Chapter 3 ACROSS THE MILES

That evening, Margaret found herself driving past Eleanor's house on Maple Street, something she'd started doing without quite realizing it over the past few weeks. The house sat back from the road, a modest two-story colonial with white clapboard siding and green shutters that had seen better days. The front porch sagged slightly, and several of the shutters hung askew, but there was still a dignity to the place, a sense of having been deeply loved. Margaret parked at the curb and sat in her car, watching the house in the gathering dusk.

She'd been carrying James's letter in her purse all day, unable to leave it at the office, unable to stop thinking about the words he'd written. The phone call to directory assistance had yielded a number for Sunset Manor, but she hadn't been able to bring herself to dial it. Not yet. What would she say? How did you tell a dying man that his mother had been gone for two years, that his letter seeking reconciliation had arrived too late? How did you break a heart that was already breaking? A car pulled into the driveway next door, and Margaret saw Mrs. Patterson getting out, struggling with grocery bags. Without thinking, Margaret got out of her own car and hurried over to help. "Oh, Margaret, how thoughtful," Mrs. Patterson said gratefully as Margaret took two of the heavier bags. "These old bones aren't what they used to be." As they walked toward Mrs. Patterson's front door, the older woman glanced toward Eleanor's house. "Such a shame about that place," she said softly. "Eleanor loved that house so much. She used to say it was the only place she ever felt truly at home." "Mrs. Patterson," Margaret said carefully, "did Eleanor ever talk to you about her son? James?" Mrs. Patterson paused, her key halfway to the lock. "Oh, my yes. That was her great heartbreak, you know. They had such a terrible fight after Robert's funeral. James blamed her for something-I never did understand what exactly-and he just left. Packed up his things and moved clear across the country." She shook her head sadly. "Eleanor never stopped hoping he'd come back, though. She used to say that anger couldn't last forever, that love would win out in the end. Every birthday, every Christmas, every Mother's Day, she'd get her hopes up. I'd see her looking out the window, watching the mailbox." Margaret's heart clenched. "Did she ever try to contact him?" "Oh, she tried. But he'd changed his phone number, moved apartments. Her letters came back. After a while, I think she decided she had to respect his choice to stay away, even though it was killing her." Mrs. Patterson's eyes were bright with unshed tears. "That woman died of a broken heart, Margaret. The cancer might have taken her body, but it was the loneliness that really did her in." They stood in silence for a moment, the weight of Eleanor's story settling between them. Then Mrs. Patterson looked directly at Margaret. "Why do you ask, dear? Have you heard something about James?" Margaret hesitated. She couldn't reveal what she'd read in the letter, but she felt compelled to say something. "I've been thinking about family lately, about the things we leave unsaid. Eleanor seemed like such a good woman." "She was the best," Mrs. Patterson said firmly. "And if that son of hers ever does come around, he's going to have to answer to me for the way he treated her." As Margaret drove home that night, Mrs. Patterson's words echoed in her mind. The image of Eleanor watching the mailbox, hoping for word from her son, was almost unbearable. How many days had she walked to the end of her driveway, expecting to find the letter that James had finally written but hadn't had the courage to send until it was too late? Margaret's own house was small and tidy, a reflection of her ordered life as a woman who had built her world around routine and responsibility. She'd bought it twenty years ago when she'd finally given up hope of marriage and children, deciding that she needed to create a home for herself alone. It was comfortable and quiet, filled with books and the kind of furniture that lasted-practical choices for a practical life. But tonight, the silence felt oppressive. Margaret made herself a cup of tea and sat at her kitchen table with James's letter spread out before her. She read it again, noting details she'd missed the first time. The careful way he'd described his children, the regret in every line, the desperate hope that maybe, somehow, it wasn't too late for love to bridge the gap that pride had created. Margaret had never married, had never had children of her own, but she understood something about loneliness, about the way silence could grow between people until it became impossible to cross. She'd watched it happen to friends, to neighbors, to the countless families whose mail she'd handled over the years. Letters of reconciliation that arrived too late, Christmas cards sent to addresses where the intended recipients no longer lived, love letters that got lost in the system and never found their destination. She thought about her own family-her parents, long dead, her sister in California who called twice a year and sent obligatory birthday cards. They weren't estranged, exactly, but they weren't close either. They'd simply drifted apart over the years, caught up in their separate lives, assuming there would always be time later to reconnect properly. Maybe that was what made James's letter so affecting. It was a reminder that time was finite, that the luxury of assuming "later" would come was an illusion. Eleanor had died believing her son hated her, and James was dying believing his mother had rejected his attempts at reconciliation. The truth-that she had never received his letter, that she had never stopped loving him-was trapped in the space between them, known only to Margaret. She picked up her phone three times that evening, dialing the first few digits of Sunset Manor's number before hanging up. What gave her the right to insert herself into this family's tragedy? What if James was better off not knowing that his mother had died still loving him? What if the truth made his guilt worse instead of better? But each time she put the phone down, she thought about Eleanor watching that mailbox, and she knew she couldn't leave James to die without knowing that his love had been returned, even if it had never been received. Finally, at nearly midnight, Margaret dialed the full number and waited, her heart pounding as the phone rang.