by Rick R. Reed
Cole liked it that way, and each excursion out lately found them getting home earlier and earlier, pining for the simple comforts of their well-appointed but never lavish home.
So this morning, once he’d seen Tommy off outside, he came back and felt a little lost, as though a part of him were missing. Maybe it was, he thought, time for them to go down to the animal shelter in Chicago and give some lucky dog or cat a new and reliable home. They were both certainly around enough to dote on a little critter and to ensure its proper training!
He’d rattled around in the oversized condo for hours, drinking coffee, nibbling on some bacon he’d fried up earlier, scanning through hundreds of offerings on their big-screen TV and finding nothing he’d want to watch. Sometimes it seemed like the more there was on offer, the less appealing it became.
Cole knew he was just lonely, already missing Tommy. It was crazy, he told himself; he shouldn’t be so dependent on another person. It was sad.
But it was the truth. Their life was, in a word, dull. But it was theirs. And it was enough. And though it lacked thrills and chills, it was all Cole wanted.
As he was making his way into the kitchen, hoping there was still some of that pastrami left in the fridge, he happened to look outside. It had stopped snowing, and the sky had brightened. Some of the clouds had been swept away by the wind. He also saw the mailman rolling his trolley through the courtyard.
Cole smiled and remembered the anticipation seeing the mailman used to bring. These days, though, there was rarely anything in the mailbox other than junk. Even bills didn’t come in the mail anymore.
He’d forgotten the mailman sighting until much later, when he was stuffed full of a pastrami and Swiss on rye with spicy brown mustard and a bag of cheddar and sour cream chips that was definitely not meant for one person. The movie he’d finally landed on, an old Lana Turner weeper called Imitation of Life, had left his nose running and his cheeks wet. He was glad, in a way, Tommy wasn’t here to witness the pathetic spectacle he was at the moment. Cole chuckled at himself.
He’d gone into the bathroom and was just beginning to fill the claw-foot tub with water when he remembered seeing the postman. He squirted a healthy amount of an herbal soak liquid Tommy had bought over at Lincoln Square into the water and headed off to run downstairs to check the mail.
In the marble-and-tile foyer, with its mica fixtures, Cole expected nothing less than a handful of fliers, envelopes gussied up to look official and/or important to trick you into opening them, and maybe a free offer from Jewel.
But there was only one envelope in the box, and wonder of wonders, it was something Cole hadn’t seen in years—a hand-addressed letter. He turned it over curiously in his hands, considering sniffing it. It seemed like something that had time traveled, like a rotary phone or a black-and-white TV.
His name and address were half written/half printed on the front in black ink. The letters were blocky, a bit architectural—and vaguely familiar. Cole didn’t know quite why, but the familiarity was there in his head, like a clue just out of reach. This is from someone I know.
There was no return address.
Cole simply stood there in the lobby for the longest time, staring down at the envelope. It incited both a giddy feeling of anticipation and also what he thought of as an inexplicable harbinger of dread. Warring within him was a desire to rip the envelope open right there in the lobby or to shred it up as much as he could in his hands without ever looking at it and deposit it in the blue recycle receptacle in the lobby’s corner.
It wasn’t until old Mrs. Borque came in, shaking the snow from her gray hair, that Cole was reminded he’d left the bath water running upstairs.
“Think we’ll get more than eight inches?” she asked, her bright blue eyes regarding him, standing there in sweat shorts, a black T-shirt, and barefoot.
Cole panicked and answered in a way that could be taken the wrong way, but he didn’t really think so. Mrs. Borque was over eighty.
“One can dream!” Cole called over his shoulder as he scampered up the stairs, hoping against hope he’d not find a flooded bathroom or—worse—his downstairs neighbor pounding on his door because her bathroom ceiling was bulging with water.
There was no one outside his unit, which was the first good news. The second good news was that, when he rushed to the bathroom, he got there in the very nick of time. The greenish water was just at the very top of the tub, a little of it trickling down the side. None of it had reached the floor yet. Cole grabbed the two porcelain handles and twisted them forcefully and suddenly. They both squeaked. Then he plunged his hand into the water and pulled out the rubber plug in the drain.
Just to be sure the tub didn’t magically fill up again when he wasn’t looking, Cole watched as the water drained down to about three-quarters full, arms folded across his chest.
And then he left the bathroom and went to sit on the bed with his letter. He didn’t know why he had this eerie, prescient feeling about it. Maybe it was just because it seemed like an artifact from a bygone time. Who got letters in the mail anymore? Why wouldn’t someone just email, or text, or Facebook message—that’s how people got in touch in the twenty-first century, for cryin’ out loud!
The lettering also bothered him—he could have sworn he’d seen it before.
“Oh, for the love of Christ!” Cole shouted to the walls. “Would you just open the damn thing already?”
And he did. His gaze went immediately to the signature. And his mouth dropped open.
This has to be a hoax. A sick joke.
He started reading.
And stopped breathing. After, he’d guess he’d managed to hold his breath for the entire length of time it took to read the one-page letter. It started off with a shock and then simply continued on and on with a domino effect of shocks.
