I have a third-floor apartment with a bolt lock on both the front and back doors and usually two guns stored inside somewhere, and none of this probably deters break-ins as much as the two front doors to the three-decker itself. There’s an outside one and an interior one, and they’re both reinforced with steel and made of heavy black German oak. The portal glass in the first one is wired with alarm tape, and my landlord has fitted both doors with a total of six locks that require three different keys. I have a set. Angie has a set. My landlord’s wife, who lives in the first-floor apartment because she can’t stand his company, has one. And Stanis, my crazy landlord—terrified that a Bolshevik hit squad is going to come for him—has two sets.

All in all, my building is so secure I was surprised someone could even tape an envelope to the front door or lean a box against it without setting off nine or ten alarms and waking five city blocks.

The envelope was plain, white, letter-size with “patrick kenzie” typed in the center. No address, no stamp, no return address. I opened it and pulled a piece of typing paper from inside, unfolded it. There were no address headings, no date, no salutation, no signature. In the middle of the page, centered, someone had typed one word:

HI!

The rest of the page was virgin.

I handed it to Angie. She looked at it, turned it over, turned it back to the front. “’Hi,’” she read aloud.

“Hi,” I said.

“No,” she said, “more like ‘Hi!’ Give it that girlish giggle.”

I tried it.

“Not bad.”

HI!

“Could it be Grace?” She poured another cup of coffee.

I shook my head. “She says hi an entirely different way, believe me.”

“So, who?”

I honestly didn’t know. It was such an innocuous note, but weird too. “Whoever wrote it is a master of brevity.”

“Or has an extremely limited vocabulary.”

I tossed the note on the table, pulled back the tape on the box and opened it as Angie looked over my shoulder.

“What the hell?” she said.

The box was filled with bumper stickers. I pulled out a handful, and there was still another two handfuls waiting.

Angie reached in, grabbed a fistful.

“This is…odd,” I said.

Angie’s brow was furrowed and she had a curious half smile on her face. “You could say that, yeah.”

We took them into the living room and laid them out on the floor in a collage of blacks and yellows and reds and blues and shiny iridescents. Looking down at all ninety-six of them was like standing over a world of petulance and hollow sentiment and the hopelessly inept search for the perfect sound-bite:

HUGS NOT DRUGS; I’M PRO-CHOICE AND I VOTE; LOVE YOUR MOTHER; IT’S A CHILD NOT A CHOICE; I JUST FUCKING LOVE TRAFFIC; IF YOU DON’T LIKE MY DRIVING DIAL 1-800-EAT-SHIT; ARMS ARE FOR HUGGING; IF I’M A ROAD HOG, YOUR WIFE’S A PIG; VOTE FOR TED KENNEDY AND PUT A BLONDE IN THE WATER; YOU CAN HAVE MY GUN WHEN YOU PRY IT FROM MY COLD DEAD FINGERS; I’LL FORGIVE JANE FONDA WHEN THE JEWS FORGIVE HITLER; IF YOU’RE AGAINST ABORTION, DON’T HAVE ONE; PEACE—AN IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS COME; DIE YUPPIE SCUM; MY KARMA BEATS YOUR DOGMA; MY BOSS IS A JEWISH CARPENTER; POLITICIANS LIKE THEIR PEASANTS UNARMED; FORGET ’NAM? NEVER; THINK GLOBALLY, ACT LOCALLY; HONK IF YOU’RE RICH AND HANDSOME; HATE IS NOT A FAMILY VALUE; I’M SPENDING MY CHILD’S INHERITENCE; WE ARE OUT & WE ARE EVERYWHERE; SHIT HAPPENS; JUST SAY NO; MY WIFE RAN OFF WITH MY BEST FRIEND AND I’M SURE GOING TO MISS HIM; DIVERS DO IT DEEP; I’D RATHER BE FISHING; DON’T LIKE THE POLICE? NEXT TIME YOU’RE IN TROUBLE, CALL A LIBERAL; FUCK YOU; FUCK ME; MY CHILD IS AN HONOR STUDENT AT ST. CATHERINE’S ELEMENTARY; MY CHILD BEAT UP YOUR HONOR STUDENT; HAVE A NICE DAY, ASSHOLE; FREE TIBET; FREE MANDELA; FREE HAITI; FEED SOMALIA; CHRISTIANS AREN’T PERFECT, JUST FORGIVEN…