Chapter 20: Return to Sender

We sat on the floor of my kitchen with the shoebox between us and the pickle jar on the counter above.

Colin had found his pants.

Veda had found the coffee, and she sat cross-legged with a mug balanced on her knee.

I lifted the lid.

The envelopes were packed tight on their edges.

Every one had my name printed on the front in a different hand.

Across each one, in red ink, someone had stamped RETURN TO SENDER.

Under the stamp, in neat blue pen, was the same line over and over.

Declined. Per M.S.

"That's Lindsey's writing," I said.

"I know it," Colin said, in a voice I hadn't heard before.

I took the top envelope out.

It was thin and cream-colored and addressed in a square hand I knew, though I had no memory of it.

"That's mine," Veda said. "That's the November one."

"You wrote me in November?"

"I wrote you every month. Some weeks I wrote twice."

She started tallying on her fingers, then gave up and tipped half the box into her lap.

"Forty-one," she said. "Forty-one letters. Three birthday cards. One coupon for a free pottery class, which has expired."

She laughed, and it came out wet.

I slit the November envelope with my thumbnail.

The card inside showed a mud-colored mug with a face drawn on it.

"Still mad," Veda had written inside. "Come eat anyway. The pot's on the stove."

I looked down at her familiar scrawl.

Then I read another one, and another, and Veda put her hand over her eyes.

"I was so stupid," she said. "I thought you were reading them and throwing them away."

"I never saw one."

"I know that now."

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