Love, Bonnie (1941)

As I flip through the letters I’d unearthed from the peeling leather trunk, I realize that my grandmother was braver than the soldiers of her day. There must have been a decade’s worth, yellowed and wrapped in twine, tucked away in the attic. The worn envelopes packed with passion feel wasted in my hands. I drop the lid and dust scatters from the top of the trunk. I let out a hack, bracing against a cardboard box labeled Xmas.

I wait for my husband to ask if I’m alright, but the house settles into sickening silence. I am still getting used to the notion that “separated” means apart.

I lean against the trunk and reopen the first of the letters addressed to my grandmother. Pressed violets fall from the envelope, the papery petals softly land at my feet.

My love, etched in now-faded ink. The nearly illegible script is oblique, swoopy, and as unfamiliar to me as the intimacy of its contents. She pens scraps of her day: morning tea, midday chores, midnight strolls. Menial things framed by the repeated notion of her messages: I wish you were by my side.

I imagine him here, surrounded by the stacks of musty books and scratched records. I cradle the letters close to my chest, clinging to their words.

My love, my love, my love.