He'd been born inside it. The weekend went differently than Sophie had expected. She told him so on Saturday afternoon over the fence in the backyard when he was raking leaves, and she appeared at the property line with her arms crossed against the cold. We didn't argue once yesterday, she said like it was a piece of data she didn't know what to do with. Calvin kept raking.
What'd you do instead? He asked me to help him sort through the garage. A pause. 3 hours in the garage, Calvin. 3 hours.
Find anything interesting? She went very quiet. He stopped raking and looked up. Her jaw was tight. Her eyes were bright in a way that wasn't quite tears, but was close.
He has a box, she said. In the garage back corner on the highest shelf. He had to get the ladder. She stopped. Swallowed.
It's a shoe box and it's got every postcard I ever sent him. Since I was 11, Calvin set the rake down. Every single one, she said. 14 years of postcards. I sent them whenever I traveled.
Just cheap ones from airports, from rest stops, stupid little things. I'd write two sentences on the back. Nothing real. I thought he just threw them away. Her voice cracked slightly on the last syllable, and she recovered fast, pushing through it.
He had them all in order. He wrote the year in pencil on the backs of some of them. Calvin said nothing. He labeled them, she said. And this time, her voice did break.
Just at the end, just for a second, he labeled them by year. The October air sat between them. Sophie, Calvin said carefully. Did you know he kept your room? She looked at him.
What do you mean? I've been over to help with things. The gutter, the furnace one winter. I've walked past that hallway. He paused.
That room at the end of the hall. Your room. He hasn't touched it. She stared at him. Your posters are still on the wall, he said.
The bookshelf. I only saw it for a second, but it's all there. It's the same. She pressed her hand over her mouth. Calvin waited.
She took a breath through her nose. Another. She got herself back. She was good at that getting herself back. But each time it costs something.