Dear Cole,
Yeah, it’s me, Rory. I know you’ll be surprised to be hearing from me after all of these years. And I know the first thing that may (or may not) come to mind is this letter can’t be real. That I’m dead. Or at least gone for good.
I’m neither, and you know this letter isn’t a prank or a hoax because we both know the one true thing: we saw each other a couple of weeks ago.
Yeah, you followed me through Wilmette for a bit and watched as I went in my mom’s door. She’s still kickin’, but my dad, sadly, passed away while I was gone.
I’m writing now because I didn’t want to just show up at your doorstep unannounced. Didn’t want to send you into cardiac arrest!
And you might wonder why I took two weeks to write to you. For one, it took Mom and me a little while to find a private investigator to locate you, and then we had to wait for his results. He was thorough! And fast! He got everything we needed overnight.
But I needed a few days to process what he told me. I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised that you’d found someone else. And, wonder of wonders, what with the impossible happening while I was gone, you’d married him. I never thought I’d see such a thing for our people in my lifetime!
Anyway, I want to assure you I’m not out to interfere with your current life at all. I’m getting in touch to let you know that I’m okay and alive and well (at least physically). I know you must have lots of questions, where did you disappear to for twenty years being principle among them.
I wish I could tell you I have lots of answers. The truth of the matter is my story is too mysterious and confounding to be believed—at least in a letter. Sadly, that also holds true for real life. I’m sorry to be so enigmatic. But I still think we need to talk—face-to-face.
Which is why I’m writing. I hope we can meet. One confusing tidbit I will tell you is that, although twenty years has passed in your time, it seems more like a few days or a couple of weeks to me. Don’t try to get your head around that. You won’t. I can’t. My mother can’t.
But I need to see you, to talk to you, and to at least make you understand some things.
I know this l
etter is shocking and maybe even frightening. I wrote it out rather than using the computer in the hopes you’d recognize my handwriting. I also wrote, instead of calling or some other means of communication, because I wanted to give you your space.
Because, even though it breaks my heart to say this, I want you to have the ability to opt out. To say that you can’t, or won’t, see me. You don’t have to explain.
You can, of course, relegate this letter to the trash (or the recycling bin, I guess, would be more correct these days). You can convince yourself it’s a prank from some twisted sicko.
Whatever your thoughts are, I beg that you do one thing—let me know. Even if it’s a one-word answer—no—at least I won’t be left hanging, worrying and wondering if you’ll get back to me. My address (although you know that—I live with Mom) and my phone number are below. There’s also an email address for my mom, which you can reply to. I haven’t set one up for myself yet.
But I hope you’ll want to see me. I want to see you. And I repeat—I’m not interested in interfering with your life. I just think we need to talk and connect at least one more time.
Are you willing?
Please, please let me know, either way.
All my love,
Rory
Cole sat, dumbstruck, on the bed for a long time, just clutching the letter tightly in his hand. Several thoughts went through his mind, ranging from This can’t be real to Oh God, it’s really him, a miracle has happened.
One line from it made him laugh, although it was a bitter snort. It was when Rory said he didn’t want to interfere with his life. That was rich. Whatever Cole did with the letter, however he acted on the request, his life had definitely been interfered with. In spades!
He got up after a while and opened his closet. He got down on his knees and moved some stuff out from the closet floor, at last pulling out the old shoebox in which he’d kept mementos from Rory.
He had to be sure. The handwriting in the letter did look familiar, right off the bat, but it had been so long since he’d seen Rory’s penmanship, there was no way he could know for sure. Well, there was one way….
With a trembling hand, he opened the box and groped around in it until his fingers landed on that yellow Post-it where, years ago, Rory had poetically professed his love for him.
He looked from the Post-it to the letter several times.
The penmanship was exactly the same, right down to the way his As looked like triangles with a line slanting upward through them.
The only thing that seemed a little hinky to Cole was that people’s handwriting tended to change a bit over the years. His certainly had. And maybe this pair of documents, written two decades apart, were a little too alike to be believed.
Cole’s rational mind wanted to absorb the notion that this was a hoax. It had to be.
But his heart had told him it wasn’t. And he trusted his heart. The voice he heard as he read the letter, he thought, was Rory’s. He hadn’t even realized it at the time.
He also trusted his eyes, harkening back to the day when he’d seen Rory.
Of course he’d see him. He had to. If only to get his questions answered.
And the universe had even cleared the weekend for it.
Cole got up off his knees and went to get his phone.
He pondered calling for the longest time. But once he had his iPhone in hand and was seated in the leather recliner in the living room, he just couldn’t bring himself to call.
In the end, he wrote Rory an email.
Chapter 20
GRETA ALMOST deleted the email. She didn’t recognize the sender name, “West1971,” and the subject line, “Getting back to you,” had the ring of someone phishing. Why would someone she’d never heard of be “getting back” to her? She sighed. Email these days was lining right up with what used to be junk snail mail. Marketers ruined everything!
