I have to wonder something. Can I call a person beautiful even if you can’t see her? What I mean is; does it mean the same thing if I just go on and on about her by describing her and all of that other stuff rather than whipping out a picture to shove in your face? If you ask me, film could never do her justice. I’m not just saying that because I have no pictures of her. I am saying that because not even Michelangelo in all of his glory and splendor in his prime could never do her justice. And you know what? I would kill him if he even tried.

I suppose that that’s the attitude that got me here in the first place. You know… love. But not a love that you could ever understand. I mean a love that is undefinable by any mortal. In fact, I don’t even think that the gods in the heavens could breath out words that are fit enough to define that love. If they could, then they would probably keep it all to themselves.

I am sure that by now, you must piqued. Who is she? And all of that other rhetorical bullshit. I wish I could introduce you to her, but I can’t. She’s dead. Yeah, that’s right, I killed her. I killed her right before she killed me. How’s that for a storybook ending? Okay, okay, okay. So she didn’t actually kill me, she was just the cause for my untimely demise. More about that later, why don’t I just offer you up an explanation of our love.

I guess I should begin by telling you all about her. That’s usually how these sort of things go, right? Don’t worry, I won’t go off on some sort of Shakespearean tirade. I was never one for that kind of thing, so why should I subject you to that kind of crap? I’ll do my best to be brisk. But not too short. I can’t come off as funny, she would have never wanted that. She deserves better.

Janice. That was her name, you know. Amazingly, she looked just like a Janice. I mean, my next door neighbors had a cousin named Janice and she looked nothing like a Janice. She looked more like a Courtney. Don’t ask me how, but she did. One of those freakish things I’ll never understand. Sorry, let me get back on track.

Janice was beautiful. I mean she was stunning. Morning, noon, and night. No matter when it was, she was just unbelievable. Her eyes were greener than the hills of Ireland. I don’t mean like Dublin or Belfast, I mean out in the country. You’ve probably seen travel brochures with those hills splashed across the cover. Pretty green, eh? Well, Janice had eyes that were even greener. I don’t even think you could call them green. The color was just one you don’t come across normally. Yes, they were that green.

What was even more amazing about Janice was that she had red hair. Sure, a lot of people had red hair, but how many have hair so red that you’re blinded by looking at it. Well, maybe her hair didn’t do it. Actually, that was just an excuse to talk about her beauty. I could care less about her hair, she never let me touch it. I have some locks of it hidden somewhere, but she still never let me touch it. Some people don’t like to have their perfection tainted.

Back to her beauty, and she had plenty of it. For days at a time I would revel in it. Now don’t go thinking that all she did was waste her time by letting me stare at her. That would be a wrong conclusion. I hardly even saw her. While I didn’t really have Janice, the person, to look at; I did have her presence etched into my brain. Not exactly literally, but pretty damn close to it. If you were to come into my room before the cops cleaned it out, you would have seen walls covered with pictures of my fair Janice. Oh, you know what? I shouldn’t hold back from you. A couple of months ago I did paint her portrait on my ceiling. For a couple of weeks I lacquered some of my smaller portraits of her on to the floor, but my mother had it carpeted. I was pissed and all, but I figured she had a good reason. After all, it would be wrong to walk on the face of the one I loved.

Have I actually described Janice, yet? I know I told you about her graciously green eyes and her rambunctiously red hair, but did I tell you about her nose? Or her lips? Or her eyelashes? Probably not. If I had days, which I kind of do, I would go on, but I’m sure that soon, Janice will want the man of her dreams by her side, so I won’t go into all the details of her beauty, besides, it’s like I said, there is no way in hell that I could ever do her beauty justice with a mere description. All you need to know that there is no way in hell that anyone, and I do mean anyone could ever compare with the beauty she brings forth.

Before I go on to tell you about our first date and our Romeo and Juliet ending, why don’t I tell you about what brought me to her feet in the first place. Again, this is actually a long story, but it must be told so I will truncate it for the sake of your knowledge.

What’s so funny about this story is that it began like something you see on television, or the movies, even. We both attended the school. Well, actually, I was a guest student, which means that I would go to her school and go to classes every now and then. I never got graded for doing this, but that’s just the kind of guy I am. Always going the extra mile when all that was needed was an inch. That’s probably what brought her to me in the first place.

As I was saying, we were both at the same school. Same hallway, in fact. She was walking on one side, and I was on the other. When all of a sudden, I got lost in thought, bumped into her, and knocked her books to the ground. She liked to carry her books rather than use a book bag. She wasn’t lazy. Being the gentlemen that I am, I helped her to gather up all her books. I won’t bother to tell you about all of the bad students who attempted to keep me away from her books, but I got them all and walked her to class. Like I said, straight out of tv. It was romantic.

I’m sure that when you watch tv, you’ve seen some guy talking about how he had to win his wife’s hand over before they even became an item. Same thing with me. It took some coaxing, but gradually, I did wear her down into having a conversation. Let me tell you this: she was not disappointed. She wasn’t a slut or anything, so she didn’t just come out and say let’s go out. She tried to play hard to get. You’ve probably heard this line before, "I’ve got a boyfriend." Most guys who fall for that one are saps. I am no fool, so she knew that she had a keeper when I threw back my comment. "A mere technicality."

And it began like that. It wasn’t spectacular or an all out accident like you see on tv or in the movies. I believe that there was a reason that I was in that hallway, on that day, at that time. It was meant for me to be there with my love, Janice.

Contrary to what some may believe, we didn’t just start going out and get married two weeks later. I wanted to pace things out. That’s the kind of guy I am. Laid-back. There was no way that I would let us rush into things. Suppose we weren’t Mr. and Mrs. right? We had to grow into each other. We had to get comfortable with being with one another. Sure, it was hard, but I managed. She was a quick one, Janice was. Always rushing. To class. To her car. Into her house. It goes on. She had never been laid-back. Everything she did had to be done quickly. From closing the door to hanging up the phone. Sometimes, she didn’t even give me a chance to say my name on the phone. She was just that quick. But you know what? It was cool because we were on the same level. She knew when I wanted to say "I love you," so it was like I didn’t even have to say it. It was great.

What was even greater about our relationship was that we were always testing each other to see if my heart was really into it. Remember that time I told you about her trying to fool me with that "I’ve got a boyfriend" line, she tried it again, but differently. She got some guy to pose as her "boyfriend" to see if I was really dedicated to her. The best part about it was that this guy was really into the role. He said he loved her and that they were engaged and all of that other kind of stuff "boyfriends" are supposed to say. I simply told him that he had it mixed around and that I was her boyfriend and that he could go back and tell her I passed the test. He really bought his role. Well, I did apologize for breaking his hand. He did need to wake up and smell reality.

Now you should know by now that I’m a pretty level headed fellow. Really. It takes a lot to get me irritated to the point of point blank anger. In fact, I’ve only been to that point twice in my entire life. The first time was when her father decided that I wasn’t good enough for his daughter. When Janice and I first got together, he was cool. He even said he’d like to have a son like me. That was the ultimate compliment, you know. However, he really started tripping one day and just decided to change all of the locks in the house. The front door, the back door, side door, master bedroom door, and for some odd, sick, ungodly reason he changed the lock for Janice’s room, but of course, I didn’t find out about that until later. Much later. Nevertheless, I was pissed. Of course, the locks were just the tip of the iceberg.

I know that sometimes, people like to play pranks on you and call block you for the fun of it. Unfortunately, her mother forgot to take it off. I’ve never been one to rain down on good humor, but I had to speak to Janice, so I let her know that they forgot. Her mother had never struck me as too sharp on the IQ scale, so I’m sure that it kept slipping her mind. It cost me a lot of quarters, but I called. I was insulted by the fact that they assumed I couldn’t use pay phones and must’ve thought I was someone else.

