Elizabeth Staie

Mailbox #36

The wind blew the yellow stained curtains, letting in spots of sunlight into the small, hazily lit, loft. She rolled over on her floor-ridden mattress to face the broken window. The children across the street had sent a baseball through it while waiting for the bus a few days ago. She was thankful that it was summer, giving her more time to find the money to pay for the expenses before it became too cold. The light danced across her sheets as it created a rainbow-reflected spectacle. She sighed, sitting up, stretching, and with hesitation, the girl glanced around her apartment. Clothes were thrown around the room, the only furniture spotted was a mattress, a small table, a lamp, and she could still hear the water tap down from the leaky faucet in the bathroom. A younger woman she was, on her own, with nothing to her name but somehow still found the courage to carry on every day. A light yawn woke her up slightly as she rose out of bed and into the kitchen for a glass of water. The kitchen, not spaced out further than a few feet in an open square shape, gave her a sense of accomplishment. She didn't have much, but it was hers. She looked out her perch of a window onto the bright Manhattan streets. Children were running up the street playing hopscotch or jump rope while parents chatted on building steps about the neighborhood gossip. The mailman waved at her from down below, and she gave a kind smile in return. Stepping towards the door, she slipped on her shoes and pulled on a sweatshirt over her messy hair. She grabbed the doorknob to pull but tripped over a small object on the floor. Out of slight frustration, she closed her eyes and hung her head low expecting much worse than the little black book she found lying between her feet. With an inquisitive look on her face, the girl bent down to pick it up. She rubbed her hand over the cover and turned it over a couple of times. It couldn’t have been bigger than a small notepad like the ones she found at the bodega down the street. “Peculiar, “ she whispered to herself. Gently, she opened the book to the first page. It read: