Page 102 of Shelter
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “It’s okay.”
“Well…” He lifted a hand and for the first time, I noticed it held an ivory envelope. “Maybe this will cheer you up. It was taped to the door when I opened up the front just now, and it has your name on it.”
I sat up straight. “Who’s it from?” I asked the question, but deep in the marrow of all of my bones, I knew the answer.
Ed coughed a laugh. “Don’t know, sweetheart, but I’m starting to get pretty curious.”
All the rules I’d just lain down for myself blew away like sawdust.Settle down,I told myself, but my heart was discovering new dance rhythms. I shot to my feet.
Ed placed the envelope in my hand, and I felt the heavy, expensive stationery, and those new dance rhythms became electric.
I hadn’t had many occasions to see Cole’s handwriting back then. I’d glimpsed it on the pages of his notebooks when he was in school or when he’d leave notes for Mama in the old kitchen, but when I flipped over the envelope, it was as though I’d read his slanted cursive every day of my life. It leapt off the page, almost shouting my name.
I swallowed, because even though the envelope’s stock was weighty and thick, what it held was thick too. Cole had things to say. To me. And I didn’t even consider not reading it. Not for a second.
“I think I need to take a break.” My voice came out dry as a husk. I barely threw Ed a glance as I headed to the back and found my boss grinning like a fiend. He could laugh at me if he wanted to. I couldn’t spare him a thought. I pushed my way out the back door and found myself in the little alley behind the shopping center. If I got here before Ed opened up, I came in this way, and if I stayed after hours, I left this way, too, which meant I’d been in the outdoor space at least a hundred times.
But today it looked different. The light even looked different. Like someone had put an Instagram filter over the sun. I leaned back against the brick wall of the building and held the envelope in my shaking hands. Before I let myself tear into it, I made my breath slow. This could be anything. An invitation to a party. A greeting card. It could mean nothing.
I nodded to myself and slid the nail of my index finger under the flap and carefully tore it open. It wasn’t a card or an invitation. Matching, heavyweight, ivory stationery lay inside, and as I drew it out, my eye landed on a short set of instructions written across the back of the outer page.
Read this page first.It should have been written on July 19, 2010.
I suckedin my breath at the date. Clasping that sheet, I tugged it away from a second page. That, too, held instructions.
Read this one second. It’s from today.
I unfoldedthe first page and fell into his words.
My Elise,
Gettingyour letter today was the best thing to happen to me in months. You might as well know I think of you every day, and I’m so ashamed of the way I left things between us. I’m beyond sorry. Please forgive me. I’ve blamed myself for what happened to my mother that night, but I never blamed you. I wanted to punish someone, and I was the only one left.
Letme make something very clear. I don’t hate you. I could never hate you. You were my beacon — even before I longed to kiss you. You saved Ava and me so many times. And no matter what happened to us, I knew yours was the one clean, innocent, undamaged soul that would come out of that place. That alone gave me hope. You gave me hope. Even when we were kids.
And then one day, I came home from Tulane, and you’d grown up. God, from the moment I saw you sitting at my kitchen table in that orange bikini, I was finished. I couldn’t stop thinking about you, no matter how hard I tried. And I tried, Elise. Because, despite appearances, you were just fifteen then. I had no business chasing after you.
When I camehome for Christmas after you turned sixteen, I had to have your attention. I had no peace without it. That’s why I teased you and bugged you and waited for you in the cold for hours. And when you kissed me the next day, I had no peace at all. It may be hard to believe it now, but, before what happened, I had plans for us. I was coming back for you. I would have come back.
That doesn’t meanI thought you would wait. It was only my hope that when the time came, we’d have a chance. What happened that night made me believe I didn’t deserve that chance, and the way I treated you before I left… Well, I wouldn’t blame you if you agreed.
I still want that chance.But, as much as I want it, I still don’t deserve it. In about five minutes, I’m going to walk into Ava’s room, and find her shooting up for the first time. I’m going to lose my shit, Elise. I’m going to scream at Ava. I’m going to give her boyfriend a bloody nose and throw him out of the apartment. In the next few weeks and months, I’m going to try to control everything Ava does. Where she goes. Who she sees. What she spends money on and if she has any money to spend. And it’s going to backfire. Spectacularly.
This will goon and on. And one day, almost six years from now, I’m going to find her on the living room floor. Her lips will be blue. I will press my ear to her mouth, and I won’t hear her breath. I’ll try to find her pulse, and it will be so faint, I’ll think I’m imagining it. I’ll call 911, pinch her nose, tilt back her head, and seal my mouth over hers. Hers will be dry and pasty as I push my breath into her, and it will feel like an eternity before the paramedics burst through the door and take over.
And only then,when I’ve come as close as I possibly can to losing what’s left of my family, will I understand that Ava and I need to come home, even if I won’t comprehend exactly why. That is, I won’t begin to comprehend why until I see you again four weeks later.
So,I know I have no right to ask for it, but I beg for your pardon. And, most of all, I beg for your patience. I’m coming. I’m coming back for you, Elise.
Yours to dowith as you wish,
Cole
By the timemy eyes reached the bottom of the page, my face was soaked. My tears started when I’d read the first two words.My Elise.By the time I got to Ava’s overdose, I could barely read. I was a slow reader on a good day. Whole passages I had to read two or three times just to make sure my brain hadn’t shuffled the letters around or that whole words hadn’t swum away on my tears.
But after I read parts of it aloud, whispering and hiccupping as I did, I knew I’d understood him. He’d finally answered my letter. It felt like a gift. Like a cure. Like it healed an old wound. And more than that, it made me desperate to talk to him. I had the bizarre urge to check him for injuries. How had he come through these last few years unscathed?
Remembering the second page, I wiped my eyes and tucked the first letter behind its mate. This one bore only a few lines, and I devoured them greedily.
