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  clowns. "Just because you want something doesn't mean

  you should have it."

  "Just because you want something doesn't mean you

  should deny yourself the pleasure," Miriam said serenely.

  "Buy yourself that box. You deserve it."

  "I have nothing to write with it!"

  "Letters to a sweetheart," she suggested.

  "I don't have a sweetheart." I shook my head again.

  "Sorry, Miriam. Can't do it now. Maybe some other time."

  She sighed. "Fine, fine. Deny yourself the pleasure of

  something pretty. You think that's what you need?"

  "I think I need to pay my bils before I can buy luxuries,

  that's what I think."

  "Ah. Sensible." She inclined her head. "Practical. Not very romantic. That's you."

  romantic. That's you."

  "You can tel al that from the kind of paper I buy?" I put

  my hands on my hips to stare at her. "C'mon."

  Miriam shrugged, and it was easy to see how she must

  have been as a young woman. Stubborn, graceful,

  beautiful. "I can tel it by the paper you don't buy. When you're an old lady, you'l be wise like me, too."

  "I hope so." I laughed.

  "I hope you'l come back and buy yourself that box. It's

  meant for you, Paige."

  "I'l definitely think about it. Okay? Is that good enough?"

  "If you buy the paper," Miriam told me, "I guarantee you'l find something worth writing in it."

  Chapter 02

  Shal we begin?

  This is your first list.

  You wil folow each instruction perfectly. There is no

  margin for error. The penalty for failure is dismissal.

  Your reward wil be my attention and command.

  You wil write a list of ten. Five flaws. Five strengths.

  Deliver them promptly to the address below.

  The square envelope in my hand bore the faint ridges of

  realy expensive paper and no glue on the flap, like the

  reply envelope included with an invitation. I turned the

  heavy, cream-colored card that had been inside it over

  and over in my fingers. It felt like high-grade linen. Also

  expensive. I fingered the slightly rough edge along one

  side. Custom cut, maybe, from a larger sheet. Not quite

  heavy enough to be a note card, but too thick to use in a

  computer printer.

  I lifted the envelope to my face and sniffed it. A faint,

  I lifted the envelope to my face and sniffed it. A faint,

  musky perfume clung to the paper, which was smooth but

  also porous. I couldn't identify the scent, but it mingled

  with the aroma of expensive ink and new paper until my

  head wanted to spin.

  I touched the black, looping letters. I didn't recognize the

  handwriting, and the letter bore no signature. Each word

  had been formed carefuly, each letter precisely drawn,

  without the careless loops, ticks and whorls that marked

  most people's writing. This looked practiced and efficient.

  Faceless.

  The paper listed a post-office box at one of the local

  branch offices, and that was it. Since moving into

  Riverview Manor five months ago, I'd received a few

  advertising circulars, requests for charitable donations

  addressed to two different former tenants and way too

  many bils. I hadn't had any personal mail at al. I turned

  the card over again, listening to the soft sigh of the paper

  on my skin. It didn't have a name or address on the front.

  Only a number, scrawled in the same languid hand as the

  note. I looked closer, seeing what in my haste I hadn't

  noticed before.

  114

  114

  That explained it, then. This note wasn't for me at al. The

  ink had smeared a little, turning the one into a passable

  version of a four, if you weren't paying close attention.

  Someone had stuffed this into my mailbox, 414, by

  mistake.

  At least it wasn't another baby shower or wedding

  invitation from "friends" I hadn't seen in the past few years.

  I wasn't a fan of being put on a loot-gathering mailing list

  just because once upon a time we'd been in a math class

  together.

  "What's that?" Kira had come up behind me in a cloud of

  cigarette odor and now dug her chin into my shoulder.

  I don't know why I didn't want to show her, but I closed

  the card and slipped it back into the envelope, then found

  the right mailbox and shoved it through the slot. I peeked

  into the glass window and saw it resting inside the metal

  cave, slim and single and alone.

  "Nothing. It wasn't for me."

  "C'mon then, whore. Let's get upstairs. We have a

  "C'mon then, whore. Let's get upstairs. We have a

  threesome with Jose, Jack and Jim." She held up the

  clanking paper grocery sack containing the bottles.

  Every woman should have a slutty friend. The one who

  makes her feel better about herself. Because no matter

  how drunk she got the night before, or how many guys she

  made out with at that party, or how short her skirt is, that

  slutty friend wil always have been…wel…sluttier.

  Kira and I had traded that role back and forth over the

  years, a fact I would never be proud of but couldn't hide.

  "It's not even eight o'clock. Things don't start jumping until

  at least eleven."

  "Which is why I stopped at the liquor store." She looked

  around the lobby and raised both eyebrows. "Wow.

  Nice."

  I looked, too. I always did, even though I'd memorized

  nearly every tile in the floor. "Thanks. C'mon, let's grab the

  elevator."

  She had to have been as equaly impressed with my

  apartment, but she didn't say so. She swept through it,

  opening cupboard doors and looking in my medicine

  cabinet, and when it came time to eat the subs we'd

  bought for dinner she made a show of setting my scarred

  kitchen table with real plates instead of paper. But she

  didn't tel me it was nice.

  It was almost like old times as we giggled over our food

  and watched reality TV at the same time. I hadn't forgotten

  what a bizarre and hilarious sense of humor Kira had, but

  it had been a long time since I laughed so hard my stomach

  clenched into knots. I was suddenly glad I'd invited her

  over. There's something nice about being with someone

  who already knows al your faults and likes you anyway…

  or at least doesn't like you any less because of them.

  She had a new boyfriend. Tony something-or-other, I

  didn't recognize the name. Kira had never mentioned him

  in her text messages or occasional e-mails to me, but the

  way she dropped it casualy into our conversation now

  meant she wanted me to ask about him.

  "How long have you been going out?" I leveled a shot of

  Cuervo and studied it, not sure I wanted to take it. Once

  upon a time I'd been able to toss them back without fear

  of the consequences, but I hadn't done much drinking

  lately. I pushed it toward her, instead.

  Kira drank back the shot with a practiced gulp. "Since just

  after you moved. A long time."

  I didn't feel as if it had been