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Understand my background first. Methodist middle-class with all that entails. Dancing and cards frowned upon by the grandparents but tolerated by the parents. Adages such as "You can tell a person's status by her shoes" or "It's better to pay a little more and have it last." Good girls never "had to get married" (they secretly used the Pill) and wearing black or having one's ears pierced was low class. We attended Sunday school and church service Sunday mornings, Youth Fellowship Sunday evenings and Bible School in July. We went to church camp in the summers and the "gang" my parents socialized with was all from the adult Sunday school. If we happened to mutter "Jeez" in a fit of frustration, my mother let us know in no uncertain terms that we were taking the Lord's name in vane. And there was absolutely no liquor in the house. Ever.

In the spring of 1998, I moved to New Jersey - not by choice. I'd lost my job as a junior high art teacher in Pittsburgh when the school board downsized. I applied to every school I heard about. A middle school in Woodbridge, New Jersey hired me to take over an art position when the regular teacher took a health leave. The neighborhood was upscale and the kids seemed to be relatively intelligent, although smart-mouthed. My first day there I noticed a skinny little boy with airplane ears sitting in a corner madly drawing. He seemed unaware of anyone else in the room and stuck the tip of his tongue out while he concentrated. According to my desk map, his name was Thomas Falco.

After I got through the introductory threats about grades and my speech covering what we were going to learn over the next weeks, I started the class on their first project, "Soul Masks." These were papier-mâché and were to express their inner selves. With the low-level buzz of activity around me, I approached Thomas and said cheerfully, "You're pretty good at drawing."

He shrugged so I went on. "That's a real good wolf there."

"It's a coyote," he corrected. His accent was ultra Jersey and sounded cute and tough coming from such a delicate little stick of a boy.

"Oh sorry," I said. "At least I recognized it was a canine."

He didn't laugh but looked me over, then back down at his work.

"I don't suppose a drawer like you is interested in a three-D project like the Soul Mask," I ventured.

With the serious face of a funeral home director, he replied, "I don't object to other media. Art is art. I'm gonna do it."

I knew I was in the presence of a genius.

I wasn¹t fond of New Jersey. There was such a culture clash between this world and my old one that it seemed I had moved to another country. The women scared me. They were wiry and tough and wore black for every occasion morning and night. Black silk, black linen, black denim, black leather--you name it. They had perfect hair like women in soap operas only a bit harder-edged. Their eyebrows were plucked into thin little arches and their fingers heavy with gold rings, the kind I didn't like with oodles of tiny gems instead of one simple good stone. They had tiny waists and fast moving mouths and you had the feeling they could flip a man down on his back before he knew what hit him then place their stiletto-heeled foot on his genitals while coolly lighting a cigarette.

So far, I didn't like the men either. They were nothing like the ones I was used to - preppy boys with hair falling over one eye, smelling of spicy cologne and fervent about politics or their careers. Jersey men resembled hoods with their eyes darting about while they talked into the air, never at you, flashing their fake Rolex watches and thick gold chains, driving BMWs and Mercedes they couldn't afford. Everyone was putting on a show of see-how-rich-and-successful-I-am when the truth was they were living with their mothers and having loudmouthed conversations around dingy dinner tables.

At night I cried into my pillow and periodically went back to smoking. My old boyfriend, the one I'd ditched before moving to Jersey, kept calling and hinting he wanted to marry me. This guy kissed like he was trying to wrestle with his tongue and had flabby upper arms, something I found hard to abide in a man. I was growing tempted though - that's how low and lonely I was in New Jersey.

There were a few discipline problems in my classes but nothing out of the ordinary and soon all had settled into an acceptable routine. This gave me more energy to devote to Tommy Falco, for I felt he had great potential. At three o'clock he would stop by the art room to hand me his doodles for the day, things he'd drawn during his other classes when teachers weren't looking. Half the time they probably let him get away with it since he was smart and did his lessons well enough. I was building up a fine thick folder of his work when it occurred to me that perhaps I ought to discuss the boy's talent with his parents to see if they were supporting it properly.

When I told Tommy of my intention, he didn't seem happy with it.

"What's the matter?" I asked him. "Not a good idea?"

He had a narrow, sensitive little face with large hazel eyes rimmed by thick black lashes. His hair was chestnut brown and worn in the currently hip gelled hairdo. Now he tilted his head and shrugged in a decidedly jaded European fashion. "My mother died. And my dad's real busy. I don't think you'd want to meet him."