Yet… if it weren’t for the first few words of the email, which she could read, thanks to Gmail revealing the opening of every email, she would have thrown the message into the trash or marked it as spam. Those initial words were, to put it mildly, intriguing, because they mentioned Rory:
Dear Rory, I don’t know what to think.
When she saw her son’s name, she had no choice but to open the email. Clearly it was intended for him, because it began, “Dear Rory,” just like an old-fashioned letter. Greta had been on Rory to set up his own Gmail, but he didn’t seem inclined—she wasn’t sure why. Maybe the fact that he knew no one anymore who’d get in touch with him? The thought broke her heart. She needed to help him find a way to reintegrate himself back into life. Somehow. Yet it always seemed that goal could be put aside for another day.
But right now she was faced with a bit of a moral dilemma. Did she read on beyond the salutation? Or did she let her son have his privacy and call him to the computer, leaving the room so he could read in private? Of course she’d mark it as unread before calling him into the little den off the kitchen.
Since he’d returned, she knew she’d been overprotective. But it was with good reason. And that’s the excuse she gave herself to read the email. She was being protective. And even after reading the message, she could still mark it as unread. Rory would be none the wiser.
Still, she felt guilty as she started reading. This wasn’t like her, she told herself as she scanned line after line of the email. But when she finished, she found herself glad she’d pried for her son’s sake, and again, on the horns of a moral dilemma.
She had a choice—she could delete the email or share it. And then a third possibility arose in her head: she could answer for Rory and say what she determined was best for the situation.
Oh God, sometimes it’s too hard to be a mother.
She’d actually started writing a reply, a very deceitful one, casting herself in the role of her son and saying, in effect, that he needed to move on, when she stopped herself, covering her face with her hands. You are not this person. You love your boy. He’s a grown-up, and this is his decision to make.
She deleted her response, throwing it in the little garbage can and, yes, marking the original message as unread.
She got up from the old porcelain-topped table she used as a desk and went into the family room, where she found Rory eating a bowl of cereal and watching a DVR’d segment of The People’s Court.
She had to chuckle at his viewing choice, and then she went serious as other thoughts intruded. You’re making him a shut-in. And the worst possible thing might be happening—he might be starting to feel comfortable in this reclusiveness you insisted on. A good mother, like the one you hope you are, or at least aspire to be, helps her child find his wings so he can fly. Even if that means flying out of this nest….
“What on earth? You like this show?”
Rory turned to her, a little dab of milk still on his chin, and it made Greta’s heart clench—only a mother could see such an image and visualize a little boy with freckles and a cowlick. It almost made her regret her decision to come into the family room, to tell him what she was about to.
“It’s okay. I like it when that judge gets herself wound up. She’s more emotional than Judge Judy, and I guess that’s what I like about her.”
“You need to get out more! I hate to say it, but—”
Rory turned the TV off. “You’re telling me to get out more? Mother, it’s all I’ve wanted since I came back.”
“And I’m starting to see the wisdom and necessity of that, God help me.” She stared at the blank TV screen for a couple of moments, then said, “I’m sorry, Rory. I’ve been being too overprotective. But like any mother, I just don’t want to see my son hurt.”
Rory’s eyebrows furrowed together in concern. “Has something happened?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re sounding like you’ve had a change of heart. What about your wanting to keep me under wraps because of the weird amnesia and not-aging thing? That we can’t easily explain? Your word
s, not mine.”
“Sometimes life gives us the impossible to deal with, mysteries we can’t hope to fathom, but we go on, don’t we? We don’t hide away from the world.” She sighed and then blurted out, “You have an email from Cole.”
Rory said nothing for a long time. She identified certain emotions passing over his features like sun and shadow. There’s relief; there’s shock; there’s happiness; there’s hope. “And what? You read it?”
Greta had to resist the urge to lie, even though the falsehood was at the ready on the tip of her tongue. But she couldn’t allow herself any more deceit. “Yes. I read it. I’m sorry. I’d like to say I opened it by mistake, but I didn’t.”
“It’s okay.” Rory stood. “I’d probably do the same thing.”
“Really?”
“Yes, you’re not perfect. I’m not perfect. Nobody’s perfect. You yielded to a little temptation, but in the end, did the right thing.” He began to move toward the den. Over his shoulder, he asked, “What did it say?”
Greta was still a little dumbfounded at her son’s reaction, like their roles had suddenly reversed. “Why, he said he got your letter, and of course, he wants to see you.” She went over to the french doors and let in Minnie, who scampered around both of their feet, sniffing and licking, before hopping up on the couch. “But you should read for yourself.”
“I will.” Again, Greta could feel the hope emanating off her son. It was almost an aroma. Just before he disappeared into the den, she offered, “I can take you to him if you want. I can drive you down to Evanston.”
Their gazes met, and something passed between them—acceptance, maybe, understanding, for sure. Rory said, voice barely above a whisper, “Thanks, Mom. I might take you up on that.”
She nodded. “And I won’t stick around. You know how to use the Purple line to get back home.”
