Listen To Your Heart ~ Book One.

Mr. Edwards

"Billie." (He mumbles.)

"Who are you calling Billie, fool?"

(He notices a male rapper, sitting in his lap.)

"What the fuck?"

"Oh my God, he thought you were me! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!" (Billie laughs)

(David looks to his right, to see Billie dressed in a baggy hip-hop outfit. Surrounded by other rappers.)

"Did you truly think you ever had a chance with me? You're to fucking old! You're not even in my league!" (Billie laughs.)

(Her and the other rappers start rapping, while the others beat-box.)

"You're too old! You're too fucking old! She never really cared for you. Don't expect us to feel sad for you. You're too old!"

"What? What?" (David stammers. He hears a tapping sound in the distance.)

(David wakes up, drenched in sweat. A dream, it was just a bad dream. Holy shit.)

(Mr. Edwards, his elderly next-door neighbor was tapping on the railing dividing them with his cane.)

"Hey boy. You alright?" (He asks)

"Yea. Yea, I'm okay. Just a bad dream I guess."

"Only two things I know of that can make a man have bad dreams like that. Military service or a woman. Now I know you did some military, even if you don't talk about it none, but I'm betting it has to be a woman."

"I'd rather not get into it. It was just a bad dream."

"Now c'mon now, boy. Ain't a damn good thing on television as usual, and I'm old and I'm cranky. Humor an old man for a change."

"It's a mess, no matter how you look at it."

"Well then, start at the beginning then. Let's see if we can't figure this out."

"Alright, but don't say I didn't warn you."

(I start at the beginning. Telling him about the gypsy woman, about Billie and everything that had happened between us.)

"Hold on now, boy. You're not pulling an old man's leg with a story like that?"

"Yea, I'm having trouble believing it myself. I still don't fully understand it."

"Do you love her like you said you do?"

"Yes, I do. God....what was I thinking getting involved with a 18-year-old girl? I'm gonna get locked up for being crazy for sure."

"Crazy? Love itself is crazy, but it's the greatest feeling in the world. My wife and I had 50 years of proving that. God rest her soul."

(I remembered his wife, a very kind woman. She had passed a year ago. A victim of a drive-by shooting. Such was life in Philadelphia now.)

"So, what's your next move now?"

"Move? I don't have any moves. She said we couldn't see one another again."

"Now boy, haven't you been listening to a damn thing I've been saying? Of course, you haven't! That's the problem with this world, you young'uns think you know everything!"

"If I knew everything, I wouldn't be in this mess. God, everything felt so right when I was with her. Now it isn't."

"And you sitting here sulking isn't helping a damn thing either. Tell her how you feel."