Lost Letter
Flash Fiction from the Vault
Tom recognised his name and the address.
A letter managed that trick often enough, but the house and place addressed a home Tom moved from three decades ago.
The handwritten script flowed with a practised hand.
Rachel looked up from the counter.
“Who sent it?”
“Someone from my parents’ generation, and not a doctor.”
Tom meant it as levity, but the joke died as he sat at the kitchen table.
“Bad news?”
“In a way. Robin Fitzgerald. I went to school with him. His mother, Anne wrote to the only address she knew. He’s missing. Lost at sea.”
“How?”
“Sailing.”
“Oh.”
Rachel filled the kettle.
“Robin and I shared a year and a House, but not a friendship.”
Tom rubbed one thumb along the edge of the envelope.
“Don’t misunderstand me. I disliked some boys, and they returned the courtesy. Fair enough. You can’t please all the people, all the time. Robin unsettled me because I never understood him. Some days he seemed all right, even friendly. Other times, he looked at me like dirt on his shoe.”
“Adolescence confuses everyone.”
Rachel dropped teabags into two mugs.
“Why has his mother written to you?”
“She wants me to pray for him.”
Tom-the-boy never concealed his Christian faith.
He gave a thin smile.
“That counted against me, only a little less than science fiction or computers. I liked both, of course, but neither raised questions of eternal life. Jesus did. So I talked about Jesus.”
Rachel put his tea before him.
“I still don’t understand why Robin’s mother reached for you after all these years.”
Tom shook his head. He lacked an answer too.
“She says I spoke to Robin about a dream. I warned him. Telling him to take care on the water.”
“Did you?”
“I do not remember saying that. I suppose I must have. It made an impact. He remembered, and he told his mum.”
Tom decided prayer gave him the only useful response. At first, he whispered of a man lost with his boat, but his imagination caught, stumbled, then changed. He saw Robin struggling inside the turmoil of his own conscience.
The ocean became spiritual chaos: a deep expanse filled with primordial monsters, great beasts of greater oceans, desires that raged through nations, tribes, and souls. They broke men with the same appetite that drove them to rule mankind. They defied love of neighbour and even love of self. The dragon in the sea wanted Robin to hate himself as much as he hated everyone else.
Tom kept the waking dream out of his reply. He hand-wrote a short note to Anne Fitzgerald, assuring her he would keep her and Robin in prayer.
Months passed before an email arrived from Robin. He thanked Tom for the letter and informed him, with sorrow, that his mother’s death, not long after his return.
“Thank you for your prayers. Mum appreciated them. I still don’t know what to think about God, but her remembering something I forgot ages ago, and that amazes me.
“I got lost at sea, in fact. A silly beggar, truth be told. Yet the whole mess turned out right in the end. I came home in time to see my mother before she passed.
“I was indeed lost, then I was found.”