Page 33 of What Matters Most

His veined hands lifted the round pieces one by one and replaced them in the tattered box. “Just seems to me a woman your age should be more interested in young men than her old Gramps.”

Carla started picking up the red pieces. “His name’s Philip. Does that satisfy you?”

The blue brightened on his ageless face. “He must be a special young man for you to miss him like this.”

“He is special,” Carla agreed.

Gramps hadn’t asked anything more, and Carla hadn’t voluntarily supplied additional information. But if she were to show up again today, Gramps wouldn’t let her off as lightly.

Backing out of the parking space, Carla drove to a local Hallmark shop and spent an hour reading through cards. She selected two, more for the need to justify spending that much time in the store than from a desire for the cards.

—

That evening, as a gentle drizzle fell outside, Carla sat at the kitchen table and wrote to Philip. The letter seemed far more personal than an email. It was probably the most difficult of her life. Bunched-up sheets littered the tabletop. After two hours, she read her efforts with the nagging feeling that she’d said too much—and not nearly enough.

Dear Philip,

You told me to let you know when I was ready to let go of the fears that rule my life. I don’t know that I’m entirely prepared to face you in full police uniform, but I know that I can’t continue the way I have these last two weeks. Nothing’s the same anymore, Philip. I lost a game of checkers yesterday, and Gramps said I shouldn’t play if my mind isn’t on the game. The only thing on my mind is you. The moon has your image marked on its face. The wind whispers your name. I can’t look at the ocean without remembering our walks along the beach.

I’m not any less of a coward than I was in Mazatlán. But I don’t know what to do anymore.

I used to be happy in Seattle. Now I’m miserable.

Even checkers doesn’t help.

Once, a long time ago, I read that the longest journey begins with a single step. I’m making that first attempt. Be patient with me.

Carla

The letter went out in the next morning’s mail. Since she didn’t have Philip’s address, Carla sent it to him in care of the Spokane Police Department. His return letter arrived four torturous days later.

Dear Carla,

My first reaction was to pick up the phone and call, but if I said everything that was going through my mind, I’d drive you straight to Alaska, and I’m afraid you’d never stop running.

My partner must have thought I was crazy when the watch commander handed me your letter. I’ve read it through a thousand times and have been walking on air ever since. Do you mean it? I never dreamed I could take the place of checkers.

Carla, I don’t know what’s been going through that beautiful head of yours, but with every minute that passes I’m all the more convinced that I’m in love with you. I didn’t want to blurt it out like this in a letter, but I’ll go crazy if I hold it inside any longer. Get used to hearing it, love, because it feels too right to finally be able to say it.

You asked me to be patient. How can I be anything else, when that first step you’re taking is on the road that’s leading you back to me?

Hurry and write. Your last letter is curling at the edges from so much handling.

I love you.

Philip

P.S. I can tell I’m going to like your grandfather.

If Philip claimed to have read her letter a thousand times, then Carla must have doubled his record. Her response, a twelve-page epic, went out in the next day’s mail.

—

Monday evening the phone rang. Nancy called Carla from the kitchen. “It’s for you. Cliff, I think.”

Carla was tempted to have her roommate tell him she wasn’t home. Their date Saturday night had been a miserable failure. The movie had been a disappointment, and their conversation afterward had been awkward. But the problem wasn’t Cliff, and Carla knew as much. Nothing was wrong with Cliff that substituting Philip wouldn’t cure.

“Hello.”

---