Keen reader, you will remember the day my book was heralded as the greatest feminist text of the Century? It was before I'd written a word.Yet, do our beginnings ever know our ends? Over the several months of writing,  the book slowly evolved, like a fish, or an unlovely insect, into what it's commissioner surely intended all along, a biography of himself. I remember saying I was exasperated by this turn of events, and insisted on re-writing it in the first person, but this was just a puff of anger. I can't say I was overly concerned. While I've had my moments with feminism, it was never my mission to advance the cause. No, Axel wanted me to write a book and, in plain sight, he'd bribed me.  Now when I am dead, I'll claim the accolade of having provided therapy for hundreds of unknown clients as well as having ghostwritten the autobiography of my friend, Axel von Raffenstein. Axel, himself a ghost.

I stopped walking, my mind peeling away, trying to appraise itself. I smiled, or imagined doing so. That was...a good thought...about the ghost. I continued walking.

I was walking the river path of the Vialonde into the village of Sauve. I was in Europe, in France. Like skimming stones into water, these thoughts never lasted. They bounced once, twice, and plummeted who knows where. Who knows where? I always seem to have my best ones as I'm about meet friends, colleagues, clients. As if my mind only functions when its' peace is about to be...devastated. And it was at this moment, feeling like a born Frenchman, I raised my head and saw Axel sitting in the restaurant garden, holding his elephant ivory stick. He was watching the waiter with the intent, or deliberation, of a an old, old man.

Axel!

I picked up a stone and swiveled round, as if to skim it back along the current of the river but instead, turned toward Axel and, smiling, slipped the stone into my pocket. It felt good. A few more moments like that might suffice. They could save a life. 

Salut!

He lifted a finger, along with his head, towards me. I loped over to his table, gently lifting his hand,  his elbow and slowly his whole body into a welcoming hug. I had written the life of this homosexual billionaire. I felt I was owed the chance to know what his body and bones felt like. Surely there was some truth in his physical presence? I clasped his shoulder and hit his back three times. His chin juddered on my shoulder.