Unsent Letters #30

Until your memory returns

Photo by Luca Bravo on Unsplash, rendered black & white by me

Dear S.,

When I came to visit you at the clinic last week, it was raining heavily. Huge drops of water drummed on my open umbrella as if they were about to tear through its fabric any moment. Despite its large width and the strength of its material -- one of those sturdy, canvas-like fabrics that are no longer in use -- the umbrella couldn’t provide sufficient shelter, and my clothes were half-soaked. At the bus stop across from the theater where we saw that Gaber monologue many years ago, I stood alone, the surroundings unusually still and deserted. The display read fourteen minutes; another fourteen minutes of waiting there under my barely-sheltering umbrella. And I knew all too well that those minutes on the display take at least two to pass, sometimes three or four. Everyone knows this.

Aboard the bus, its dark floor wet and glistening, I scanned for a double seat with both spaces vacant and found one about halfway toward the rear, on the left. I took the seat by the window and laid my backpack on the other one, signaling to the casual observer that it was taken. I like these trips to the clinic, up that narrow, winding road surrounded by thick woods, even in dire weather. And I like looking out the window, and thinking. You know how much I care for you, and I understand that I’m the only one you have left after what happened to your family. But please believe me when I say these monthly visits stem from a genuine desire to see and be with you. As I watched the streaks of rain steadily whipping the window, my mind went back to that afternoon six years ago, in early June, when it all started.

Not a day goes by without me wondering why them and not you, and why none of them left a trace. Maybe they’re all still alive, in some other dimension or on some other planet billions of light-years away. Maybe they’re still celebrating your dad’s birthday somewhere, all together. No one just vanishes into nothingness like that. Well, I stand corrected -- there have been disappearances before, like the Bermuda Triangle and other strange phenomena. But an entire family at once, at a birthday gathering? In the most secure and peaceful place on Earth? When you invited me to your chalet by the lake to go fishing that Sunday, you didn’t even tell me it was your dad’s birthday, or that your whole family would be there, including aunts, uncles, and cousins. All of them there, guests in your enormous wooden chalet by that beautiful light blue lake, nestled in the Dolomites. And me, who didn’t even know how to fish! But maybe the fishing was just an excuse, maybe you wanted to talk to me alone about something. Something strange you noticed and kept to yourself, something that never left your lips, and who knows if it ever will. 

When you took me out on that little boat all the way to the middle of the lake, your chalet with its many guests a miniature on the distant shore, I did notice a shift in your demeanor. You couldn’t care less about fishing and I felt you were about to reveal something. But then it all happened in a matter of seconds: the sight of your chalet in the distance glowing with an intense, pulsating, fluorescent light, as if burning with no flames; you staring at the scene with your eyes wide open, your lips moving but emitting no sound, your skin paper white; me rowing as hard as I could to reach the shore quickly. Inside, nobody. Minutes before, a lively birthday party was underway -- now no sign of any prior human presence was detectable, no sign of struggle or brawl; everything was in order, as if the place had been uninhabited for years. 

The bus window was all fogged up as these memories resurfaced. I wiped it a little with a handkerchief, while outside the rain kept falling relentlessly, and we had just started climbing up the narrow road through the woods -- the last twenty kilometers before arriving. 

Waiting for your memory and speech to return, both of which you suddenly lost that afternoon six years ago, I will keep coming to see you every month, hoping that you've made some progress. I will keep talking to you and writing to you, and I will keep trying to ignore your vacant stares when I mention something or someone. Even the doctors can’t explain why you remember everything about me but nothing else, no one else. They say that one day your memory will return all at once, that your recovery won’t be gradual. But as for when that day will come, unfortunately, no one knows. Speech, they say, will be easier to recover once your memory is restored.

One day, many years ago, your dad and I had a long conversation in his study that I’ve never shared with you. He told me about a recurring dream, one he’d had since he was a kid. In it, he was standing in front of the bathroom mirror. In the reflection, tears as white as milk were trickling from his right eye. He quickly reached up to wipe the tears away, but somehow his reflection in the mirror didn’t move -- only stood there, white tears running from his eye. After a little while, in the reflection, when he finally resigned himself to the fact that he and his reflection were two separate entities, each with a life of their own, a woman came from behind and reached up to his right eye to wipe the tears away, this time successfully. But this happened to his reflection, not to him. There was no woman behind him. She wasn’t young, or particularly beautiful. Yet, there was something quite attractive in the curve of her neck and the cut of her eyes. She didn’t wear makeup, and her white dress was neat, as if freshly ironed. 

Your dad kept dreaming about this scene for decades, but could never come up with a satisfying interpretation. At some point, the phone rang, and he excused himself. While he was away, I noticed a red leather notebook spread open on his desk with strange drawings and dense scribblings. I stretched my neck to get a better view and saw that the scribbling was in his calligraphy (the same calligraphy you had shown me once, on a letter he had written to you longhand way back -- so round and neat and perfect), but in a language that I couldn’t recognize. When your dad returned, he hurriedly closed the notebook, locked it in one of his desk’s drawers, and politely dismissed me. He looked uncomfortable and agitated. I wish you could remember this red leather notebook, whether you had ever seen it somewhere at your house. It was thick and worn out, as if a thousand years old. I wish you could remember whether this notebook was what you wanted to talk to me about that afternoon on the boat in the middle of the lake, but didn’t get to.

Your lake chalet was sold a few months after that mysterious occurrence. I remember accompanying your family’s attorney to see you at the clinic and get your consent for the sale. Although you lost your memory and speech, by law you’re not ‘incapable of understanding and consenting’, and no one else was left but you to sign off. The folks who bought it are Hungarian, and have kept the place closed ever since. Meanwhile, the police have archived the case of your family’s disappearance as unresolved.

I’ve often thought about going back to the lake chalet. About contacting the new owners and asking for their permission to visit the place. Your dad appeared to me in a dream a few months ago. He was walking slowly on the surface of the lake and had a reassuring voice, but I couldn’t understand a single word he said. He spoke in an unknown language. Unknown to me, at least. Has he come to you in a dream yet? If he did, would you be able to tell he’s your dad? Would you be able to recognize him? I wish we could dream together, so I can point your dad out to you, if he comes. 

I will keep visiting, and writing, patiently. Until your memory returns. 

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Many thanks to

Nathan Slake

for suggesting an initial prompt for this piece. Although I later decided to take a different direction, his idea of the lake served as a stimulus for the development of the story.

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"Unsent Letters" is a series released every other week. These are imaginary letters to fictitious or real individuals who may or may not have influenced my life, not always mirroring actual events.

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