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Charm

His answer arrives five days later.

Charm,

“Roads work both ways” is irritatingly good.

Professor Klein would accuse you of relying on emotional interpretation without enough textual evidence. I would tell her literature that requires a reader to leave her life outside the room isn’t worth reading.

You’re right about Donne. You’re almost right about Browning, and I look forward to fighting with you about why.

You’re entirely right about Lowell.

I miss teaching you.

That sentence is inaccurate. You taught me as often as I taught you. I miss sitting across from you while we made each other angry over people who have been dead for centuries.

Thank you for reading the books.

They are yours.

Ryan

Two months before the wedding, I entered a used bookstore and found a clothbound novel tucked behind a row of newer editions. The spine was cracked, the pages smelled like dust, and someone had written small notes throughout the margins.

Near the center, one sentence appeared in faded blue ink.

She would have understood this.

I bought the book before reading the paragraph surrounding it. Now I package it before going through the letters to Ryan I wrote during therapy. I never intended to send those. They contain my most intimate and unguarded thoughts, but I need to remember what I felt when I found the book so the words I give him now remain honest to that moment.

Ryan,

I found this in a used bookstore about two months before the wedding.

Someone wrote “She would have understood this” in the margin. I don’t know who they meant, whether that person ever received the book, or if the writer was brave enough to say the same thing aloud.

It made me think of you. I didn’t tell you that part the night at the bar in the castle. I didn’t tell you that you would understand this book. You would argue with several parts, insult the narrator, and become unbearably pleased when the ending proves you right.

It is a loaner.

Charm

Ryan responds from Milwaukee four days later.

Charm,

A loaner?

You mailed a man a book carrying an unnamed person’s confession, told him he would understand it, and called it a loaner. You cannot possibly expect me to read that word casually.

Is that a promise I will see you again?

I have read half the book. Your assessment of the narrator is generous. He is a coward hiding behind eloquence, which is still cowardice even when the sentences are beautiful.

The previous owner disagreed with him too. I like whoever wrote these notes. They underlined the lies and left the honest sentences untouched, as though truth didn’t require decoration.

I understand why you bought it.