"What? Why would you think that? And I'm sorry to hear about your mother."

His eyes briefly met mine then stared out the window. "She had cancer. And my dad is, umŠ" He hesitated. "Um, not your type."

The tension broke and I laughed out loud. "Not my type, huh? This is just a conference, not a marriage proposal! Should I be insulted?" I figured he was worried that women would be in line to take his mother's place and he'd already decided I wasn't right for the job.

His eyes widened in surprise. "Oh, no, that's not what I mean." He shook his head and smiled in a sad, how-can-I-ever-explain-this manner. "Um, I mean I just don't think you'd like him." Though he looked like he had a lot more to say, he stopped.

I assured him, "It doesn't matter if I like him or if he likes me. This is just about you, nothing else. It's business, not social; do you understand me? Part of my job."

"Yeah," he said in his tough little way and on that note, I let him do as he pleased for the rest of the class while I browbeat the others into their latest project - positive/negative self-portraits.

Mr. Falco returned my call that evening. It sounded like he was doing it from a phone booth because I could hear traffic in the background. His accent was thicker than his son's. "Miss, uh, Weaver? I'm, uh, returning your call?"

"Yes, Mr. Falco, I wanted to speak with you about Tommy's outstanding art abilities."

"He didn't do nothing wrong, did he?"

"Oh, no, the total opposite. Is there a chance of your coming in for a conference?"

Long, long hesitation, then he said, "Yeah, sure. How 'bout tomorrow?

He was in my classroom when I got there in the morning, standing with his hands locked behind his back, perusing Van Gogh's life story on the bulletin board. Since I'd had to use my key to unlock the door, it was disconcerting to see him there.

"How'd you get in here?" I asked him and when he turned to face me, my stomach seemed to drop about ten feet. The guy was one gorgeous hunk of manhood. Not movie star perfect, more like a rock star - skinny and wiry, but tall and wide shouldered. I saw where Tommy got his face but Mr. Falco's eyes were ebony and his hair black. Evidently, his wife had been lighter complexioned. There was an intense sexual energy crackling from the man, forming a sort of heated aura around him several feet out into the room. I was quite susceptible to it. Especially since I'd not had a date since moving to Jersey and before that only with Mr. Flabby Arms back in Pittsburgh.

I cleared my throat and waited.

"The janitor's a second cousin of mine," he said, and his voice made me ovulate. In person it was much more seductive than on the phone. All I knew was, I seemed to have lost the lower part of my body. "He let me in," he finished.

"Uh huh," I said. I was torn between wanting to tell him off for daring to enter my private domain without my permission and the urge to be alone so I could fantasize about him to my heart's desire. I was certain he was nothing in real life like what I could imagine. I tried to purse my lips to express my disapproval of his behavior but he didn't seem to notice as he had turned back to Van Gogh.

"So this guy goes and cuts off his ear because women don't like him?"

"Something like that," I muttered.

"Why didn't he just go to a hooker?"

"He did," I said. "I believe the woman he handed the ear to was a hooker."

"Hmmm," he said. "Poor guy was just a loser all way around then."

"I wouldn't say that," I replied. "I heard one of his paintings sold at auction for ninety-three million."

"But he was dead though, right?"

"I get your point," I said and motioned for him to sit down in the only other adult-sized chair in the room next to my desk. I sat down behind the desk.

What he had just said was, in short, the entire philosophical contention I seemed to have with New Jersey. Where I came from, academic or creative achievements surpassed salary earned in status. Not that money was unimportant - it talked like it did anywhere, but it wasn't the only king. In New Jersey it appeared that it was.

Mr. Falco took his seat and straightened the crease in his pants. He had on black slacks and a black polo shirt, a black leather belt with a brass buckle and a charcoal gray sports jacket. On his wrist was the requisite Rolex. He wore no rings.

He watched me with some insolence but was friendly enough.

I said, "I've been an art teacher for six years, Mr. Falco, and have come across many students who have talent. Usually every year, there are maybe three or four of them. But I have to say that your son, Tommy, is the most talented I've ever dealt with. He's only in eighth grade and believe me, he can draw like a college art student. In addition, he wants to do it hour after hour and the rest of his subjects are only an annoying distraction to endure before he can return to his true love. You have there what appears to be a real artistic prodigy and you might want to make plans to steer him in the right direction."

