https://nopenotpam.com/2022/08/14/a-letter-a-week-t/

We’re at Letter T…click the link above for more info and join in!  I’ve used the host-author’s drawing and her 5 prompt words:  Tropics, Thrill, Tactical, Tempt, Toucan

A tactical decision

Waiting till he’d been retired

For years before writing to him

Thinking his fan mail would

Have diminished…increasing

Her chance of a reply

How thrilled she been, a child

He, handsome cowboy star…

~

Married, divorced, disillusioned, but

Her love for hero never waned…

~

Receiving brief cordial

Response she was tempted

To empty bank account

Board a plane, meet him

She knew he lived in

Eden-like tropics with wife

Of many decades

~

The trip was doomed…his city

Was hot, humid, crowded with

Tourists… she was irrational

Imagining he’d actually see her…

~

She wept entire flight home

Had counted on him being

The image heart clutched…

Would it have been so

Inappropriate to enjoy

A short conversation?

In truth, she’d hoped for

A replacement father…

~

But hero spoke

Through closed door

Pretending to be the butler…

~

Now she sat in shadowed room

A world far from his paradise…

He’d written second letter

Words lacking coherence

It lay in drawer with toucan

Pin, souvenir of fated journey…

The media announced

He’d died…likely suffered

Dementia a long time…

Some dreams are best

Kept locked in heart

Pristine…

©Leyde Ryan, 2022 ~ All rights reserved.