Page 65 of Returned Mail

Silence is a language too, you know.

Monica has been speaking it for months. Still, my hands don't want to unfold the page. Because that would make all of this shit real. And real is painful.

George,

I've rewritten this more times than I want to admit, and every version ends in the same place.

I can't do this anymore.

I stop reading…

That's as far as I get.

I fold the page, put it inside the envelope, stand, and walk outside. The night air is cooler, but not cool enough to cool me down right now. I keep walking until the lights behind me thin out. Then I stop beside a concrete barrier and put both hands on it.

I breathe in once, then twice. But nothing helps. I knew she would end things. That's the worst part. Some stupid piece of me kept writing anyway. Over twenty-four letters. Like persistence could turn silence into something else. Like, if I kept telling her about dogs, dust storms, and shitty coffee, eventually she would remember how to answer me.

I laugh once, and it sounds just wrong. I press both hands against the concrete. She told the stranger in our apartment to throw them away. That lands harder than I expect. Not the breakup, but the indifference... Discard them.

I close my eyes.

“Hale?”

I don't turn around. “Go away, Mack.”

He comes closer. “Sure.” I hear him stop a few feet behind me. He doesn't leave. I hate him for that too. For a while, neither of us says anything. Then I say it… “She left.” The words come out flat. Mack stays quiet. “I got a letter.” Still nothing. “Not from her.” That makes him shift. I look down at the page in my hand. “Some woman's living in the apartment.”

Mack takes that in. “Okay.”

“She found my letters, and she opened them.”

His eyebrows go up.

“Yeah.”

“That's…”

“Yeah.”

“And?”

I look at Monica's folded letter. “She sent me this.”

Mack's face changes. He understands enough. “Shit.” He comes to stand beside me. Doesn't touch me. Doesn't tell me it'll be okay. Good. I would probably beat the fuck out of him.

“You read it?”

“Just two lines.”

“Maybe two's enough for tonight.”

For half a second, something in my chest loosens. Then tightens again. Mack looks toward the dark. “Come find me if you need me.”

“I won't.”

“I know.” He says as he walks away.

It’s finally morning.