Dear Betty:

I can't disappoint Blink, who seems surprised that I would be willing to pose for her in the all together.

"This seems like something Betty would do," Blink says, and her eyes grow wet.

She's right. Where did that come from in you, Betty? You were older than me, more sheltered than me, but nothing stopped you. Herb adored you, even when you made him blush. He never told you to pipe down.

One of my few regrets was that we didn't become real friends until after Herb died. I remember the funeral. You wore red, and shocked the priest with your eulogy, talking about Herb's legs and his kisses. Maybe that's why you stayed married, and I didn't. I fell into the Wife Trap, that's what Blink calls it. Now Roy's married to a go-getter who makes him feel young, and even collaborates in his silly secret of making him younger.

If you were around, you'd tell me to forget my plan. To book a cruise with you, to find a Hawaiian boy to make me forget my troubles. You would have left me money, Betty, I know it. But the cancer ripped through you too fast.

Blink told me that she'll start painting me tomorrow, if I don't mind.

"How long will it take?" I ask.

"Are you going on a trip?"

"Something like it," I say, and suddenly I see my body floating down the river.