“I thought of Andi. Over and over. As if she were only a name and that name was powerful enough to propel me. The love I felt in that moment was pure, Richard. I had done what she asked of me. What more can we do?”

Outside, the Goblin sky was still dark and Charles ran under it, hailing a cab with one hand, a severed toe clamped by twin blades in the other.

“Andi, I thought. Andi, Andi, Andi, Andi…I did it. For you, Andi, I did it. For Andi, for you, big love, legendary love…Andi.”

15

The people at the post office waved to him as he came in the next morning. “A present for your lady friend in Minnesota?”

“Sure is,” Charles said.

“A happy girl is a happy boy.”

Charles thought about that.

“Sure is.”

After leaving the post office he drove south on Christmas to the Transistor Planet. He had to work. It wasn’t going to be easy. Standing around selling electronics while thinking about whether Andi was going to like his gift. Would she have questions?

He helped people with the newest printers and tried not to think about the images he’d seen in the morgue. A body half in shadow. The bone that broke like old bark. The toe in a plastic bag in the mail.

16

Two days later Andi called. She was electrified.

She told Charles she loved him and that their love would go down as one of the all-time greats. She even hinted at marriage.

Charles’s blood flowed masculine through his body. He was basking in the bright light of love.

But Andi wanted more.

“I couldn’t believe it, Richard. She asked for a finger. She said that no man had ever sent his lover two parts and that we stood a chance at ‘upstaging’ Van Gogh and all the lovers who ever came before us. And those who’d follow, too. What could I do? If Andi wanted a finger…I’d send her a finger. Besides…it wouldn’t be mine. What harm was there in saying yes?”

The second time Charles was prepared. He brought with him a small hacksaw and a plastic bag.

Once again he found the side entrance open, and again he used his wallet to hold open the heavy metal door. After turning on the lights he was accosted with the strange feeling of returning to a place he never thought he’d see again. He walked straight to the second drawer from the left in the middle row and slid it halfway open. It was the same body. There was no doubting that. And Charles had no more intention of seeing its face this time than he did the last.