I’ll tell the events in the exact order they unfolded. I hid a little bow from my dress in the corner of a playground, and 10 years later, it sits at my desk as I write this. I was 7 when we moved to another state. As we left, everyone was pretty nostalgic, and I was under the impression that I should be too, but I’d be lying if I said I had any hint about the seriousness of the situation. I didn’t realise that I wouldn’t be meeting these people again; I was just happy with the parting gifts. Half of this incomprehension can be attributed to my age, but the other half, I feel, was just indifference. If only I knew back then, I would have remembered a little more, sought a little longer for those connections. The shift wasn’t particularly difficult for me, as I didn’t really miss my old friends or school because I felt like I fit in more in this new school than I ever could have there. I never missed that place for a second, until one day things decided to change.
As I returned home one day, I flung open the gate to my room only to find a little envelope on the floor. Physical mail in this age? For me? I, who had never received mail of my own, was genuinely shocked at this, as it was very clearly addressed to me. The contents read, ’You never looked like the type of person who would play pen pals with someone, but I have decided to ask you anyway. So, after all this time, will you be my friend?’
I wasn’t aware of the usual pen pal letter format, but I’m sure it’s supposed to have the sender’s name or literally any other way of contacting them other than just their post office address, which was from my former residential town. I think I know who this is, but if it really was her, she’d be straight about this. And if it really was someone I knew, there would be no point in omitting names, so it has to be someone else, a distant ex-contact probably. Maybe that was the whole point of this: forming a friendship with someone new, but writing back to a random post office just to ask, ‘And who are you?’ felt a bit odd. Moreover, this said ‘stranger’ clearly knew my name and address, which was creepy too. Well, I decided to leave it be and dismissed it as a prank.
A month later, another letter arrived. This time asking for updates on my life, all the while not even revealing my name. While the first one I dismissed as a mistake, this one just felt audacious. I decided to reply. I needed to know who this was and why this person felt the need to know about my life, but wouldn’t just choose to conventionally find me on some platform online. My reply was short and crisp, asking for details as to who this person is and whether or not I know them from somewhere.
By the time the reply arrived after a month, I had forgotten that I’d written a letter, but considering that my mail traffic was absolutely zero, I knew exactly who it was from, just by the envelope. Considering we had to leave in the next half hour, I thought I should finish packing first.
Tragic news had arrived this morning, which is why I was home early from school after finishing my test, in the first place that day. A friend of my mother died this morning, from the town we hadn't been to in the past ten years. The car drive there meant 6 hours of road, and I, for one, was not glad, but the situation made me keep my discomfort to myself.
I forgot the letter amidst the rush. The dark clouds that day added to the sadness, and as we reached, we were greeted with excessive thunder, which naturally felt ominous on the day of a funeral.
The funeral took place the next morning; the untimely death had grieved many hearts and had drawn a crowd to the deceased's house. Given the breezy weather outside, I decided to go for a walk to escape the gathering.
It had rained the previous night heavily, and my foot accidentally slipped into a tiny ditch, splashing my whole outfit in turn. And now, I needed to change, so I went back. I returned to our room and started looking through my bag for a change of clothes, only to find something that definitely wasn't there before. It was an envelope, but as I held it in my hands, I realised that there was something inside. I tore open the envelope to find a key lime green bow. My bow, I knew, was from one of my favourite dresses, which I absolutely adored when I was little. Looking back, the dress was more tacky than cute, but it had only one bow, and only I knew where I hid it. In the corner of a park here, in this town, back when I was seven. An unusual and stupid act done in innocence, but I knew very well that this was the same bow. I had done it because I had heard that if you bury something precious to you, the thing you wish for most, comes true. Superstitious bullshit, I know, but it felt pretty convincing at the time.
I felt stalked and hurt. Someone obviously dug the bow out, and then started writing letters to me, or someone wrote those letters and then found out about the bow- highly unlikely but possible. I don't know which happened first, but I knew what I had to do next. It has to be someone from here, maybe an old friend, because I don't believe that 7-year-old me had a nemesis. I changed quickly and went out again to find the park where I used to play when I was young. I lost my way thrice but found it in an hour. I looked around, and there were no children, and it was mostly grass now. I went inside anyway, towards the corner which had felt pretty sacred to my younger self. The thunderbolts grew louder, and it was probably going to rain soon, too. So, after staring at the corner, which was now just full of grass and didn't look freshly dug at all, I felt I should return before the rain started. Before I could turn, somebody came up beside me. Not somebody, it was her.
In theory, I have known her for the longest time, but did I know her at all? A bully most times, best friend occasionally. We used to be friends, great ones, until she turned on me after finding new friends who just weren’t as weird as me, which meant I obviously had to be stopped from playing with everyone and ousted from the common group. That’s all I remembered; my brain flushed down the rest, I guess.
The eye contact felt awkward and unsure, but a second later, I was in her arms, and she was crying. She sobbed and explained, but even before she physically voiced it out, I knew. She had waited for me to return for years, so that maybe one day she could get her best friend back, and had held on to my bow to remember me by, which she had seen me bury in the ground from a distance. She had kept coming up to my empty house every summer, in hopes of my returning for summer vacation, just so she could apologise and tell me how she had realised that I was worth much more than those pretentious bonds. I wasn’t going to hold it against her after ten years anyway, but the apology meant a lot. It made me remember, remember what I'd lost and had moved on from a little too fast. I was grateful beyond words and said a silent prayer as we sat on those swings once again. Still the same, just not tiny anymore and a little wiser. You can call me naive, but I know what I wished for when I buried my bow, and I know that it worked because I have it now and am never going to let go of it again.