Come See Me, and Come Lonely

Favors for a Friend

C.J Mallory
P.O. Box 2571
Peachtree City, GA

Dear Luke,

Thank you for your concern in my personal disasters. It did cheer me up to know that, in addition to the other bounties she's given me, Cara Friday has made me some thoughtful and caring friends. I haven't made very many friends for her in return, have I? Her boyfriends keep turning out to be crooked, and her friends get murdered. Maybe this reflects my own jaundiced view of the world. I don't know. My outlook isn't any rosier at the moment.

The piranha-at-law must have been staying up nights thinking of new ways to torment me, and he has hit upon a dandy. Why didn't I see this coming when we were in college together? He seemed like such a nice fellow back then. I was a dewy English major who dated one engineer too many, and I suppose I lost my head when I found myself dating someone who didn't think my writing short stories for the underground college newspaper pro bono was a waste of time and who couldn't wait to sit side by side with me in Sanford Stadium and cheer the Bulldogs on homecoming night. I guess at the time it just all seemed too perfect. After graduation we got married, I took my degree and taught English to high schoolers to supplement our meager income, while he completed his law studies. And everything remained peachy keen during that first year of marriage.

I even let him talk me into getting an implant I didn't want so that we wouldn't have any unplanned pregnancies during his residency. I had a horrible reaction to it, but he refused to take me to get it removed. He even threatened he would divorce me for breach of promise if I had it taken out. It took an ectopic pregnancy, followed by a raging infection and me nearly dying in the ER for him to see the wisdom of having it removed. I think it was around that time he started cheating on me.

I really can't believe I'm telling you all this. Just tell me if it's too much information and I'll stop! But it's incomprehensible. I haven't even met you in person and yet you seem so easy to talk to. Oh, God. If you didn't know before, you probably already figured it out. Yes, Luke, I am a lonely writer. For all the money and success, I really have a very small circle and have certainly never opened up to any of them like this. Pathetic, isn't it? Okay, I'll stop now. Jesus, please accept my apologies. I am so, so sorry.

But, you see, the upshot of all this is Malcolm wants in on the books. Before he used to tell me that the trees used to make the paper that my books were printed on would be better off used as lumber. Remember how I told you the novels used to sell for peanuts? But now, he's caught on to my success. I don't know how.

Now they go book club, and movie producers buy the rights to hoard for a year while they threaten to cast Kristen Stewart in the role of Cara before the one-year option expires, but they still pay...as do the book clubs, foreign publishers, audio people (did you know that Laura Linney is the reader of all the Cara Friday audiobooks?), and so on. The money just added up. Now suddenly my "little hobby" is a valuable commodity.

Maybe one of his friends bought a book and showed it to him. In any case, he smells money like a shark smells blood in the water. And not only does Malcolm the Merciless want part ownership of the early books, written when I was still Mrs. Bluebeard...get this...he also claims that he has an interest in all the books containing that character because he "provided financial, intellectual, and emotional assistance in the creation of the character and the series." I quote from his latest legal torpedo.

He and his bimbo are coming into town, and we have a court date soon. So, the fate of Cara Friday is very much up in the air, I'm afraid. I suppose I'll just have to wait and see what the lawyers have to say.

Luke, you've been a dear friend and a faithful reader, so I thought I'd better explain this to you, so that you'll understand. I can't let my work be used to provide Malcolm and the bimbo with sports car and spandex money. It would be like turning Cara into a prostitute. So, I'm afraid that my work in progress will be the last Cara Friday novel. When I turn this book in, I'll be out of contract, and I'll tell them I'm through. I think I'd rather go back to teaching high schoolers about semicolons and Shakespeare than pay blackmail to Malcolm.