Drew Mahlon—
Two weeks ago, I was diagnosed with leukemia. There is a cloud of uncertainty hanging over us right now, and so I decided I needed to come here. To the apple tree. I know I’m breaking the rules, that I’m doing this earlier than we had planned, but this might be the last chance I get. It is 5 am right now. You’re sound asleep at our home, and I asked your dad to drive me here and help me get up to the tree this morning before you wake up.
I read your letter, Drew, and it made me smile because you really were so blind to your feelings, weren’t you? But that’s okay. I still believe what I wrote. Everything will work out how it’s meant to. For me, it already has. I told you how I feel about you, and we got married, and for two years, you’ve been my wife, and you’ve made my life complete.
I don’t want to leave you, Drew, but if I do, you will need this To Do List. Just one more, and then I know you’ll be okay.
You need to fulfill the promise of coming here at thirty years old, even if I can’t. You need to read these letters, even if I’m not here. You need to take the emerald ring off your finger and keep it in this box, because I know you’ll never forget me, and because, knowing you, you’ve probably kept it on your finger this whole time, and because you need to be at peace with everything. You need to come back here once a year, not because I want you to be tied down, but because I want you to know I’m not completely gone. I want you to remember everything we had and be thankful for it.
There’s one more thing you need to do. The most important item on the list. Promise me you’ll do this, Drew, even if I’m gone, even if it’s hard, even if it hurts sometimes:
5. Keep going. Keep writing and learning and growing. Keep living.
I love you, Drew Mahlon.
River
A mess of emotions is still spinning around in my body, my head, my heart. Dirty tears are still running down my face, my neck and chest.
River came back to the tree.
He came back when he was sick, not long after he had been diagnosed. He had written me this letter, because he didn’t know. He didn’t know if he would make it back here with me.
He read the letter I wrote to him at eighteen.
Understanding and gratefulness flow through me like cascades of pure water. I needed this letter. I needed to hear from him one more time. Tonight, as I’ve been alone at the apple tree, I needed his guidance and his words and his presence to rush through me like this.
Right then and there, I make a promise. I will come back. I will return every year to this meadow. I will retrieve the box from the barn, reclaim the key from the knothole, and I will sit under our tree and read all of the letters. I will remember all the wisdom and beauty and light River brought into my life, how he made me into the person I am today. How he gave me Cedar. How River lives on through him.
I will bring Cedar with me, when he is older. We’ll come here together, and I’ll show him the letters. I’ll tell him the story of how River and I found this tree together so many years ago. I’ll tell him about the love River and I shared, and I’ll tell him that I will never stop loving River. He is forever a part of me, forever a part of Cedar.
I slip the emerald ring off my finger and let it rest in my palm, let it sparkle in what is left of the horizon’s light. River was right—I haven’t taken off the ring since he left me. I don’t want to take it off now. I don’t want to part with it, to store it in the wooden box inside the barn, and not see it again until next year.
But this is River’s request. This is what he specified in the new and final To Do List. So I will listen to him, even though this is a painful task for me right now.
I arrange all of the items in the box: two pens, three letters, one ring. I remove the key and close the lid. I will climb the tree again in order to replace the key, and I will return to the barn in order to rest the box back under the floorboard. But for now, I take a moment to just sit here. There is a fallen apple near my spot on the ground. I pick it up, turn it around in my hand, and it is perfect: small, evenly round, no wormholes or blemishes, a deep scarlet shade. I take a bite, and my mouth is filled with a bright sweetness. I can see the core of it now, its brown seeds tucked away within the flesh, and a moment later, the sun’s light is gone.
◈ ◈ ◈
At my parents’ house the next morning, I barely get the front door open before my dark-haired four-year-old is charging toward me, colliding into my legs, and chattering away about everything that’s happened since I last saw him thirteen hours ago.
I catch a few words amidst his excited speech—noodles and lions and sleeping bag—as I crouch down to hug him. I only have him in my arms for about four seconds before he breaks away and takes off toward the kitchen, singing, “Mom’s here, Mom’s here, Mom’s here!”
There are sizzling and clinking sounds ahead of me, and I’m not at all surprised to find my parents in the kitchen: my dad setting out plates and mugs, my mom flipping French toast at the stove. It looks like both Cedar and I will be joining my parents here for breakfast, which is fine with me. Cedar looks happy about the situation too—he is propped upon a stool, his spindly legs tucked under him, his head vacillating from side to side as he is ogling the bottle of maple syrup before him.
“Drew.” My mom acknowledges my arrival with a quick smile before turning her attention back to the skillet. “Just in time for breakfast. Cedar, will you help Grandpa set the table, please?”
He accepts the request with zeal, jumping down from his perch and rushing over to the dining room. Five minutes later, we’re all seated at the table, fixing up our pieces of French toast with butter and syrups and fruit, eating and talking—mostly listening on my part, hearing about how my dad let Cedar sleep in the living room last night after the movie, how he gave Cedar a sleeping bag, a pillow, and a flashlight, and told him stories ‘til he drifted off.
“It was like camping,” Cedar says. He has never been camping, but he’s developed a strong interest in it recently, since turning four.
“We’ll go real camping soon. Next summer, probably. When Cambria’s in town.”
My head snaps up from my plate to look at my dad, who made the comment, and he gives me a nod. My parents haven’t gone camping since Cambria and I were in high school, so this news surprises me. It excites me at the same time, the idea of doing something like that as a whole family again, introducing it to Cedar for the first time. Of course, I’m always excited at the thought of seeing Cambria, too, which will happen soon enough on Winter Break. She and Jamie are married now. She still works as a makeup artist in the Bay area, and Jamie, funnily enough, ended up going into family practice rather than the ER. He’s mellowed out somewhat over the years, but not too much.
“I’ve also been thinking,” my dad speaks up again in between sips of coffee, “about booking a trip to one of those houses. On one of the lakes nearby. You know, you can do that kind of thing pretty easily now. Book a few nights near a lake, some trails.”
My eyes return to him, yet again in surprise. “Like the cabin we used to have, with the pond?” I ask.