I had only been looking for an empty box. The one I found perched on the closet’s top shelf would work. I overturned it onto the bed and sorted through the miscellany. Receipts, sticky notes, promotional pens, junk mail. My husband never throws anything away. A card caught my eye. A drawing of a jaunty bird, chirping something in typewriter lettering. The message inside upended my heart. “I’m so glad you came back to me. I love you.” It was signed J----, an unfamiliar name. I stood, card in hand, unsure when—if ever—I would ask my husband about it.
Maria Hypponen is a writer, indexer, and creativity mentor based in Burlington, Ontario, Canada. She writes about confused hearts and things that might have been. Substack: Petits écrits / Tiny writings Bluesky: @mhypponen.bsky.social