P.S. I’m house-sitting for Isla while she’s on a weird wellness retreat for future cat ladies. I think you’re going to have to play cupid with Luca.
• • •
Dear Abby,
Thank you so much for the letter. I could imagine your voice while I read it, and it made me smile. Your reassurances help. I’m giving what parts of my heart I can here and when the kids smile and seem to forget about everything except playing or running without worry, it makes it worth it. I hope this doesn’t sound strange, but in those same moments, I see you. In their laughter or dimples or a pair of eyes. I think I miss you so much that I search for you in others.
I’m glad to know your summer is going well. I get the feeling you’re windsurfing more than studying, but you’ve always been much cooler than me. I understand what you mean about feeling more than playing. It reminds me of that phrase everyone throws around: “Let the game come to you.” You can’t control the waves any more than you can control what happens on the field. You can only feel and react. I think accepting that is surrender. I’ve always enjoyed that part of softball, taken comfort in it. Maybe because in many ways it’s reminiscent of faith. Surrendering to the unknowable.
Clearly, I’ve spent too much time alone out here. I’ll be back stateside in a few weeks. Then it’s off to Colorado to be with Blake for the draft. We’re almost done fixing the school’s roof. I honestly go to bed so sore and tired that it’s easy to sleep. It reminds me of the farm in Deer Park. Is it bad that I don’t miss it as much as I miss Insley?
You’re my blessing too.
Kate
P.S. I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I doubt my matchmaking abilities. In fact, after your success with Mick and Haley, so chivalrously “distracting” Zoey, maybe you should play cupid instead.
• • •
Dearest Kate,
Is that jealousy I’m detecting in your postscript? You know I would have rather been distracting you.
I’ve thought of that night a lot. You looked stunning, and I forgot about everything else—Blake, the team, the bigger questions. I’ve never experienced what I have with you, with anyone else. There’s a word for it, one I think we’ve both considered, but I’m not sure it’s right to say. Not when I mean it so completely. I guess it’s cowardly of me to write this in a letter, when you’re on a different continent, but I’m afraid of hurting you with a confession more than I fear your rejection. Maybe pen and paper can soften the blow.
If faith is surrender, then I think playing softball is the closest I’ve ever been to God. It must not be a coincidence then that I found you there too.
I think it’s okay to not miss Deer Park as much as the rest of your life. Home is a feeling too. You know what I just thought of? The ballpark is the only place where you must return home to win. Maybe that’s why we always find our way back there.
Praying this letter gets lost in the mail.
Abby
• • •
Dear Abby,
You can say love. I love you too. Friends can love each other. I’m just not and can’t be in love with you. Especially not when I’m committed to someone else. Though that may be presumptuous of me. You didn’t say you were in love with me. Either way,I wish we would’ve said it to each other in person before we went our separate ways. But maybe it’s just one of those things we’ve been saying without words. It makes me sad that you correlate love and hurt. Surely you don’t believe that your love could hurt me. Or that love may hurt you?
If we’re sharing secrets, that night at Sunny’s made me jealous. I often wish to have you to myself. Sometimes I feel like I do. When we’re turning two, when we’re studying and I catch you looking at me, when we had dinner at Isla’s. Those moments keep me awake sometimes. They put something foreign in my chest and stomach, like I might explode from the inside out. Maybe it’s good in that case to only have you in moments.
One more week here. Six until I see you.
Love,
Kate
P.S. How are classes? Have you chosen a major yet?
• • •
Kate,
I love you too. I agree, I should’ve said that a long time ago, but it feels good to write it now. Of course, I didn’t mean to make you say something that you didn’t mean.
As far as love hurting, maybe I’m just projecting. No matter how much we might love, or think someone loves us, we hurt each other, don’t we? My mom loved me, but not enough to not hurt me or herself. I worry that may be in me too. Worried that Audie might also exist somewhere deep, but I don’t know him well enough to be sure. I think that’s why I resent them sometimes. It feels like the only thing they gave me was a curse.
Does it make you feel better that I get jealous too? I’m even jealous that you’re on your way to see Blake. He’s a good guy, decent third baseman, but horrible timing, am I right? I’m wishing him and you luck with the draft.
