Five years unsent
an invented case, written the way I'd write a real one.
Dear J.,
You taught me to poach an egg, and I haven't made one the same way since. Same too-small pot, same wrong wrist. Both of them yours.
I owe you the reason I left without a goodbye. I've written this letter forty times, and every draft before this one had an excuse where the reason should be. Here it is, undecorated: I was jealous of you. Jealousy made me a coward, and cowards leave quietly. You would've been kind to me about it. That's the part that kept me away the longest. I couldn't take kind.
I heard about your dad a month late: grocery store parking lot, someone who didn't know not to tell me. I should've been at the funeral. That sentence doesn't get softer.
You owe me nothing. Not an answer, not even a reading. But if you're reading: the eggs work now. Almost as good as yours. I make them every week, on purpose.
Still yours, even unsent, M.
If you have someone you can't quite send it to, write to me: [email protected].