Chapter 20: The Letter

Gavin's POV

I opened Willa's envelope at the little table by the window.

Cassandra sat across from me with her hand around a cup of tea.

Two things fell out.

One was a sheet of thick paper folded in three.

The other was a cream envelope I had last seen three years ago.

It had gone soft at the edges, and one corner was worn thin by someone's thumb.

It was unopened by Willa.

I knew it before I touched it.

"Read hers first," Cassandra said quietly.

I unfolded the paper.

The date at the top was the afternoon before the show.

"Gavin," I read aloud. "I wrote this in case tonight went badly. If you are reading it, it did."

Cassandra did not move.

"I knew in the first minute at the gallery. You looked at the canvas the whole time I stood beside it.

"No man had ever looked at me with that face."

I stopped.

My throat had closed.

"Go on," Cassandra said.

"I said yes when you asked if I painted it.

"I told myself I would correct it before the evening ended.

"Then you stayed, and I thought: let me have this for one night."

I cleared my throat.

"One night became four years. I'm not sorry enough.

"I will become sorry slowly, and you do not have to wait for it."

The window glass rattled in a gust of wind.

"I never opened your letter. I did not need to.

"I know what a letter looks like when a man writes it to somebody else."

My hands had begun to shake.

"I watched Cassandra take it from my bag on my wedding morning. I stood behind the door. I let her."

"She let me," Cassandra said, to no one.

"I thought: let her have the trap, I will keep the rest.

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