Percival Everett - Erasure

Yours forever,

Fiona 25 FebruaryDear Benjamin,Rain. Rain. Rain. That’s all our skies have to offer lately. And so sight of your letter was a bit of sunshine. Then of course I opened it and discovered that you are expecting a third child. Certainly I am happy for you, but the sting is considerable.My mother is again in the hospital. I’ve not made the trip to see her because of my new job. Finally, I am again a nurse. I’m afraid I must have romanticized our time in Korea, because now the work feels so much like work. I’ve been rethinking my suggestion that we get together in New York. With your family obligations, I’m sure you’re too busy anyway. And the whole matter is just too painful for me to consider.Please know that I love you dearly and miss you, but I am afraid I cannot keep up this letter writing.

With love, forever,

Fiona 20 AprilDearest Ben,I’ve not received a letter from you for a couple weeks now. I hope all is well. I have this fear with each letter posted that you might be suffering with a cold or flu and that another member of your family might collect the mail from your office. It fills me with such dread to imagine causing you such an embarrassment and problem.My mother is doing worse I am afraid. She’s had a string of small strokes and she seems hardly herself. I’m quite sure she doesn’t recognize me. Writing this now seems to help me detach myself from the grief and so I thank you for this. My brother, who has been seeing to most of the business concerning my mother, is wearing away to nothing. He is running himself ragged and I feel I’ve done little to really help him. I wish you could meet Bobby, whom we affectionately call Booby. His heart is an impressive one. He has encouraged me to make the trip to the States in the fall. I believe he thinks mother will be dead by then. I cry a lot thinking about her death, and then I cry because I feel guilty for thinking death might be the best thing for her.I’ve rattled on about myself for too long here. I hope that you and your family are well. Last night, I don’t know if it was a dream or a thought, but I saw the way we used to have to sneak around in Seoul. It was only when we had to sneak, when someone looked at us crossly, that I ever considered our difference.Anyway, I love you.

Yours forever,

Fiona

A very small, leather-bound book. Silas Marner by George Eliot. An odd book to find, but pressed in its pages was a small flower, pink and white. The pages between which the little flower was pressed seemed to have no significance or bearing on anything.

Three more letters, the contents of which were not unlike previous letters, except that the mother died.

One round trip train ticket from Washington to Penn Station, dated 15 September 1955.

One receipt from the Algonquin Hotel, showing two nights’ stay and three room service visits.

A book of matches from the Vanguard.18 SeptemberDearest Benjamin,I never believed that I would really see you again. And who could have known how wonderfully thrilling such an impossibility could turn out to be. Do I sound giddy? Well, perhaps I am. Seeing you was so lovely, my darling. To be held by you once more would make life too much for me.I am sorry for the reaction of my brother-in-law. I did not know — how could I — what a bigot he is. But it seems your country has no paucity of bigots. I had deluded myself into thinking that the stares and comments, mumbled and not, were the domain of those awful soldiers during the war, the territory of the uneducated and the uncultured, but I was wrong. I can only imagine how awful it is for you daily.I can still clearly see your smile in the morning. And your dark hands on my near translucent breasts. You were so kind not to tease me. The contrast is striking and wonderful. I did so love being with you, my beautiful lover. Think of me at night, please.

With love undying,

Fiona 1 OctoberDearest Benjamin,I arrived at home to find your card waiting. Sadly, I also learned from my brother that my mother had died. I wonder how it is that knowing what is coming never abates the anguish. But still I feel, deep down, that my grief is somewhat artificial, that I believe her death is for the best, especially hers. I suppose it is normal to think such a thing, but still it is difficult to express it outwardly. I guess this then is further evidence to the closeness of spirit I feel with you.I must run now. I miss and love you.

Yours through eternity,

Fiona 12 NovemberDear Ben,You mean more to me than you can ever know. I’m sorry I have not written for a while now. And in an odd way, I’m thankful that you haven’t either. What I have to tell you is both wonderful and terribly anxiety-making. Ben, darling, I am pregnant. I don’t want anything from you and I want you to know that I will not seek to complicate your life. I am moving from this address and my mail will not be forwarded. Please, let this be our last communication. I love you far too much to hurt the family you love so dearly. And I do not wish to hurt you, though I know that this does. So, do not write for your letter might reach someone other than myself.

Love forever,

Fiona

A postcard mailed from Chicago, dated 2 July 1956.It is a girl. Her name is Gretchen.

[unsigned]

Dear Gretchen,Your mother is a kind, sweet, dear woman, but she was wrong to remove you and herself from my life. You must know that she did so believing it was the right and moral thing to do. She has strength which I can only pretend to fathom.I want you to have this letter, but I do not know where you are. Your mother’s sister in New York will not take my calls and so there is no help there. The card notifying me of your birth was postmarked Chicago, but tells me nothing.Wherever you are, I love you and wish I could be a father to you. You have two brothers and a sister. They know nothing of you, but I dare say that you would love them. They are fine people. Your mother is so fine that you have no choice but to be the same. I wish that I could hear your voice, see your face, a photograph, a sketch. I hope that you have your mother’s eyes. How I love those eyes.I suppose I could be ashamed of the relationship between your mother and myself, but I am not. It pains me that I could not be with her, that it all remained so secret and, therefore, dismissed. I was married with two children when I met her and, truth be told, I should have left with her then, but I did not. But because I didn’t, I have your nearest-in-age brother, my son, Thelonious. I dare say of the three I love him best.I wish that I had someplace to send this letter. So that you could know how much your father loves you, how much he misses you and how sorry he is that he does not know whether you are left or right handed, what color your hair is, or whether you can forgive him.

The letter was unsigned. That was all that was in the box. I had read a voice of my father’s that I had not heard directly in life, a tender voice, an open voice. I couldn’t imagine the man who had run off to New York to have an affair. I knew my mother had read the letters, but I didn’t know when. I knew she wanted me to read the letters. Knowledge of the affair gave me, oddly, more compassion for my father, more interest in him. Even when I considered my mother and her feelings I did not find myself angry with him, though I worried about her pain.

I had another sister.

I grew up an Ellison. I had Ellison looks. I had an Ellison way of speaking, showed Ellison promise, would have Ellison success. People I met on the street when I was a child would tell me that they had been delivered by my grandfather, that I looked like my father and his brother. Father’s older brother had also been a physician until he died at fifty. When very young I enjoyed being an Ellison, liked belonging to something larger than myself. As a teenager, I resented my family name and identification. Then I didn’t care. Then the world didn’t care. Washington got bigger and all the people my grandfather had delivered died. I knew Father’s father only through stories, but there were many. His nickname, one of them, was Superdoc, as he apparently had been able to start his battery-less car and drive it home from a house call.