apologies | Johannes Punkt’s Flaskpost

3/Dec/2013

Second Draft of an Unsent Love Letter

Subj: I Know You Said Not to Write

I’ve been thinking about you. The weather’s been in a sour mood. There’s a causal link there but I can’t figure out which way it goes. You said once, smiling, that you were cursed to umbrellas, good coffee, and books.

Did you know that the rain was lukewarm and perfect on that night you bailed on skinny-dipping? I imagined your shoulderblades.

Sorry. There’s no easy way to say this; I need to ask you a favour. In person. Come to the pub the day after you receive this letter. I’ll explain everything.

27/Aug/2013

Pitch Drop

It is a misnomer to say that they have buried the hatchet, as that would imply an intention of keeping it in the ground. The tell-tale thing beats under the floorboards, right below their bed, while the air is thick with taciturnity. The hatchet is the only thing willing to spill guts. They sit about one body’s width apart, sinking into the mattress.

“I’m sorry,” she says, stroking a lock of hair back so she can look at him without turning her head. Her mouth is dry. Her words come like molasses,

but his are a pitch drop. “I know.”

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21/May/2013

Unlikely Places

In the bathroom mirror when it’s fogged up, so that I’ll see it only when I’m naked and cold and vulnerable.

In the bottom of the cereal box.

In the blood.

On the balloons I used for our daughter’s birthday, I got a letter from you every time I inflated one. Some of the taller parents had to crouch when they entered our home.

In the sky, with the clouds.

In the pattern of the blooming cherry tree you planted thirty years ago. How long have you been planning this?

You write little eloquent apologies in the most unlikely places.