Postmark — Oversized Tee

The note says they meant to write sooner. It also says almost nothing happened, which is difficult to reconcile with the next three pages. A neighbor has bought a dog. A cupboard has fallen off a wall. There is an entire paragraph about a sandwich whose relevance becomes clear only near the end.

'I thought the H on the foil meant ham,' your friend has written. 'It was cheese, which I took to be an error in the labelling.' A few lines later, Harriet returns from her swim and asks where her lunch has gone. Your friend has underlined the word her twice, apparently still coming to terms with this interpretation of the letter.

You hear their voice in it. The sudden capital letters. The sentence that doubles back to correct an earlier sentence. The small arrow directing you to something they remembered after running out of room. You could have received all of this on your phone, but then you would have missed the particular shape of their impatience with the margin.

You keep the envelope, too. It seems to belong with the rest, even though it has already completed its useful work. For a few days the note stays on the table, where you read bits aloud to whoever happens to be there. Then it goes somewhere you will find it again.

The next time you need a stamp, you find the note before you find the stamps. You read the sandwich paragraph again. It still makes you laugh, especially the small addition squeezed beneath the signature: 'Harriet is writing separately.' You take out a sheet of paper and sit down at the table in the blue tee you have been wearing all afternoon. The address is already where you need it.

You begin a reply. There is not much to report. Then you remember the person at the bus stop, and before long you are drawing an arrow toward the part of the page you thought you wouldn't need.

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