This is an excerpt from Part One of my unpublished first novel EDGE OF CALIFORNIA. If any publishers are interested in reading the entire novel (in order to consider publishing it), please contact me.

I haven't seen Connie in two years but I still think about her. I go months sometimes without thinking about her, but I always end up giving in. Our friendship lasted just ten months, but in that time I’d gotten to know her, and near the end of it I realized I was in love with her. It was a difficult period in my life—struggling in school, fearful about the future, etc. My love for her made things worse. At least for a while I thought it was LOVE.
     In March, I saw a girl at Lake Murray who was a DEAD RINGER for Connie! I knew it wasn’t her, yet all my memories of her began to flood back in. So began the latest Connie lapse. My recollection of her sweet face infected me, every minute detail invaded me. I experienced a…yearning (I suppose), for Connie. Picture all that in so few words.
     I hate getting my friends involved whenever this occurs, so I avoided them as much as possible. But wherever I went, I thought about her. Example: at Home Depot (didn’t know why I was there, but I bought Arabian Jasmine—sampaquita, the national flower of the Philippines—for Mom), I imagined Connie there with me, making a decision on the color of paint that’d best suit our bedroom. I swear, she was that pretty—a girl you’d like to be seen with because of her sweet face and lovely smile. You could see yourself settling down with her and living with her in some stucco home in Paradise Hills with a green lawn out front and an old wooden fence surrounding the place. “Do you have time this summer to paint the fence?” she’d ask. “Of course,” I’d answer, wrapping my arms around her in the den as we studied the new paint on the walls. That fulfilled me for a while. That and the memory of her peach shoulders.
     Life with Connie has its nuisances, too: One day, I found myself wandering the lonely streets of Clairemont. I had no idea how I got there; it was cold and foggy, far from home. I pondered the sky, hands deep in coat pockets, gazing at the road; I sat on the curb but felt out of place, so I stood and looked around as if I had someplace to go—a destination—hands squeezing the life juice out of my skull. It was like something out of an old European WWII film, with nasty old colors but beautiful cinema nevertheless. I’d stare at the road, then, finally, at you, Beethoven or whomever as background music, staring straight at you like something out of Sweden or Ingmar Bergman. I lingered in the warm seam of things, considering Connie’s face, her breasts, also my solitude, our solitude. Considering also that I was lost, a college grad with nothing truly to show for it—meaning her (Connie’s) mother may not care for my mother, her sister may loathe my sister with a passion, all her ex-boyfriends may be much more successful than I am. I realized I had no potential or productivity anymore; in fact, I was depressed, seriously depressed.
     In Downtown (during lunch) sometimes I see petite brunettes (5’2”, 110 lbs.) who remind me of her. Peach complexion, brunette ponytail, lithe body, businesswoman’s gait (“I have to be somewhere!”), etc…I begin to think they’re all the embodiment of her. I even stopped a girl once because of the resemblance, but she said “Sorry” and moved on, and I realized it wasn’t Connie at all. Do I even know the real Connie?
     I wake up in the middle of the night and think I’m with Connie and waking with her at sunrise, gazing into her dreaming face. One day I’ll have a spur-of-the-moment realization, I’ll find something and clutch it and keep it as a personal memory. Maybe all I’ll really need is one skewed-perfect memory and then no more, I can just stop. Forever.
     I’m almost twenty-four and I still think about her. I don’t know what it is about her—her beauty, her personality, the way the sun danced off her lovely face—that makes me think about her, but it’s sweet and wonderful at times, dirty and horrible at other times. I’ve considered also that she’s happy with her life now and doesn’t need me to screw it up for her. She’s probably married now anyway; girls like Connie don’t stay single, it’s impossible.
     My friend Rob once asked me, “What do you think about when you think about her?” I replied, “Her face; she was lovely.” Hers is a face Rob can no longer recall, since she was never “worthwhile” to him. We were all in Shakespeare together. Then, he said she was beautiful; now, he can’t even recall her face. Even giving him a detailed description, like he’s a police sketch artist, is no help.
     Maybe it was that cold loneliness I felt in college that made me want to be with her. In my sophomore year, I had the sad realization that I didn’t have many friends, that I didn’t go to many parties, that I didn’t get as drunk or as stoned as was possible for a boy my age and in my state. Then I met Connie in Shakespeare and all the macrocosmic/quantum matter in my life seemed to make a little more sense to me.