I noticed that Mr. Falco's eyelashes were as long as his son's and then my stomach growled and I blushed.

"You didn't have breakfast, Miss Weaver?" he asked.

"Just some tea," I told him. "My alarm didn't go off."

He shook his head. "It's bad to start the day without a good breakfast."

"I know, I normally do eat one," I said.

"If you're still hungry this evening, would you like to go out to dinner?"

Oh my God, I thought. My tongue seemed to jam up in my mouth and I couldn't get it to work straight. "UmŠ" I muttered.

"Pick you up at seven?" he asked, looking me straight in the eye and causing my spine to transform into liquid.

"Uh, yeah, okay," I said.

"And you live where?"

I gave him the address, then returned to the subject at hand. "Um, Tommy," I said stupidly.

"He got it from his mother."

"What?"

"His art talent. She was good. We have paintings all over the house. She did sculpture too."

"I'm sorry about your wife," I told him.

For a second the slick smart-ass expression left his eyes. "Yeah," he said.

There was a pause, then I said, "Tommy might want outside lessons."

"What about you?" he asked.

I hadn't thought of that, but it was obvious. "Yeah, I could give them."

He stood up and held out his hand. I had no choice but to follow suit. When I took hold of the hand, I found it warm and dry and very friendly. It closed around mine and then its mate covered what was left exposed. "Good, it's settled," he said. "We'll work out the details tonight. You like what kind of food? Italian, Chinese, Korean, French, what?"

"I like them all," I said.

"Good. Call me Lou. What's your name?"

"Janice," I said.

"I'll see you later, Janice," Lou said.

When I told Tommy I'd be giving him lessons, he gave me a sideways look that spoke volumes.

"What?" I said, annoyed but uneasy.

"Nothing."

Irked, I slapped down a box of oil crayons in front of him. "Today you're doing what everybody else is doing," I told him.

With the resigned patience of an old man, he reached for the box and opened it.

To my surprise, Tommy came with us. But his presence did not detract in the least from the eroticism between Lou and me. I spent half the time embarrassed that the boy should be witness to such a thing and the rest in a state of heat unlike any I'd experienced. Until now, evidently, I'd only been dating boys.

The restaurant was Italian, of course, Sicilian to be exact. And the food was nothing like the spaghetti and lasagna I'd grown up believing was Italian. We had pasta alla Norma, pasta con le sarde, polpetti and salad.

We shared the food like in a Chinese restaurant. The wine was red and very dry and the dessert cannolis.

"If I keep eating like this, they'll have to move me with a crane," I said, groaning.

Lou smiled and delicately wiped his lips with the huge linen napkin. "Once in a while you gotta splurge," he said.

He asked me a lot of questions until I'd told him just about my entire life history, leaving out, of course, details not good for a thirteen-year-old's ears. About his own life Lou told me little, just that he was in the olive oil importing business and that his wife, Gina, had died of leukemia. When I asked him for more detail on the workings of his business, he steered the conversation to other areas, ending up with a description of his last trip to Italy and Tommy's enjoyment of the art at the Vatican.

At this, Tommy perked up, his eyes glittering with pleasure, but when the subject had passed, sank back into his teenage remoteness. It was clear that Tommy was not pleased his father and I were socializing but was resigned to it.

It had been a while since a man had touched me so when Lou got around to a goodnight kiss at the door (Tommy was asleep in the car), my entire body jumped to meet it. I was so flustered afterwards I banged my shoulder into the doorjamb, mortified that Lou had possibly seen me do it. But his back was turned as he headed to his car. We'd made another date for the following Friday and I knew that one would not include his son. I knew too that it would lead to bed and it did, oh, it did.

He'd already lined up a room at the Holiday Inn, which I thought was a bit presumptuous but my body overruled my brain. I was glad he had the foresight. The only thing was he kept having to make phone calls on his cell phone and once had to leave the room to "take care of some business."

"Are shipments coming in on a Friday night?" I asked, slightly annoyed.

"Shipments are always coming in," he replied. "It's kind of round the clock."

And then he started things up all over again.

Tommy quit stopping by at the end of each day to hand me his drawings and when I talked to him, he answered me in monosyllables. Though it would be proper for our relationship to remain on a normal teacher/student level, human nature being what it is, I would have expected him to grow friendlier, especially with the private lessons twice a week at my apartment. After a while, his reserve nettled me. Being the cynical person I sometimes tend to be, I assumed he was telling me he didn't relish the idea of me possibly becoming his stepmother and this festered in me.

