Page 55 of Return To You

Setting the letters aside, I dig deeper into the box.

A puck.

And another puck.

A plastic sleeve with newspaper cutouts. Seeing the first one, I know what each will be about: me. Me and Hockey.

At the bottom, there’s another small Ziplock bag with a tiny loop of twine. That brings up no memory at all.

Little figurines of wood roll around. I pick one up. It’s a coarse doll carved in maple. There are others, some showing better craftsmanship than others. Did I carve these?

Maybe. Since they’re in this box, I’ll go for yes. I must have been… what? Twelve?

Jesus.

To the side, there’s a piece of bark that feels fairly recent. The wood isn’t decaying or turning to sand the way bark does after a few years. I pick it up and turn it around, revealing the carving I very distinctly remember.

A Heart Prank Reign

My vision blurs as I trace the letters with my finger—the anagram of our names, carved into a majestic oak tree where I’d built a treehouse for us. We’d worked hours on finding an anagram that would mean something without giving our relationship away. No G + E for us. Not only did we want secrecy, we deserved more than what everyone else was doing.

We meant so much more than that.

We wanted to seal our relationship, and how better than by putting our imprint in the woods that sheltered our love?

That was when we’d decided we were it for each other.

Why did she carve out the tree trunk? I turn it in my hands and notice some burn marks. I put it back in the box.

The cat meows and jumps from the lid of the box to the bed and starts licking its paws.

I stand up and sift through the rest of her shelves. Just in case she keeps a box for any and all boyfriends? You can never be too sure.

I find nothing and feel ashamed I even considered that Grace might be… a psychopath?

She’s not.

She’s a liar. Not the bad kind, though.

Except when it comes to me.

Absentmindedly, I hook the door back up, fiddle with the hinges. Screw them the way they should be to stop the door from tilting. Satisfied with my work, I pick up the box and call Lucas.

“All good?” he asks.

“Yeah, all set. Wasn’t much.” I tell him what I did. “But uh… there’s a problem with the cat.”

“What cat?”

“The owner has a cat and uh… it’s been puking and shitting everywhere. I mean, it’s not a pretty sight. Thought you’d want to let the owner know. I don’t know much about cats, but they might want to take it to the vet ASAP.”

“Oh shit. Sorry you had to deal with that.”

“That’s alright. Just… thought they shouldn’t wait.”

“Definitely. I’ll let her know right away.”

“Great.”

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