Chapter 50 Chapter Forty-Nine

In addition to my father's letters, I stumbled upon a note in his files some years ago, the only memorial of his expressing his love for Helen.I put it here because it speaks of their first love, though the anguish of the letter leads me to believe that the letter he wrote was out of reach for her. Ah, my love, I want to tell you how I've been thinking of you. All my memories belong to you, because it often goes back to the first time we were alone together. When I never expected it, what you said before has swallowed me. I feel your hand on mine, feel its weight, both of our hands hidden under my coat folded on the seat between us.I feel the lovely lightness of your fingers, your profile turned that way, and I feel your shouts when we arrived together in Bulgaria, when we first flew over the mountains of Bulgaria.

Maybe that's when I spotted your only blemish--perhaps where I never kissed--that little curly dragon on one shoulder blade. My hand must have run across it before I saw it.I remember myself — and you — gasping when I spotted it, and ran my fingers over it curiously and reluctantly. "Soon, it became part of your smooth back for me, but at first it brought awe to my lust. Whether this happened in Sofia's hotel or not, when I remember the edges of your lower teeth and their fine serrations, the skin around your eyes, the cobweb-like lines that age has carved on it, I must have Know this awe.