Page 83 of The Seven Year Slip

Sounds good, I texted, and Fiona gave a thumbs-up.

I turned my phone to silent, and went back to work. It was out of my hands. Whoever James chose was who he chose. There was nothing I could do about it now.

Everything would run its course—come into my life and then leave again, because nothing stayed. Nothingeverstayed.

But things could return.

That reminded me of something. I pulled out my phone again and added,Would you two like to go with me to deliver the letter?

33

What Never Was

Vera lived on eighty-firstStreet, between Amsterdam and Broadway, in a four-story walk-up the color of cream stone. According to the address on her letter, she lived on the third floor in 3A. Fiona and Drew stood on the sidewalk behind me for support, though Drew still believed I should just mail the letter back instead.

“What if she doesn’t want to see you?” she asked.

“I’d rather find out in person if someone I’ve written letters to over the last thirty years died,” Fiona argued, and her wife sighed and shook her head.

I understood where Drew was coming from—perhaps it would have been easier to just send back the letter. My aunt and Vera’s relationship wasn’t my business, but because I knew the story, I felt... obligated, I guess. To finish it.

I had heard so much about Vera, she almost felt like a fairy tale to me—someone I never thought I’d meet. My hands were clammy, and my heart raced in my chest. Because I was about to meet her, wasn’t I? I was about to meet the last piece of my aunt’s puzzle.

I took a deep breath and scanned the buzzer box. The names were smudged—almost illegible. I squinted to try to make out the numbers at least, and pressed the buzzer for 3A.

After a moment, a quiet voice answered, “Hello?”

“Hi—I’m sorry to bother you. My name is Clementine West and I have the letter you sent my aunt.” Then, a bit quieter: “Analea Collins.”

There wasn’t a response for a good long moment, so long I thought that maybe I wasn’t going to get a response, but then she said, “Come on up, Clementine.”

The door buzzed to unlock, and I told my friends I’d be back in a minute.

Then I took a deep breath, and steeled my courage, and stepped into the building.

Pursuing Vera felt like opening a wound I had sutured together six months ago, but I had to. I knew I did. If she and my aunt had kept in touch over the years, then why hadn’t Analea ever mentioned it? If they had stayed friends, why didn’t it work out? I thought Analea had cut ties with Vera, like she had with everything she loved and refused to ruin, but apparently there were more secrets to my aunt than I had originally thought. Things she kept hidden. Things she never let anyone see.

I used to want to be exactly like my aunt. I thought she was brave and daring, and I wanted to build myself like she’d built herself. My aunt gave me permission to be wild and unfettered, and I wanted that more than anything else, but ever since she passed I’d recoiled from that. I didn’t want to be anything like her, because I was heartbroken.

I was still heartbroken.

And now I had to tell someone else, someone who also loved Analea enough to write her letters thirty years after their time ended, exactly what I never wanted to hear again.

I stopped at apartment 3A and knocked on the door. My aunt had told me about Vera, about what she looked like, but when she opened the door I was immediately struck by how much she reminded me of my aunt. She was tall and thin, in a burnt-orange blouse and comfortable slacks. Her grayish-blond hair was cut very short, her face angular for a woman in her late sixties.

“Clementine,” she greeted, and suddenly pulled me into a tight hug. Her arms were thin, so it surprised me how strong she was. “I’ve heard so much about you!”

Tears prickled in my eyes, because she confirmed what I had wondered—whether this letter had been a fluke, or if it was another line of conversation in a long history of correspondences back and forth over years and years. And it was the latter.

Analea had kept in touch with Vera, and they had talked about me.

She smelled like oranges and fresh laundry, and I hugged her back.

“I’ve heard a lot about you, too,” I murmured into her blouse.

After a moment, she let go and planted her hands on my shoulders, getting a good look at me from beneath her half-moon glasses. “You look just like her! Almost a spitting image.”

I gave the smallest smile. Was that a compliment? “Thank you.”

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