Letters in the Attic

by Talea Botha

  “I have to get going, I’ll see you later. Don’t mess the place up okay. I’ll let you know if I’m working late tonight.”

  Will nodded, and I let myself out. There was a bite in the morning air, the rays of the sun not strong enough to force away the evening chill yet. I walked to the bus stop, my mood a sight better than last night, and set my briefcase down next to the bench. I checked my tie, trying to peek at the headlines on the paper the man next to me was reading without looking interested, and waited. Will was so unpredictable. I’d have thought that at 19 he would have grown out of his teenage issues. Had I ever been like that? I couldn’t remember; I just had to grow up and get it over with. Someone had to take care of Will, he was only 12 then, scared and lost, clinging to me, the last thread of stability he had left. I’d had to go get a job to keep us going, to keep social services from taking Will. I couldn’t remember if I’d had the time to be unpredictable after that.

  I chuckled at Will’s question. The old house for business meetings, imagine that. Butch was probably talking nonsense into Will’s head. What kind of business did they think of starting? With Butch I couldn’t imagine it being anything legal; he wasn’t really the rule-abiding type.

  I had been so anxious to get rid of that house, the agency kept on blowing down my neck to get rid of it. It was bad publicity, the longer it took. I kind of missed it now that it was gone though. Not the old mess that it was, but I’d seen that house more often than any other. I’d taken so many people through it, closed the creaking door behind me so many times with a heavy sigh, I could walk those planks in my mind’s eye and recall every little detail. It was a different place, like something that knew what it had lost, and mourned for it.

  The bus pulled up and stopped with a shudder, and I followed the others on, picking a seat in the back. Another long day ahead of me.

  CHAPTER 3

  Serena

  The old house was officially my fifth project. The other houses had been easier, less of a challenge; they weren't as neglected. This house needed more than a fresh coat of paint and just a bit of scrubbing. It needed reminding of what it once was. It needed encouragement to stand up, shake itself off, take a step and live again.

  I’d started with that horrible kitchen. There was grime in every groove, and I’d scrubbed until it was all clean and sparkling. The pantry was musty and smelled of stale food, so I aired it out, wiped the shelves, repaired the light and replaced the bulb. There would be life in this kitchen soon, I was determined, it would not be a depressing place as long as I could help it.

  With food adorning the clean shelves, the gentle hum of the fridge, and the splashes of color I’d created with flower arrangements and my pots and pans, it almost welcomed me in the mornings. Almost.

  My bedroom needed the least attention of all, only a good cleaning. There was no restoration that needed to be done, and in no time my large bed with its colorful comforter and the matching curtains looked right at home. The bathroom, on the other hand, was in a disgusting state. I scrubbed and polished and bleached, until everything was shiny and I could take a bath without feeling like I would end up dirtier. It appeared that it was covered in creamy pink tiles, rather than off orange, once I’d removed the grunge, and the white bath mats and curtains created a retro effect. Splashes of red brought that bit of life back, and I was pleased with the results. By the end of the week my bath times had stretched from a quick five minutes to a luxurious hour and a half submerged in frothy bubbles with a glass of wine, with Mozart flowing from the portable CD player in the room.

  One by one I worked my way through the rooms, gauging how much restoration needed to be done, preceding everything with a thorough cleaning. I would work on everything in much detail later: fix cracks, replace doors and shelves, floorboards even, but for now the worst was the filth. I had a feeling that whoever had lived here before hadn’t been a particularly clean person to begin with, and the years of neglect had added to it, creating a mixed soup of grime for me to deal with.

  One evening, I tried to light the grand fireplace, thinking a nice fire would liven up the otherwise slightly dreary front room. I hadn’t thought to check the chimney for blockage, which I should have. The smoke billowed into the room in wild grey plumes, making everything smell like burnt wood and dried leaves.

  It was at the end of the second week that I noticed the paneling at the end of the balcony above the dining table. It was the same dark brown as the paneling at the foot of the stairs, and under it where the storage space was. Large squares, no doubt the same as the gleaming ones I’d polished around the kitchen door. In the same way, it wasn’t solid. I pushed against it, and found another door. Full of secrets, this house. In front of me was a steep, narrow staircase that led up into the darkness of the room above.

  I found a flashlight and tested the stairs carefully. The structure seemed to be sound. Everything around me was coated with a blanket of dust. There had been no traffic up here for a while; the agent must not have known about it either. At the top of the stairs I found myself in an attic, a small room that sat under the canopy of the roof like the house was squatting over it. Shivers ran down my spine at this discovery of a secret room. It was like discovering a hidden treasure. I breathed in deeply, and then coughed. It smelt terribly stale and the heat of the sun shining directly on the other side of the old tiles baked the room into a dusty little oven. I flashed the beam of light upwards, and found beams nailed into place. If I stood on my toes I could just push my fingers under the first beam, and I tugged on it. The nails moved, and a bit of light broke through.

