Hi. I’m the one with the pink hair. The one who kept glancing at you, even when you weren’t the one speaking and my attention should have been elsewhere. I think our eyes met a few times, but it may have been wishful thinking.

You turned two wineglasses upside down, and put the sign with your name on it on top of them. Then you had to give one of them away, and it didn’t work anymore, but I thought, that’s exactly what I would have done.

We’ve never met. Not officially. I’ve been in the same room with you several times this week. I’ve even spoken to you once, but you don’t know who I am. Nor should you.

I love you. Platonically. I’m not a crazed fan. I don’t want to fuck you. (Well, I wouldn’t say no, but I’m young enough to be your daughter. And you’re married. And I have a boyfriend. And either way, we don’t know each other.)

I wish I were twenty years older, and that I could have been there when you were still at liberty to mingle and talk without being drowned, because I think we would have got along spledidly. I think we would have liked each other, and had a lot to talk about. I think we could have bounced ideas off one another, and become friends.

I choose to think so.

I’m prone to hero-worship, but if I were twenty years older, and knew you then, maybe I wouldn’t have to be. Then it wouldn’t be so hard to breathe. Then I’d be able to look away.

I promise I’m not mad. Well, no madder than most people. Well, a bit madder than most people, but not mad enough to hunt you down and kidnap you and take a lock of your hair as a memento, or sew your skin into a lamp shade, or have a shrine in my basement with your pictures, and try to reenact things that happen in your stories, causing pain to other people.

I’m not that mad.

Just mad enough to think that maybe, one day, when my dream comes true and I’m a writer too, I will meet you, and we’ll talk, and we’ll get along splendidly. We’ll bounce ideas off each other, and become friends.

I choose to hope so.