E-mail To My Best Friend (About My Girlfriend In Austin)

If you ever breathe a word of this to anyone, even Sue, I will never forgive you. I will never trust you again. Anna is the love of my life. My soulmate. I didn't know what those words meant before I met her. My kids are older, I was looking forward to caring for hers. I was looking forward to all the times, like so many times we’ve done before, when we’d walk Bu, her corgi, down Ramsey Avenue to Ramsey Park, past Karen the gardener on one corner, and the handsome young couple on the other corner, who’ve just had their second baby. Bu is the most popular dog in Ramsey Park. Nobody knows my name or Anna’s name but they all know Bu. When we come back to the house about twenty yards from the house Anna shouts “mush Bu” and Bu starts running on her little legs. Then she goes in the back yard and chases a squirrel we call Jones. Next door are Ann and Andy. They bring their dog Rocket round for play dates with Bu and we sit outside on Adirondack furniture and talk liberal politics while the dogs play. It's very hot. For lunch we’ll go to Billy’s. I’ll have a veggie burger with “fries”, she’ll have a chicken sandwich with salad, dressing on the side. Then we go to Central Market and buy stuff for dinner. While we cook we take turns choosing tracks on YouTube. Or sometimes we go to South Congress and drink tequila and dance to bands, or maybe the Violet Crown where we watch art films with a bottle of wine and afterwards eat filthy hot dogs, or the Alamo Drafthouse where they bring your dogs and beer to your seat as you watch the film. On Thursday we get the Austin Chronicle and laugh at the horoscopes and "The Luv Doctor's" agony column. On Wednesday's we go to Laguna Gloria where Anna is doing an art course. I sit in the corner pretending to read, but really I'm watching her paint and wondering how I got so lucky. At night we go to the TV room and she falls asleep on my shoulder with my hand between her thighs. I’ve never been so happy. And now it’s gone. All gone.