The attic air, thick with dust and the scent of forgotten lives, caught in my throat. Another sneeze ripped through me, and I scrubbed my hands on my jeans, pushing aside a box of moldy textbooks. Mom’s relentless campaign to reclaim this space had finally worn me down.
“Why hoard this stuff?” I grumbled, dragging a heavy box labeled ‘College Memories’ towards the sliver of light filtering through the grimy window. The late afternoon sun, muted and hazy, cast long, distorted shadows that danced across the dusty floorboards.
I pried open the box. No moth-eaten sweaters, no obsolete gadgets. Instead, my fingers grazed something smooth, cool—a bundle of envelopes, bound by a faded blue ribbon.
My breath hitched.
I knew them. Each slant and curve of the handwriting was familiar, a ghost of my younger self. Daniel. Every envelope addressed to him.
Oh God.
I sank back on my heels, the letters suddenly heavy, laden with years. Ten? Fifteen? How long had I buried these? These confessions, penned in moments when the weight of unspoken feelings threatened to drown me. Never sent.
The ribbon, brittle with age, yielded easily, as if it had waited for this reckoning. The top letter, dated September 2008. Freshman year. I closed my eyes, and the memory surged back, sharp and vivid, like a forgotten song suddenly playing.
Pizza boxes littered the floor of Daniel’s cramped dorm room, empty soda cans forming a haphazard barricade. He sprawled on the bed, strumming a simple melody on his guitar, his voice a low, slightly off-key hum. How could someone look so effortlessly captivating and be so utterly oblivious?
“You’re staring,” he said, the strings of his guitar still vibrating.
My muscles tightened. “I am not.”
He grinned, a flash of white teeth, his eyes still fixed on the fretboard. “You are. Admit it.”
“Fine,” I snapped, crumpling a napkin and tossing it at him. “You’re just… irritatingly focused.”
He laughed, a warm, genuine sound that sent a strange flutter through my chest, a sensation I didn’t dare name.
I blinked, the present snapping back into focus. The attic felt close, the air thick and stifling. My fingers trembled as I unfolded the top letter.
Dear Daniel,
I don’t know why I’m writing this. Maybe it’s easier to speak to paper than to you. You’re my best friend, and I don’t want to lose that. But sometimes, when you smile at me, I wonder… do you feel it too? This… possibility?
Maybe I’m imagining things. Maybe I’m just hoping.
I’ll never send this. But it helps to pretend, even for a moment, that you might feel the same way.
Yours, always,
Elena
I swallowed, my throat tight. So young. So naive. I’d written this after one of our late-night study sessions, when he’d fallen asleep on my shoulder, and I’d held my breath, afraid to break the fragile moment.
I set the letter aside, my hand hovering over the next. Did I really want to do this? To exhume these ghosts?
The box sat there, a silent challenge. I could seal it, shove it back into the shadows. Forget it ever existed.
But something deep within me—something stubborn, something aching—refused to let me.
I inhaled deeply, the dusty air filling my lungs, and reached for the next letter.
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