So after I got the class started one day, I moseyed on back to his table and whispered, "What is your problem? Have you decided you don't like me or what?"

He looked startled and held my gaze for a moment longer than usual. "I like you all right," he finally said. "Like I told you before, my father isn't your type." And he went back to his work.

But I stood my ground. "What do you mean not my type? Be specific."

He shrugged and I realized that though he seemed wise beyond his years he was really just a little boy and one without a mother at that. Four years he'd been without one. I was more gentle then and knelt down next to the table.

"You must have your reasons for telling me this," I prompted.

He stared straight ahead, appeared to be about to speak, then shook his head and returned to his work. I stood up, brushed myself off and walked back to the center of the room where I lambasted the class for not trying hard enough. They were actually doing fine, but I needed to let off steam.

After my spiel, I glanced back at Tommy but he elegantly ignored me.

It was almost two months before Lou introduced me to his relatives at a Christmas party in his house. "I was checking you out first," he joked.

The relatives were cordial though removed. Lou's mother had died in a car wreck years before but he was still close to his in-laws. His wife's mother often came to his house to take care of Tommy and cook them meals. I caught her eyeing me carefully, but felt no negative judgment coming from her. His father was pleasant enough, but had to leave the party early.

"This is my sister, Connie," Lou told me as he introduced a tall woman in royal blue and black. Connie embodied all of my New-Jersey-women fears.

"Hi," I said, extending a hand, which she took and gave a quick squeeze.

"So you're a teacher, huh?" she said, her dark eyes appraising.

"Yeah, I didn't get any movie offers so I settled on that." She didn't laugh at my joke. In fact no one I'd met in Jersey other than Lou ever laughed at my jokes.

For that matter, he was always laughing at me. This was good and it was bad. He often didn't take me seriously enough.

Now I watched him from across his dining room as he talked with his cousin and a friend. Both men were hard looking, the cousin skinny and the friend beefy. Mike, the cousin, wore a casual T-shirt and jeans while the other, Frank, was dressed in a suit. Mike was riled up and talking a mile a minute with his hands flailing about for emphasis. Lou and the other man were stone-faced as they watched him.

I was left alone with Connie. She was about five feet eight inches tall and looked like she worked out. Teenage boy hips, narrow waist and small high breasts. Her hair was an impossible purplish black and glazed with something that made it ultra shiny. Every one of her fingers wore rings. Around her neck was a gold snake chain with Connie scripted in pavé diamonds. Her eyebrows were plucked to that pencil thin line and the eyes under them sharp and streetwise. I half expected someone who looked like this to haul off and whack me one just for daring to breathe in her space.

She said, "It was real hard on Lou when Gina died. Took her real long to go and all he did was wait and watch her suffer. You know," she added pointedly and looking at me hard, "he could never go through that again. Never. Tommy couldn't stand it again either."

What was she doing, threatening me? As if I could control how I was going to die. I guess I could to some extent, but hardly to the degree she seemed to imply. Did she say this to all her brother's girlfriends?

"Yes, it must have been hard," I said mildly. I suddenly had a flash of Kevin back home and his mealy-mouthed family and I was in a no-man's land. Were there no potential in-laws anywhere who were somewhere in the middle - not too pussyfooted but not intimidating either?

"It almost did them both in," said Connie. "God. Tommy was only nine. A delicate kind of kid too, you know. He don't exactly make friends easy."

"I notice that," I said.

"You do, huh? Well, it's good he has us to take care of him. Lou's pretty busy most of the time."

I looked at her. "With the olive oil business," I said.

She arched one skinny eyebrow. "Yeah, olive oil," she said. "What'd he get you for Christmas?"

A nib-nose, wasn't she? But I was starting to warm up to her a bit. "A necklace," I said. "A ruby heart on a chain." I pulled down my turtleneck to show her.

She smiled and nodded. "He likes you a lot." Then she proceeded to tell me all about her marital problems and it was so interesting I forgot she was scary.

We usually made love in the dark. To my surprise, Lou was something of a prude. To look at him, you'd think he was wild in the sack. I'd been used to my last two boyfriends, one a corporate slave and the other a jock, who both wanted to do it with the lights on. "I want to look at you, for crissakes," the jock would say. Well, now it was I who wanted to see what was happening.

