The Letter - Epilogue #2
DI Richard Poole, Chief of Police, bulwark against all things dark and sinister on this benighted tropical isle, sits stiffly at his home desk, staring out the nearest window with a mulish look on his face and his pen in his hand.
Homework, he thinks, at MY age! Oh, why did I say I'd do it? Just because Camille is pissed I wrote a letter to a married woman is no reason for her to badger me so hotly into agreeing to write her a letter too. But she did, and I did, but just to get her off my case not because I actually have anything I need to tell her in a letter than I can't say to her face…
His gaze down to the thick luxy writing paper he'd found in the sideboard drawer while cleaning one day. He runs his fingertips over it. Smooth. Silky. Rich. An image of dark skin surfaces briefly then is shoved strenuously back down into his subconscious as he sits up alertly, flexes his writing hand, and puts pen to paper. Soonest begun, soonest done.
'Camille:' he writes in perfect mellifluous penmanship, 'How are you? I am fine.' He pauses here, reads it over, then bends back to his task with a slightly stroppy glint in his eye. 'Well, I'm fine other than being forced to write this ludicrous letter to someone I see almost every day at work and if we miss each other there we certainly run into each other at your mother's establishment or you show up on my beach so I simply do not...'
The phone rings. He lays down his pen, picks up his cell, stares at the caller ID, huffs a huffy huff, hits 'receive' and growls, "What?!"
Camille's voice pours into his ear like molten chocolate, "Are you writing my letter?"
He frowns massively and crosses his arms tightly, "Yes."
"How many words have you got so far?"
"Um..."
"How much of it is a put-upon rant?"
"Um..."
"Have you written anything nice to me yet?"
"Um..."
"You'd better write something nice about me right now or I'm coming over there and..."
"Yes! Yes! I'm writing something nice right now!" he babbles, writing 'You are very nice,' in a desperate scribble.
"Did you just write 'you are very nice'?"
He sits up hurriedly, darting glances at his windows and doors, "No! I mean, yes! I mean, no, I have more sense than that!"
"You'd better. Tell me about the moon light and how it looks on the sea right now." He starts taking notes... "How it makes my hair shine, my eyes sparkle, my skin…"
His pen moves on its own as his eyes go a bit hazy and he whispers, "… smooth… silky… rich…"
"What did you say?"
He comes to with a jerk, "Nothing, nothing at all. Look, it's getting late and I'd like to get some sleep tonight so I'm going to hang up and finish this letter and I'll see you at the station in the morning, good night." He hangs up speedily and sits for a long time staring out that window.
Finally, he stirs and begins to write and recite, "The moon is a celestial body orbiting the Earth at a distance of 384,000 kilometres. It takes 1.3 seconds for moonlight to reach is in order for it to reflect off the ocean outside my door and, indeed, all oceans everywhere." He sighs happily and continues on in this vein for several minutes before relaxing and muttering, "There, all done." He folds the letter into an envelope, writes 'Camille' on the front, and goes to bed a mistakenly happy man.
Next day
He mounts the steps, envelope in hand, wondering how to deliver it without the other officers noticing when he sees her waiting at the top of the steps. Good, a bit of privacy is needed. When he reaches her, she puts a finger to her lips and draws him down to the far end of the veranda to the bench there. As he sits, he nods. Better, this is the most private spot he could hope for at work. He holds up his envelope but she beats him to the punch as she holds up an envelope of her own.
"What's this?" he grumps, "I thought I was writing the letter?"
She nods, "Well, yes, you were, but I imagine you made a hash of it, didn't you?" She waves away his indignant reaction before he can speak, "But that's no matter, I got a letter from Mrs. Foster and she says not to feel slighted because you wrote to her."
His eyebrows lift, "She did? Why would she do that?"
Camille smiles small and presses the envelope to her chest, which makes him gulp a bit, before she whispers, "Because she tells me something I really needed to hear, to believe, to…"
He's frowning now, a bit lost, "To… what?"
She raises sparkling eyes. There's no moonlight he has time to think before she says, "To have." At his worried look, she adds, "She tells me not to lose hope but to take firm action and stop wasting time since Time waits for no man... or woman."
He peers from her envelope to his envelope and back again, "Firm action? What kind of…"
Her arms slip around him and her lips press to his and she steals his breath as his arms go around her and he sits up to draw her in tight against himself…
… and his letter is dropped onto the veranda floor and kicked under the bench where it will be picked up later and shredded by a now very correctly happy man.
END
