The first letter was the product of a day of melancholy. It was a downer day that provoked inner thoughts that I was really too busy to have. After my mind nagged and nagged my emotional dramatic brain, I gave in around 11 pm just as I was about to ready for bed.
I had several papers out already, covering my desk in stacks of graded and ungraded reports of miserable, tired, and tiring growing children. I shifted my third period ESL class to the right and my Advanced English Literature behind my pen.
I addressed the letter to “Dear sir or madam”, pushing the words carefully into the college-ruled paper. The words began to spill slowly yet steadily and I began to smile weakly as the gratification I felt writing this letter was something I hadn’t felt from my students in a long time. “I have no logical reasoning for the existence of this letter.
Whosoever receives it, if anyone does, should hold my highest apologies for any inconvenience. I never imagined I would have hated language and progress as much as I do now. I understand the necessity, but I’d rather just eat, sleep, and defecate until I die young from an elephant stampede as of lately.”
I scribbled onto a scrap sheet, begging the pen back to life. It didn’t respond, so I reached for my pencil and wrote a clean goodbye; unwilling to write more without the permanence of a pen. “Sincerely, Treker”.
The next morning, I awoke to a sore neck, having slept on another pile of late work. The letter was tucked into a blank envelope and into my side bag. I couldn’t bare to address it to a stranger; it is too small a world for that risk.
This, my dearest reader, is when my mistake began. I had put my envelope in the little open pocket of my bag that hangs in the front. A few school boys transporting a couple of boxes stood in the elevator with me. As is the design of a side bag, they were quickly able to part the envelope from between the pieces of soft, black cloth of the pocket.
After pickpocketing me, they began to smirk like the amateur liars that they were, and took to whispering amongst themselves. I narrowed my eyes at their suspicious behavior, but assumed the muffled laughter was from the lines on my face from the paper I had slept on.
A hint for my dear reader- they do not return the envelope.
(Will perhaps be continued)
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See you in another day,
SA