"No, it ain't romantic," said Lou. "How can you be romantic seeing every little thing."

"You don't have a little thing," I teased him and after some more of my begging, he reluctantly agreed to turn one lamp on. We were in my apartment in my old double bed, which he insisted gave him a backache. I scooted across the bed and flicked on the lamp into which I'd had the foresight to install a pink bulb. Both of us looked nice and rosy in its sexy glow and soon Lou forgot his silly inhibitions. He was groaning away as I went to work with my mouth and was moving into the no return zone when suddenly I stopped.

"Hey, what the-" he gasped.

"Lou," I said, sitting up on one elbow, "what's this weird mark here? Is it a tattoo?"

He scrambled to sit up. "It's nothing," he said grumpily. "Just a tattoo I got a long time ago."

"In your pubic hair?"

He shrugged. "Yeah, so what? They shaved it first in that spot."

"But why would you get a tattoo in your public hair?"

He fumbled for a cigarette and then remembered he'd quit the month before. His eyes were looking everywhere but at me. "It's a thing in our family, that's all. We all do it. It's a tradition."

"Connie has one in her pubic hair?"

He snorted. "No! Just the men get them. We've done it for a long time, centuries maybe."

I dug my fingers into the hair and parted it to get a better look. He squirmed but I pressed him down with one of my legs. "Hold still," I ordered.

The tattoo was tiny - maybe an inch across altogether and consisted of a filled in black circle with five black lines shooting out from it. Four of the lines came out of one side and the other line slightly down from the others. I stared at it while Lou audibly breathed.

"It looks a bit like a hand," I remarked.

"Yeah, well, it's just a design," he said. "A family design. That's all it is. You satisfied?"

"Does Tommy have one?" I asked frowning.

"Of course not! You think we're a bunch of perverts? Kids don't have them."

"Well, when do they get them? I mean, at what age?"

Lou shrugged. "I don't know, maybe twenty. It depends on the person."

I was silent because something was nagging at the back of my mind.

"Hey, you gonna finish what you started or not?"

I finished but I was wracking my brain the whole while.

In March, Lou bought me a car. I certainly hadn't asked for one, would never have dreamed of asking, but he'd seen that my old Escort was starting to disintegrate. When he pulled up out front of my building in a shiny gold Buick Regal, at first I protested, but soon gave in. What the hell, I told myself. It appeared we were headed towards a quite serious relationship and if things continued, our property would eventually be shared anyway. In spite of Lou's lack of verbosity, I enjoyed his company and was pretty deeply in love. I had all those sensations of butterflies and hot flashes and enjoyed the feeling of protection when with him and okay, maybe I was confusing lust with love, but I felt reasonably moral about taking the car.

"Of course you'll take it," he told me. "I got to think of my own safety, don't I? You think I'm riding in your old tin can anymore?"

I laughed and climbed into the Buick.

In June, he took me to dinner at some fancy new catering place his uncle owned and I knew something was up when I caught the waiters sending each other looks and giving special attention to our table. Sure enough, when our almond cheesecake and coffee arrived, Lou pulled a little box out of his pocket and took my hand. "I've forgiven you for not being Italian," he joked. "You can't cook worth shit, but I love you, Janice. You wanna be Janice Falco?"

I'd sort of been expecting it; had felt something in the air for the past couple of weeks. And Connie'd been extra nice, taking me shopping for new clothes and trying to teach me how to "dress better."

In a split second my life jumped in front of my eyes and I tried to be honest with myself. I had some doubts about the differences between Lou and me - education, religion, area of origin and more, but we got along fine. Our energies meshed well and once he was over that deal with the lights off, we were very compatible in bed.

I smiled my toothiest of grins and said, "Falco's a good name." He laughed and slipped the ring on my finger. And surprisingly, it wasn't gaudy. A nice gold band with a three-fourths carat solitaire on it. Paid for by olive oil.

The wedding was planned for the following spring and we spent our time together pleasantly, taking Tommy to the movies or going out to dinner. Lou stayed over at my place at least twice a week but I never stayed at his. He was a pretty good father and didn't want a woman in his bed at home until she was his wife.

The trouble started in August when he showed up one morning all beat up. He'd already been seen to; the injuries cleaned up and bandaged and he had an appointment with his dentist at noon.

