Excerpt: The Deeper Footprints

Chapter Three

It smelled of vanilla. Was it on purpose he wondered. Was this person writing to him, this female, scenting her letter to him with vanilla? He raised the plain white security envelope to his nose and inhaled deeply. The vanilla was faint but unmistakable.
Walter pictured a country home somewhere in the hills east of Los Angeles. The lawn was well manicured. Green beyond reality, and lush. A cobblestone path stretched from the front porch off into the distance beyond where he cared to imagine. The home was rustic, but well maintained. A shake shingle roof of brown and grey covered the home and it’s wood plank sides. A large protruding window in the front of the home. What did they call them, he thought. Bay windows. Yes, a bay window trimmed in white with flowing curtains of Queen Anne’s Lace just inside the spotless glass panes.
His imagination began a curvy lazy panning towards that bay window. Over the lawn, crossing the path not once but two times, hovering just over a flower bed and just outside the window. The sun cast a brilliant reflection across the glass surface blocking any view inside.
Eventually the glare of the sun subsided and Walter was looking at himself in the glass. He was there on the lawn. The grass made noise beneath his bare feet. He couldn’t feel the emerald blades, but he could hear their gentle crunch as he shifted his positioning. Walter crouched down to get a better look into the glass. It was all him. His hair, shaggy and dark, framing his bearded face. Each facial feature, out of proportion, and yet at home on him. The thick brow. The deep set gray eyes. The tiny scar below his left eye. It was all him..