Up until now, it has been letters in long cream envelopes, stolen from his office, his embossed return address crossed out, his name inked in its place, the letters I insisted on after He tried to email me, email, me, and though I have nothing against the Internet, He owed me letters, for the gaping years, even if written on the back of whatever scrap of paper He appears to have had at hand, coupons for gutter cleaning, unpaid electrical bills, my own letters sent back to me, words x’d over, blackened, smelling of His cigarettes, and handwritten letters, after He tried to type one, because if He owes me nothing, which He doesn’t, but WTF, He can put His hand on his fucking Mont-Blanc and use his muscles and then allow His sacred spittle to dampen the envelope, though most of the envelopes arrive taped shut and I rip them open thinking His Mouth beyond hoping for a paper cut to curse Him spinning along His red lips everyone says we share because while I have nothing against Him or against making things easy on the one hand on the other hand emptiness as deep as cistern as black as tendon so when He called His voice oiling the cordless air and asked if I would have lunch with Him that would have meant I would have had to breathe His air and I waited for Him to dissipate and on the other end He was asking Well, don’t you think it’s about time? and I looked at the floor where the battleship gray wood slats beckon because they’ve shrunk over the years but the darkness does not open to spill me under the house to rest in the dust so I said what I had to say and He said Look for my sports car, it’s a BMW which will be easy to spot dusted in the Traceway Restaurant parking lot the only not-pickup but it’s certainly not Ferrari though this is the first time He’s asked so I go and wait in the pink plastic booth behind the globe filled with gum globes of every color so many I can’t even name them and the tabletop clear as a spring the Webster County Daily Progress sealed under polyurethane with photographs of men hefting cat fish and the Progress surrounded by silvered wooden hooked bait fish and while looking at that bait and the waitress her hair brown enough to roll in the deep fryer and at the lack of BMW that I say Shit but it’s too late and sure enough enough by the time I get back to my house small and nothing as it is with its sagging porch with no pillars only the rough boards I stole from Debby Ponder’s wood pile holding my front up, my house with one shattered window covered in black garbage bags because of some kids with rocks who I’m going to shoot in the knees if I ever catch them, my house empty as His offer which was no offer but a feint so that He could get here and talk to the ghosts of my wife and the ghosts of my little girl and steal them them going with Him because He has always had that damn way with women and damn Him their absence damn crowding in on me even damn though the door’s not even open yet their hissing gone and damn I look at the phone not damn begging for Him asking for Him to at least call and explain damn Himself this time but He won’t He never damn does as if He even damn could.