"Just had those new caps done in March," he complained. "I hate going to the dentist."

I was at a loss for words, but eventually got my tongue back. "What happened, Lou?"

He shrugged the whole thing off. "Just a disagreement, nothing serious. Look, I need a favor. I'm going out of town for a couple of days to take care of something and I want Tommy to stay with you. I'll have Frank stay over here with you to help out with things. Mom (that's what he still called his mother-in-law) ain't feeling too good. She's going in for some tests. And Connie works ten hours a day; she can't watch him. Is that all right with you?"

Of course it was all right with me, but what was the deal with Frank? "Why does Frank have to be here? I don't want him staying with me."

Lou got a sudden steely look in his eyes I hadn't seen before. "Look, Janice, do what I say. You might need some help with something and Frank's at your service. Take it."

While I enjoyed Tommy's company, I did not particularly like Frank, Lou's beefy friend. And I certainly didn't like my privacy invaded. Tommy was a quiet, intelligent kid who added to one's pleasure while Frank was a big ox who sat sullenly for hours at a time and did nothing but scowl. I wondered if there was anything occupying his thick skull. I opened my mouth to protest, but Lou put two fingers over it. "Do me a favor, Janice, and don't question it. I'll owe you one."

If he put it that way, I had no choice. I already owed him for the car.

Frank and Tommy arrived within the hour and soon things were just as I'd expected. Frank sprawled on the sofa incessantly flicking through channels and Tommy set up camp at the coffee table with his drawing materials. I escaped into the bedroom. That evening, I invited Tommy in to play some cards on the bed and shut the door.

I had the feeling for an hour or more that Tommy wanted to say something. He'd grown a bit since I first met him; had turned fourteen in April. His voice still hadn't changed, but his Adam's apple protruded and his face had matured.

"You have something you want to tell me?" I prompted after he hemmed and hawed and changed position several times.

"This is why I told you my father's not your type, Janice."

There was a long moment while we looked at each other. By now I knew that Tommy did like me. I knew he wasn't saying this because he thought I wasn't good enough to take his mother's place. By now, he and I loved each other and it was no secret. We never spoke about it, but we both knew it.

"Do you want to just come out and explain things, Tommy?"

He slapped a card down and shifted again. "No, I'm not going to say anything. I don't plan on living like my dad but I'm a Falco and we don't blab stuff. I'm just saying that me being here and Frank being here, that what's going on is what your life will be like and I don't think it's your thing."

My I.Q. is a hundred and thirty-six but you would think I was a moron. In that split second everything flashed into place and at last I understood Lou's weird little tattoo. The Black Hand. I got it.

With tears in my eyes, I played my last game of gin rummy with Tommy. He fell asleep on my bed, on top of the spread, and I covered him up with the afghan, then squeezed under the sheets without waking him. In the morning, we ate breakfast without talking. Frank ate his in front of the TV, grunting as he chewed.

Lou came and got them that evening and that night I sat in the dark thinking hard and long.

The way I got rid of him was not honest or honorable. Once I let my imagination roll, general panic set in. What if he refused to let me go? What if he let me go but sent someone to kill me? All of a sudden, in my eyes, my friend had turned into a monster. I forgot my years of trying to be ethical in my dealings with others. I forgot the rules they taught me in church. All I could think about was escaping with my life.

Eventually, in a truly cowardly fashion, I packed up and left in the night, leaving Lou a letter, which I placed on the dining room table. He had a key to the apartment and I knew he'd find it. By morning I was in Pittsburgh with my parents, composing my resignation letter to the Woodbridge school board. I claimed that family illness had brought me home. The job might have only lasted a few more months anyway as either the regular teacher was coming back or they'd hire someone permanent, probably from the sub list.

The letter I left for Lou said: "You went through it once with Gina and enough is enough. Enough for Tommy too. I've been diagnosed with a brain tumor and the outlook isn't promising. I had tests I didn't want to tell you about and was waiting for the results. The doctor called and they weren't good. I'm going back home to my own doctors. You're a really nice guy and I wish you the best. Your ring is in the place you rigged for me. Don't contact me, I've got enough to deal with. Go on with your life and good luck with everything, Lou. Love, Janice."

All right, I'm a liar. But I still jump at every weird sound and don't sleep well at night. I imagine people are following me and I wonder if God will punish me by giving me cancer. And every time I close my eyes, all I see is Tommy's face.

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