  I went down stairs and found a hammer. I returned with a mission, and hooked the back of it behind the beam, yanking on it until the nails had pulled out enough for me to get a hold on them individually. I worked, and soon I was sweating under the heat of the baking room, making the curls stick to my cheeks and soaking my collar. Finally the first beam came loose, and sunlight burst through the dust swirling in the air to make a stripe of light that dimly lit up the room. It was filled with boxes, pieces of old furniture, some moth-eaten clothing that hung on a rail in the corner. Everything was coated with the same thick layer of dust. Some of the boxes were marked, but the markings had faded and were impossible to decipher.

  I pulled the closest box towards the open floor space in the middle, and opened the flaps. The dust whirled up and tickled my nose and I rubbed it inelegantly with my sleeve. Inside were books with thick yellow pages. Literature, some science. I pulled them out and stacked them in piles around me. Some documents fell from the pages, old receipts, the typing faded. How long have these things been up here? I scanned the documents, looking for dates, but found nothing. I returned the books neatly into the box and closed the flaps again. More boxes close by had the same kind of contents. I looked at the rail of clothing, flipped through them to see if there was anything worth salvaging, but most of it was too conservative for my taste, and moth-eaten. I really only wore wrap-around shirts, skirts, shawls, dresses, headbands.

  One of the coats’ sleeves dragged with a loud tearing sound over something at the back, and when I pulled the rail out of the way, its little wheels squeaking in protest, I found another box, much less dusty, behind it. I pulled it out, and opened the flaps. Inside was a parcel of letters, tied together with a black ribbon, and a shoe box. I opened the box and found old sepia photos of people in outdated clothing. The photos had faded considerably. There were also newspaper cutouts, some keepsakes. The box smelled of nostalgia but nothing in it caught my eye. I carefully took the parcel of letters out instead, and pulled the ends of the ribbon, letting the large bow loops disappear through the knot and the letters fell into my lap. They were all signed with the same loopy handwriting, reaching across nearly the full length of the envelope with attractive pride. They were numbered, and arranged roughly in order, probably having gotten shuffled a bit when they fell out.

  I opened an envelope, and pulled out a white paper. It was decor
ated with the same elegant scrawl.

  Dearest,

  It’s been weeks since I’ve seen you, and I’m wilting. It sounds weak, I know, but you are my strength. I wish you would come home.

  You can’t hold it against me that I got upset when you had to leave. You know that without you I am nothing, and the prospect that this nothingness, this emptiness that surrounds me, will carry on for who knows how much longer will be the death of me—

  I flipped the letter closed, and looked up at the soft beam of light fighting its way through the dust from the window. It felt strangely invasive to read this letter, filled with so much emotion. It felt private; it was meant for someone else. I tried to think how I would feel if someone read my letters to Mike, if I had written him any, and thought it would feel like someone had been peeking in while I was in the shower – intruding on a very private moment. I folded the letter neatly and slid it into the envelope, returning it into the box, the ribbon tied as before. I walked down the stairs, and closed the panel door. I would forget about it all, I insisted; carry on with the house, clean, fix, paint. But I didn’t forget. I couldn’t. I scrubbed the shelves in one of the extra bedrooms, the words echoing in my mind. I swept the floor, the sounds suddenly travelling up to the room tucked away under the rafters. I even left the house in an attempt to forget them, distracting myself with paint swatches for the different rooms, and with new oils for my canvases. And when the sun set coloring the horizon brilliant shades of red, purple and orange, I curled up in bed with the same stack of letters, the ribbon drooping in surrender across the foot of the bed. The scrawled envelopes were scattered around me.

  I’ll wait for you. Your scent still lingers on your pillow, I smell your hair when I wake up in the morning. Your winter coat still hangs next to mine, brushing its elbow against mine when I take it off, the same way you do when we shake off the morning chill together. It wasn’t cold enough for you to take it, and I hope you’ll be back before it is. I miss you.

  Yours

  I fell back onto my pillows and sighed. So much passion in these words, so much hope. Had anyone ever bestowed something this beautiful on me? I couldn’t remember. So no, in other words, because I was sure I would remember. Mike wasn’t a man of words. He’d showed me he loved me in his own way. Or did he? Were his short messages, his clipped tone with me, really his way of showing love? Or had he reserved it all along, keeping it for someone he found more worthy?

  I slid the smooth white paper to the side and picked up the next envelope. I still wasn’t sure if the writer was male or female. I half-hoped it was a man, writing to a woman. There would still be hope of men with romance existing in this world - a world of order and logic and all such boring things that did nothing, absolutely nothing, for the soul.

  My darling angel,

  Thank you! I knew you wouldn’t leave me. My every cell is vibrating in anticipation of looking into your starlit eyes again, my heart longs to hear the sweet hum of your voice. I’ll be at the station, waiting for you, and we’ll feel normal again. Do you remember? Like the song. I can still hear you humming it to me in the silver shimmers of dawn with the sheets tangling us together, and your elegant fingers tracing lines of fire up and down my neck. Elsa, my darling, my heart aches all the more now that I know you’re almost home.

  Yours always.