Maybe someone had been stalking the family. I don’t really know, but I am sure someone had been calling the house besides me and they felt compelled to get the number changed. Unfortunately, I was never privy to the new number. Like I said, Janice’s mom, a moron in all pretenses of the word, probably never gave anyone the new number, which is why I never found out either and had to relay all of my messages to her through note form or through her "tests."

I think that whoever had been stalking her family had gotten to Janice, because her father was always waiting for her at the door at school and always escorted her directly to her car. The things people will do. It’s amazing, don’t you think?

You’ll have to forgive me for the crash course of my relationship with Janice, but enquiring minds want to know, right? Which brings me to our first date. Yes folks, the moment you’ve all been waiting for. I was decked to the nines. I even had my mother go and get an old clip-on tie that had belonged to my father. I was going all out, and there was nothing that would be spared for our special evening.

Since, it had been rather difficult for me to communicate with Janice, all I could do was do the thing that all women love. Surprise them. I know what you’re thinking. Have you gone mad? There was someone stalking her family, and here you are just going up to the house unannounced. How could they protect you from that unknown menace? Simple, I carried protection.

No, no, no! Nothing like that. Sure, I would have loved to, but how in the hell would a condom keep a stalker from killing me or the one that I loved or one of the ones that she loved almost as much as me? Simple. It wouldn’t. Sometimes, I get the feeling that you can be really dense sometimes.

Well, anyway, I had a gun. Nothing too big or noticeable, but it could get the job done if need be done. Sometimes, guns can make people nervous, and I wasn’t sure if her father was familiar enough with guns not to get us all shot… accidentally, that is.

As I walked up to her house. I noticed that the lights were all just shutting off. Not simultaneously, but in a very rapid succession. Luckily, for them, I had seen enough Rescue 911 and all of that other stuff to know that that was the kind of thing that happens when a hostage crisis is happening.

I swear to God, that what happened because of my training in such a crisis was all accidental. I never maliciously intended to hurt anybody in that house, but because of the way everything went down, I was so confused that I must admit: I should have never had that gun.

First off, I burst through the living room window. After all, I thought she was in danger and needed to be saved. If it had been anyone else, I would’ve walked on by and kept walking on to Janice’s house, but it was Janice, and I would give my life for her.

"What in the hell are you doing here!" I couldn’t really place the voice with a face, but it sounded like I broke up a party that nobody wanted, except maybe the hostage takers, so I fired at the voice. I heard weight fall to the ground.

"You bastard!" Surely, this was the cohort’s moll, perhaps a rival of Janice. I couldn’t be all that sure who it was since it was merely a loud scream. Naturally, I shot her. Another body dropped. Better her than Janice. I would lay down my life for her, and her I was doing so. The things one will do.

From behind me, someone rushed me and tried to wrestle away the gun. Imagine that, three hostage takers! Considering there were only four people in Janice’s family, it couldn’t have been that hard if they all had guns. Whoever was trying to overtake me had a good jump on me, because I hadn’t expected the bum rush. I turned my body around so that I could be the hero by hopefully taking out all of these villains. I was going to be the knight in shining armor. Janice was my damsel-in-distress.

All of a sudden, a gun shot had went off. It was from my gun. I was positive that I hadn’t been shot, so the first thought on my mind was that I was that knight in shining armor and I was going out on a date with my damsel. Then, the lights came back on. Before me was a sight most unwanted. Of all things I had ever done, this was not one of them. Before me was my damsel. My lady. My love. I had shot her.

I looked around and all I could see was blood. Janice’s father was on the floor. A few feet away was her mother. And before me was my love, Janice, dead. Well, almost dead. It does take a little bit of time for a shot to the stomach to kill, but I was sure that she was going to die. Her brother was at the light switch in utter shock. He wasn’t the only one. I was trying harder than anything I had ever tried before to figure what had just happened.