burning love

The man likes to order mystery packages from the Something Store. The premise is that you pay $10, and you receive a parcel that may contain anything from a laptop to a deck of cards. The boy and I refer to it as the "something disappointing store", as we have so far opened them up to find luggage tags, a pet brush, and a eye-bleedingly hideous tie. Nevertheless, it is the man's form of gambling, and about two weeks ago he succumbed to the lure of chance again.
At the same time, I was starting to knit the man-sweater. Between sketching out the design and carefully choosing the wool, I got it into my head that the item itself would become a magical love totem - that stitch by stitch, I would bind myself to the man and graft shut the injury to my heart. Since I was a kid, I have suffered from bookish mysticism. I still feel in the backs of wardrobes for snow from time to time.

An idea formed itself in my head as I sat counting stitches and conjuring magic - I needed to burn the boyfriend boxes. As a librarian, the idea of disturbing provenance is bad enough; destroying written material is kind of horrifying. This weekend the man climbed up into the attic space and tossed down the shoe boxes from the trunk in which they were hidden, careful not to look into them. I caught them from the air and did not open them, either. These are love notes I will never again read; the girl in the letters is no longer me. I need to move on, and maybe protect the dignity of the boys who, I think, loved me. The idea of setting fire to them panicked me a bit, so I tucked the boxes under the bed, instead.

Yesterday, the envelope from the Something Store arrived. The boy tore it open, then sagged in disappointment. "Dad, you need to stop ordering things from there. Don't they have a box to check if you're buying something for a kid?" He handed it to the man, who said, "Oh, well," and handed it to me.

It was a lighter.