  Elsa! He was a man, and this woman was his passion, almost his obsession. I could almost feel the pain he was going through, being removed from his lover for so long. I knew exactly what it felt like, being separated from someone you loved. How many times had Mike left on business trips, leaving me swimming alone in a bed that was suddenly far too big for one, gasping for air in the emptiness that seemed to crush me in his wake? I felt a sudden pang of sympathy for this man, this poor, passionate soul who had to be divided from his other half. The guilt of imposing on someone else’s privacy disappeared completely, swallowed whole by the pressing curiosity. I wanted to know more about this man, and his burning love. I was absorbed by how much he had to bestow, how he revered her, worshipped the very ground she walked on, praising her for the gift a woman is in a man’s life. I needed to learn more, to follow them into their happy ending.

  I read the letters one by one, drinking them in like they were written for me. My heart soared with his as he wrote about the love of his life returning to her rightful place in his arms and resuscitating him. I swooned over the elegant curve in which he expressed his deepest, purest feelings. And then it all plummeted, the room grew dark, my chest ached, as I kept reading.

  My lady,

  You are the sun, and the universe revolves around you as it should. I wish I could find it in me to be a better man, to be worthy of a place at your side, worthy of your affection. You know I could never love any other, and my heart crumbles every time you return without really coming back to me. I want to weep at the distance between us, at the pain, so much more acute than when you were physically away, because I can reach out my fingers and touch your skin, but I can’t reach YOU anymore. I can’t seem to make the smile reach all the way up to your eyes, as I once could, and it pains me to think what it means for us, for our future. Your eyes deserve the sparkle I fell in love with, not the dull cloud that drew over them and refuse to lift no matter how hard I try. My precious, please know that you will always be mine, my heart will always belong to you, and I hope that you will find a worthy companion in me too, the way you once did, before it’s too late.

  Sincerely yours.

  Tears welled up in my eyes and I wiped them away, furious with myself for crying. I could relate to this poor man in so many ways. I felt an affinity for him, and blushed at the suddenness with which it developed, with the few words that laid down what I’d felt for so long with Mike, when nothing I could do was good enough, nothing I could say could restore what once was, nothing I was could keep him there.

  Elsa, my angel, my dearest,

  I have never been any good at goodbyes, and I want you to know that it shatters me to have to do this. You have always been the only thing I lived for, my life never felt more complete than when you were in it. I believe that in time I will be able to understand how I fell short, how I didn’t make the cut to be the man you need, how you needed to find love elsewhere. I can, however, never accept it. My heart will forever belong to you, and when you lay in the arms of another, peacefully with your head on a shoulder that doesn’t belong to me, I hope you find that I have made something in your life beautiful, that I was not a waste of your time.

  I wish you the best, darling Elsa, in everything you do, and I hope that the man you choose above me will treat you as though you’re above him, the way I have strived with my entire existence to do. Remember, dearest, you will always be my queen, and even though it’s a silent death for me to say goodbye, I know that if I keep you here, I will keep you from your eternal happiness. That alone is the only thing worse than losing you to someone else.

  I am, and forever will be, your Nicolo.

  I put the letter on my lap and wept. My heart broke for this man, who had done everything in his power to be her prince charming, and the pain that shot through my chest at the lines that suggested she’d found someone else, someone better, and left him for it, was almost unbearable. They felt so incredibly, heartbreakingly familiar, so painfully real.

  Finally I wiped my face with my sleeve, and sniveled. I looked at the pile of letters, suddenly reduced to something miserable, and the black ribbon seemed suited to the somber mood it tied down. What a man this Nicolo must have been, letting her go with such dignity after she treated him so poorly. I wished for his sake that he found happiness, found love in the best sense, in the way that he was willing to bestow it. He deserved absolutely nothing less. He had the power to soften with words the things that cut like a thousand razors. He seemed to understand when it was important to let go, and he was willing to face the darkness of a life without her, in exchange for her happiness. How absolutely, heartbreakingly selfless
.

  I slid the pages, cream-colored under the soft glow of my bedside lamp, back into their respective envelopes. They had to be closed again, shut forever, in the way she’d shut him down. It seemed only right when I tied it with the black ribbon again. It wasn’t until I turned the parcel over, deep in miserable thought, that I noticed the date written in small cursive in the top corner of the first envelope. My concentration flickered back, and I examined it closely, squinting to make out the scribble that obviously belonged to someone else; the hideous Elsa, no doubt.

  March 2011

  The recognition of the date travelled through me with a jolt. 2011! These weren’t love letters written in the fragile years of history, this was dated less than two years ago! I jumped up, unable to sit down anymore, the old house’s structure groaning softly with me as I paced the room. Nicolo was real, and current. Alive, if fate had been kind. What if he was still around, what if he was still alone, what if he was still just as real as he seemed in these words? What if I could find him, and talk to him? What if…

  CHAPTER 4

  Ian

  My phone vibrated loudly against the desk and I snatched it up quickly. The other agents, stationed around the room facing each other, shot me an irritated glance and I shrugged at them. What did they want me to do, miss calls? I hated working with this bunch of clowns. They were so arrogant. This company was as good as it was because of me and my hard work. I’d been there the longest and they’d stepped into the easy ride it had become since I’d made the sales that brought business through the doors, and they had the nerve to be annoyed with me.