     Connie. Connie was a lovely girl: sparkling green eyes, auburn-brown hair that came down in waves, a great fresh-from-the-dryer scent like a special flower no one’s ever breathed in, and a face, complete with cute V-shaped grin, that had this natural beauty that just made you smile. I dream sometimes that I’m back in school with her, in Shakespeare. She’s sitting all quiet and reserved; I’m staring at her. I’d had a crush on her since a week into the semester. Shakespeare bored me; she seemed to love him though. My class time was spent admiring her. I pictured us watching the sunset, my arms wrapped around her, gazing at my reflection in her eyes, detecting my own smile. In class, she rarely spoke, her left leg often curled under her body. She followed the lecture most days, but sometimes it seemed like she wasn’t even there; she just sat and daydreamed.
     I didn’t have the courage to speak to her until mid-April of that semester. I was always shy around girls I liked because I didn’t want to screw it up. I didn’t want to let her get away either, so I caught up to her on the pedestrian bridge overlooking College Avenue. It was like those charming photographs people love, like that one with the kissing couple amid a fast-paced world. Her stunning beauty, caught up in the sunshine, mesmerized me. We were making eye contact, like she’d seen me for the first time. It wasn’t the brief “Bless you” after a sneeze, but an actual gaze, an actual smile. I now existed in her world. Our conversation was short and sweet; I loved how she carefully formed words with her nice mouth, stroking her hair back to expose an ear, wrinkling her eyes into narrow slits, and (the best one) made those cute dimples of hers grow and dwindle with every movement of her jaw.
     She was everything I wanted—the lovely girl with the green eyes, stuck in the loneliest corner of the Americas. But I’m sure we all have regrets and spend a part of our lives mulling over them. What if we’d ended up together? I imagine this: she’d look nice on my arm; was I worth all the trouble? I’m not terribly handsome but not ugly either. It’s a possibility she’d hook up with an average, nice young man like me; my initial personality interested her. She loved our conversations anyway, our deep five-minute ones on the way to the parking lot after school. I found her fascinating. Once I wrote her a poem and gave it to her after class. She gave me a V-shaped grin and her patented “Wow!” after she read it, which wasn’t a dumb “Wow” but a slow sexy drawn-out “W-w-wow-w-w” moan. She kept telling me what a great poem it was. She said I should keep writing, especially if it made me happy. Just before she got into her car, she said, with a smile and gleaming eyes, “Thank you for my poem.” I watched her drive off. That same evening, I joined my Russian class for dinner at a Russian restaurant in Normal Heights. Rob was there and we talked about Connie the whole time, since he was in Shakespeare, too. All the time, I thought about her, even after I stayed up late with friends playing poker and watching a porno. Connie moaned “W-w-wow-w-w” in the meantime, and I was in love. I still recall the happiness I felt, happiness I haven’t truly felt since.
     I remember her soft silky porcelain skin, with tiny red dots in some places; her fabric softener scent, how it intensified whenever we were close; her firm breasts packed into a halter top like bulging globes, stretching out the material, a top with the real thin straps, displaying her kissable shoulders; her fingers, the way they handled pretzels, the way they turned Shakespeare, the way they gently handled the paper I wrote her poem on, the way they put lip balm on her pretty lips, etc. I wanted her to hug me tight around the neck, let those fingers caress the back of my head as if strumming a guitar. Soft acoustic music.
     I remember random things about her and now I wonder if she really meant them: if she really hated the rain or wanted to see the world. I just loved being with her. She saw me as some shining star with potential; I saw her as the loveliest girl I had ever met.
     I really don’t remember why she ended our friendship; I guess she felt I was getting too close to her. We all have our own lines and boundaries; I crossed hers. One November afternoon I told her about my plan to marry her and bring her to grad school with me. We’d live in a small house in the suburbs with our golden retrievers; I’d cook her breakfast and she’d help me write. It’d be so wonderful. I told her, “I swear to God, I love you.” Connie managed to smile. Briefly. It wasn’t healthy for either of us. She’d tell me I was a great guy and a great writer, and she didn’t want me to discuss my novel too much because she wanted to be “amazed” when she read it. And during all this, I’d stare at her breasts, wrapped in a yellow cotton shirt under overall straps. Connie had wonderful breasts; probably still does. Sometimes I’d hope to see her, just to talk, and we’d tell each other stupid things just to seem friendly to each other. After a while it all just seemed like bullshit.
     I realize Connie’s gone. And for a reason: she has her own life to deal with and can’t include me in it. Instead she’s somewhere living her own life under her own terms, not realizing a guy she’d known in college still loves her. I realize I may never see her again. But I want to be with her one sad golden evening, to gaze at her face, shining in the early moonlight along the bay. I’ll blow all sorts of whispers into those green eyes. When I walk in Seaport Village sometimes, waiting for sunset, watching the boats and aircraft carriers busy in the harbor, I think about those eyes and wish they were gazing into mine.