Old girlfriend

Yesterday there was a letter in the mailbox from an old girlfriend.

The envelope was backwards in the box, sealed side facing me. The clear sticker over the flap, creating the seal, gave it away: she'd had some sort of allergic reaction to the gum on envelope flaps once, and spent a night in the hospital. The small, round, clear stickers came out shortly after.

I regarded the back of the envelope with suspicion. What would she want to write me, now, for? We hadn't been in touch for nearly eight years. The last time I saw her I was sixteen and driving a snazzy little Toyota. Now I drive a Bronco II that leaks oil in incredible quantities but never needs more.

I stood on the porch for a moment, wondering if I should bring the letter inside or snatch it up between my fingernails and run to the official-neighborhood-model green garbage can beside the house and fling it away.

Next thing I knew I was sitting in the dirt beside the house, where nobody could see me, opening the envelope.

The page inside was folded three times, crisply. The ink pen she had used had bled through to the back of the paper, leaving fuzzy stains that looked like whales and baseball caps.

Jason, the letter began. I studied the way she had written the 'J' in my name, full of loops and curls that shouldn't appear in any 'J' written by anyone over the age of seventeen.

Jason,

Hi. What's up? I thought about writing you for a long time now. I know you are married. I just wanted to say hello and say that I think about you whenever I am having [big ink smudge]. I am in college now and will be graduating in four years. I think I will major in environmentally. I work at the phone company. I hear a lot of funny things on the phone, like sometimes people will be [big ink smudge]. Well anyway if your wife sees this letter I have not said anything bad I don't think. Tell her I said hello and stuff even though I do not know her.

Then she had painstakingly perforated the bottom part of the letter, leaving an inch of text below the perforation. The post-perforation text read:

Tear here so your wife will not see

If you ever feel lonely I feel lonely to so call 742.221.9091 and we will you know. Love you and nobody else. P.

I replaced the letter, perforation intact, in the envelope and stuck it to the refrigerator with a magnet. My wife saw the envelope later and opened it. She read it once, then twice, and looked up at me. Then she went to the office and found a sheet of blank white paper and carried it to the backyard. I watched through the window as she clipped it to the clothesline, then went into the shed and emerged again with the 12-gauge my dad gave me on our wedding day (in case something goes bizarrely wrong, he had said). She jacked a shell into the chamber, aimed, and blew a big ragged hole through the middle of the paper.

I watched her put the shotgun away, and then she came inside and folded the shredded sheet of paper three times and slipped it into a fresh envelope. On a Post-It she wrote: I have done this to other old girlfriends. You will not be the first. L. Then she addressed the envelope to my old girlfriend, put it in the box, and raised the flag.

When she came back inside she said, "I hope spaghetti is okay for dinner. I know it's not your favorite, but."