Dear Kristina

November 1, 2005

Dear Kristina,

I'm starting my new life now. Your mother and her brilliant idea led me to a place that I never thought I'd see again. I never felt so alone. Or maybe I have. All I know is that place often reminded me of what I never wanted to become. But it seems that it became even bigger than me.

Sonny notices Alexis' shadow creep over him. He yanks the letter from the pad and folds it into the smallest form possible.

"What are you writing?" She inquires intrigued by his nervous folding.

"A list. Mommy Cass' house is falling apart all of a sudden."

"Sonny, you know what you should do? You should ya know charge Mrs. Cassarelli for your services."

Sonny thinks for a moment. "Charge? But she gives me meatballs. You're not gonna find a better meatball in Brooklyn. Besides. My momma raised me better than that."

Alexis sighs and throws her head back for a moment. "Sonny. This is the new millennium. You can't barter with meatballs."

"I'm just saying Alexis. It's a neighborly act. I can't roll up in her house all like 'pay me'. She'll just get Johnny down the street to do it for free. See I shoulda been a labor attorney." Sonny taps his temple beaming at his cognitive skills.

"Ok. Let me motivate you for a moment. You're not living here. Ever. So get a job!"

"I have figured out the job for you!" Lois screeches and flips through the sports section of the newspaper disrupting Sonny's quiet meditation over his soup.

""What's that?" Sonny looks over her paper for a clue of her idea.

She throws the paper down and moves in closer to him across the diner table. "You could be a New York Yankee!"

"Ok." He nods and continues to eat his soup.

"You obviously didn't hear me. Don't you remember how good you were back in the day? You used to play a mean game of baseball. I just remember you in those tight pants. You had such a nice ass."

Sonny licks his soup spoon and grins at her obviously buying her own vision. "Keep on. I'm liking this."

"Sonny, all you need to do is hit one homer. A grand slam! And the next thing you know, Badabing! You're an underwear model with a billboard in Times Square next to Sarah Jessica Parker. Forget baseball. Just insure your butt cheeks."

Sonny grins at Lois. "I have a better one. How about you take me to your studio and let me be the next Ricky Martin?"

"Oh hell no. You're not ruining my career too. Ricky's a gem and you My Dear are a cubic zirconia." Lois goes back to reading her paper. She looks up for a moment and notices Sonny staring off into space beyond her shoulder. She looks back at the empty counter and focuses back on him.

"Uh Sonny. What are you looking at?"

Sonny shakes his gaze. "I was looking at that guy at the counter. He looked like Lorenzo."

Lois looks back again at the counter and sees no one there. "Are you nutty Sonny? There's no one at that counter."

The rustle of the newspaper snaps him back to reality and he clears his head realizing no one is really there.

"Sonny, that's kind of weird that you see Lorenzo sometimes. Maybe you feel guilty about what happened to him. Not that you did anything directly."

"I put a lot of lives in danger. Hell I'm shocked you're sitting here. I'm glad you are by the way."

"We go way back ya know. Plus my momma always liked you."

Lois grins from ear to ear and flips her paper back to show Sonny an article. "You have to read this. TO owns his own music studio and plays football. It's all about diversification. Baseball. Underwear model. Check out this article."

That nervous feeling he always got when he was put in this position seeps like sweat in his hands. He stares at the blur of the words on the paper. And knowing Lois was one to quiz he tries to decipher the symbols with what he had integrated in his head over the years. He rubs his brow and forces a dazed temperament.

"I got a headache Lois. I get the gist. Diversification."

"It's all about diversification." Alexis hops from Kevin's desk and sits down on his comfy couch. He swivels his chair to follow her nervous pacing.

"So you think Sonny should diversify?" Kevin pokes his pen into his chin and waits for her response.

Alexis shrugs her shoulders. "What exactly was the point of this conversation again?"

"You think he should move on from the Spiderman tent." Kevin tries to hold back laughter but his face beams red and he fidgets in his chair hoping she doesn't notice.

"I just think we all have crutches in life that we need to let go of. We all could use an upgrade of something. You're the shrink. You know what I mean."

Kevin leans in towards her noticing the visible frustration. "What are your crutches Alexis? You said we all have them. What are yours?"

"It's hard to let go of the past sometimes, but you just have to do it. I wish Sonny would let go of the past."

"Have you let go of the past Alexis?"

"No. I haven't but I'm trying. It's still too soon. I have to rebuild my law firm again from scratch. The two most important people in my firm are dead, but they're still here. They always talk to me. And that's why I come to you to know whether or not it's wrong to still talk to them."

"I don't think it's hurting anyone to communicate with long lost loved ones and friends. I'd think it'd be hard to ignore them if they still come to you."

"It gives me peace of mind and assures me that maybe angels do exist."

Alexis hands him a Home Depot bag. He yanks out the box from the bag and studies the packing. Expecting nothing less than excitement on his face she draws disappointment instead.

He looks at her and forces a smile. "Uh. Thanks? I hate to be picky and everything but you bought me a Spiderman tent. My tent was a Superman."

She grips her hands together and tries to stay calm. "What is the difference? They both end with the word man."

"Yea but I don't like Spiderman. I never did. All that climbing is way to much work. Superman could fly."

"Sonny, He has the web! He swings from the web! So in essence he flies."

"I have my theories on that. What if the web stops gripping?"

She takes a deep breath and hurries past him to her door. "I'm going to have a moment of silence across the hall. You know where you can shove that tent."

"In my backyard right!"

She slams the door behind her and escapes to the apartment across the hall. She throws herself into the comfort of the recliner and meditates for a moment.

"I almost forget." Alexis thinks to herself realizing that she picked up that folded piece of paper from her coffee table that Sonny tried to hide. She unravels the letter and finds herself startled by the writing on the paper.

"What?" She sits up in the chair thinking maybe her brain might be too relaxed to translate his language. She recognizes their daughter's name spelled to the height of perfection but reading further down it all seems convoluted. Not really words. Sometimes portions of words and pronouns, but barely anything for her mind to understand. A flustered twitch in her hand makes it harder for her to hold the letter.

"I heard him read it to himself. Why am I not seeing what he read?" She folds the letter back up and lies back in the chair with a million and one thoughts flowing through her head. She tries to remember all the business meetings and excursions that they masked as business. She tries to figure out how he managed to hold it all together all of those years.

"I guess it's like Santa Claus. Or maybe it's like Spiderman or Superman. Or anything with superhuman powers. When you're young or maybe just inexperienced or maybe just too intrigued you believe the bravado and you fail to see a person's flaws and sometimes you find yourself competing." Alexis continues to ramble while Kevin writes down the ideas flowing through her head.

"How did the letter make you feel? May I see it?" He inquires.

She crosses her arms and thinks some more. "No. If it's ok I'd rather show it to Sonny first."