tongue skims the outside of her panties, trailing along the contour of her delicate pink lips. I squeeze her hips and then with one quick tug, I rip them off – sexy, red lace, an image that will be stored in my spank bank for future use.

  “Oh, Zach,” she moans as my tongue glides between her thighs, devouring every drop of sweetness. Her body trembles in pleasure – but I’ve never made her come this quickly! I glance up to find her laughing hysterically. Sometimes
cold medicine can make a person delirious, but she’s clearly amused by something. I pinch the maple leaf tattoo on her hip and bite her stomach. She snorts so loudly that I’m forced to stand to confront her awkward outburst.

  “What the hell, Nat?” I ask sweetly.

  “I’m so sorry! I was thinking about when Ralphie gets his decoder pen . . . ‘A crummy commercial? Son of a bitch.’ That part cracks me up every time – and it reminds me of the time Chloe and I saved like a million Coke tabs to send away for neon pink legwarmers – we each got one.” Natalie’s boobs bounce in excitement, and if I don’t shut her up now, she will continue with another thirty minutes of random conversation.

  “Shut up, Nat.” I say with authority. I’m a goddamn officer in the United States Marine Corps, and it’s time to fuck my woman.

  I kiss her, my tongue tracing the corner of her mouth. She tastes like peppermint and citrus, and I want nothing more than to consume her completely. My arms tighten around her waist, forcing her hard nipples to scrape against my chest. I grab her ass and squeeze with as much force as I know she can handle. My cock rubs against her thighs – and it’s that one little gesture of intimate contact that takes our relationship from friends to fuckers in about two seconds.

  She kisses me back and grabs onto to my shoulders for support. I lift her onto my hips and move her against the wall. Her legs fold around me as she arches her back and moans. Natalie likes to be taken . . . most strong women do.

  “Oh, Zach. This is so much better than chat room sex,” she says between short breaths. Her tongue moves up and down my neck as her hands clench my shoulders. I place one hand behind the small of her back and the other above her head for support. Natalie tightens her legs around my waist and uses all her muscles to slide around my shaft. God, she feels warm and amazing and with each thrust she molds around my flesh. Her delicate movement coupled with my steady impalement is – just – enough – to – fucking oorah!

  “Oh shit, Nat, oh yes, ah, uh . . . uh,” I groan.