Has she really changed?

Is she capable of it?

Or is the whole Melissa story just another ruse, one of the many tricks in my fiancée’s duping toolbox? Something she made up to show herself in a better light? How I wish I could read her mind!

As we watch Noemi’s favorite show before going to bed, memories race through my mind. I recall the worst day of my life.

Jeez, I was dumb at eighteen!

The day of the “life-changing” McDonald’s conversation with Noemi, I booked appointments at the barbershop and a tattoo parlor on my way home. Later that evening, I ordered the lemon-colored underwear from an online retailer and wrote the love letter.

I completely rewrote it three or four times over the next few days, baring increasingly more of my soul with each rewrite. Noemi wanted it to be heartfelt. It had to be sincere. No crutches in the form of song quotes, no swiping sugary samples from the Internet, no shielding myself with humor.

I had one shot at winning the girl of my dreams, and I was giving it all I had.

On the evening of Noemi’s birthday party, I arrived at her place in yellow briefs, my hair dyed a flashy shade of green, and an enormous double rose drawn on my acne covered back. The tattoo was still fresh and covered with scabs. A line of text cut through it between my shoulder blades.

It read, I love you, Noemi Dray.

There’d been a considerable amount of pain associated with that tattoo, but I’d welcomed it as a tribute to the gods for my chance to be with the woman I loved.

Everyone fell silent and stared at me. The girls whispered and giggled, and a few of the boys said things like, “You’re a nut job, dude.” If Roland were there, he would’ve done something to make it easier for me, but he hadn’t been invited.

Noemi emerged from the crowd, took my hand, and led me to her room.

Once we were inside, she pulled the door shut. “I didn’t think you’d have the balls to actually do this.”

“Yet, here I am,” I said. “Green and yellow as requested.”

She smiled.

I itched to add that if she’d allowed me to wear a blue T-shirt, I could pass for a Brazilian soccer fan, but I bit my tongue.

No humor, remember? Just feelings.

I handed her my letter.

“Will you read it for me?” she asked.

Uh-oh.

I’d been hoping she’d read it herself, silently, in my presence. Or—even better—after the party. I wasn’t prepared to voice the raw emotion I’d poured into my words.

She thrust the folded sheets back into my hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Please?”

Oh well. I’d come this far…

“All right,” I said. “Sure. I’ll read it to you.”

I unfolded the three handwritten pages and began to read.

Darling Noemi,

I saw you for the first time in Madame Foucault’s class exactly one year, three months and five days ago. You’d just transferred to our school.

That day you rocked my world. I thought you were the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen. I thought you were a blessing. A gift from heaven.

Something hatched in my heart that day, and that thing has been growing ever since. It gets bigger every time I look at you. It doesn’t stop growing when I can’t see you like in the evenings, on weekends, and holidays. At night, when I make love to you in my fantasies and dreams, it doubles in size.

You are so incredibly amazing.

If I was granted one wish, it would be to experience your love, even for a day. To have you want me like I want you, to take you in my arms, to kiss you, and to make love to you because you need it. Because you love me. After that, I could bite the dust, no problem. I would die a happy man.

Sometimes I think you’re too flawless to be real. Or to be human. Sometimes I wonder if you’re an angel or an alien or an android from the future. For the record, I don’t care what planet or time you are from. What matters is this: You are Perfection.

Sometimes, I try to picture you old with your curves gone, your hair white, wrinkles all over your face, and brown spots on your hands. And you know what? Even in those fantasies, you are still perfect.

Noemi, I had to tell you how I feel because if I didn’t, my love was going to burst like a supernova and end the universe. OK, maybe not the whole universe, but my universe. In other words, my existence.

I would do anything for you. Anything. If you want me to strip naked and jump into an icy lake, I will. If you ask me to drop out of school and join the Foreign Legion, I’ll do it. I would eat your poop if for some reason you wanted me to.

I want you to know there are no limits to what I would do for you.

If you allow me to protect and cherish you, I will do it from this day until my last breath. I would give my life to keep you safe, and it would be an honor.

I will love you always.

I looked up at Noemi as I said those words. Her eyes glistened with tears. Emboldened, I took a step toward her.

She took a step back.

What happened next was something my brain failed to understand at first. She grabbed a small cactus-like plant from the shelf behind her and ran out.

I followed her.

When I entered the main room, just a few steps behind Noemi, there was an eerie silence. Then the booing, catcalls, and laughter started. Someone threw food at my face.

“Anyone needs to go to potty anytime soon?” Noemi’s friend Lise asked. “Be sure to wrap your crap for our very own gourmet!”

The room roared.

That’s when I noticed the huge flat screen on the wall with a video that had been paused. The still image showed me in Noemi’s room, mouth gaping, as I stared at Noemi when she grabbed the plant and bolted.

Lise took it from Noemi’s hands. “This is a nanny cam, you dimwit.”

“What a show!” Noemi’s second crony, Tanya, said. “You went above and beyond in ridiculing yourself.”

Irene, Noemi’s third friend, shook her head in fake sympathy. “How will you ever recover from this?”

Dropping my head low, I ran to the door, bumping into chests and shoulders, stumbling over feet trying to trip me, and jostling guys who blocked my way. The pain of my humiliation was staggering, but what shook me to the core was the depth of Noemi’s betrayal.

Recovering from it wasn’t something I planned on at that point.

I got home, found a piece rope in the broom closet, and hung myself from the hook on the door of my room. But luckily, once the rope tightened around my neck, I started thrashing. The noise drew Mom into my room. She cut me down and drove me—dizzy but still conscious—to the ER.

The doc there examined me without doing any scans and discharged me into my parents’ care.

A few days later, I began to show signs of aspiration pneumonia and acute respiratory distress—both rare but potentially fatal consequences of near hangings. Those delayed effects came close to killing me a second time.

But I lived.

And strangely, I’ve never envisioned suicide again.

Seeing the Grim Reaper up close twice within the space of one week made certain I didn’t attempt a third encounter anytime soon. My survival instinct woke up, and my brain shifted from wishing to flee to wanting to fight.

While I was in the hospital, Mom vowed she’d take her own life if I ever took mine. Dad pledged he’d toughen me up, if I let him. I promised him my full cooperation. Flo just cried. Roland made me swear on my parents’ and Flo’s lives—since I obviously didn’t hold my own in high regard—that I’d make Noemi pay.

And that’s what I’m doing now.

Noemi scoots closer to me on the couch and fingers a button on my shirt. I blink and glance at the TV screen. Her show is over.

“How about we make love on the sofa tonight?” she purrs.

I smile, as I try to drive away the image of eighteen-year-old me hovering between life and death in the intensive care unit with a breathing tube and an IV needle sticking out of me and a ligature mark still visible across my neck. “Sure.”

“I’d like to try something new,” she murmurs.

“Be my guest.”

Before I have time to guess what she has in mind, Noemi slides to the floor in front of me and unbuckles the belt of my jeans.

Really?

Princess Noemi intends to service her “knight” with a blowjob. How shockingly un-princesslike.

How… tantalizing.

I lean back and let her take control. In a moment, she’ll discover I’m not as hard as she’s used to finding me at the slightest mention of sex. Not my problem. She can use this rare opportunity to hone her seduction skills.

They’ll come in handy with her next man.