Chapter 4: I Am Woman, Hear Me Blog!

Further inspecting her mail, Melanie found the envelope with the MasterCard Gift Cards. Taking out a blank 3×5 inch card from her recipe box, Melanie used the red marker to draw a large red “X”, followed by an equally large question mark. Beneath the symbols, she added “amy001g.blogspot.com” in ballpoint ink, and folded the card so that address was not obvious.

Melanie pulled out and plugged in her old laptop, and waited for Windows and the Notepad text editor to arouse themselves.

Friday, January 20, 2023

Mystery Man,

I won’t use “Dear,” because you are not dear to me, at least not yet. And that’s kind of the problem. You have me at a huge disadvantage, because you know a lot about me, and I know almost nothing about you. And, nice as you are being to us, I cannot help but resent it.

To start with, I created this space on BlogSpot with help from a friend of mine, in case sperm donor or his family might want to see some images of my baby. Evidently, they did not, according to the access logs. My friend helped me make this space as private as possible, and it gets no visitors, as I said.

But if you don’t want to respond here, you can write to me at

fourscars@beltwest.net

— including your name and an address that I can reply to.

If you won’t do that, I WON’T communicate with you further.

I mean it.

So, write to me immediately, and I will respond to you immediately. Think of it as two-factor authentication.

Otherwise, to be clear, it’s the big red “X” for you.

But I need to acknowledge your kindness, and willingness to overcome your shyness enough to make contact. And I won’t pretend to you that I don’t need the money. Or won’t use it.

When I heard from you (and some other stranger!?) about the tires on my old Civic, I was wracked with guilt. I cried, to be honest. I would rather die than see my Amy in danger, or hurt.

So all I can say is thank you, no exaggeration, from the bottom of my heart. I will take my car in to Honda for that service appointment you arranged. Again, thank you.

And, before I forget to say so, thank you also for the movie tickets. Amy will be so thrilled.

This is so frustrating, to “communicate” this way. You’ve earned a hug, you nice man. But nothing more, don’t you see? I’m giving you a huge benefit of the doubt, that you are sincerely interested in our welfare.

You have to understand my fear, that you are creating a dependency. An imbalance of power. In effect, buying my affection.

If you aren’t sincere, if this is manipulation, then God help you. I will track you down somehow and kick you into next week.

But your shyness, your SAD (I thought SAD was Seasonal Affect Disorder, that is, winter gloom), whatever, has bought you a small temporary measure of grace with me.

If you use that opportunity so we can have a TWO-WAY “conversation,” then maybe we can become more to each other than e-pen pals.

I am, truly, thinking of you too, Mystery Man.

But the next fucking words I see from you had better be your name and your email.

Your NAME and your EMAIL.

Or it’s the big red “X” for you.

-- Melanie Geary

Closing and saving the new text document, Melanie posted the content on her blog site and turned in for the night. She was truly wrung out and emotionally exhausted from this night.