Inspired by “Letter,” by the wonderful Byron Otis
A sigh escapes my lips the second my foot steps through the doorway. I let my
backpack slump to the floor and stumble toward the large wood burning fireplace across from
my bed to stoke the flames. The air is icy. I must have left the heater off this morning. Closing
my eyes, exhausted by the very act of seeing the world, I turn towards my bed for a nap. I
blink. He is in my room, lounging across my velvet throw pillows like an arabian princess. He
attempts to gaze at me with a sort of suggestive serial killer type expression, but instead
scrunches his face up in into a weird grimace that reeks of constipation. Casanova is trapped
in the body of a pudgy 16 year old. After a minute to shake off my shock, I notice the jacketpuffed over his broad shoulders. “Give it back” I say unflinchingly. I am cocky, contempt
coating my words like maple syrup coating a spoon. I can take him. Afterall, he is wearing
MY quarterback letter jacket. His lip curls, revealing a yellow braced tooth and he whispers,
“You don’t understand it. You wear it without reverence, as if this meager, meaningless felt
letter wasn’t the brand of a god, as if these leather arms are not the greatest trophy an
average IQed, unremarkable in every way young man can receive, his voice had risen to
the volume of a dramatic speech by now as if this jacket wasn’t your ticket to every vip show
in the country, your key to every treasure trove in the world, as if it isn’t society’s way to point
out the winners from the losers, and pound every sorry loser to a pulp, stripping from them
every dignity until they are waste of space. When I speak it is an unforgivable disturbance of
the air. When you speak, wearing this jacket that is, it is art.” As he speaks I begin to get
nervous, my heart thumping at a more desperate pace, and I hear the fire behind me gasping
to a roaring height. The realization of the possible danger before me creeps like the trickle of
sweat runs from my armpit to the shelf of my hip. Words stumble from my throat, “Nils, this is
too far. I’m calling the police.” My words get stronger. I hope to scare him off. “I have been
dealing with your twisted obsessions since 8th grade. You are a miserable loser, and I am
tired dealing with your desperate, stalker attempts to be an actual person. Go to hell.” My
finger surely go to the pocket of my jeans and close around my mobile saviour device. Nills
smiles slowly, lips spreading across teeth like honey spilling across the surface of milk. He
reaches down to a jug of lighter fluid, that I had not noticed until this moment. He dips his
hand into the liquid and the brings his palm to hover over his head with a dramatic flourish.
Than with fevered restraint he sluggishly rake his fingers through his hair. The lighter fluid
shapes his hair like a 60s greaser, forming a wave of strands into a smooth swoop with one
perfect oily tendril hanging down to tease his forehead. He stands, grinning at me all thewhile, and saunters towards me. I start, but he walks past. I hear him stop behind me. I turn
to look, dread inundating my every cell. He looks back at me. He stoops and climbs into a
now roaring fire.
