Querida Gabriella:
When you’re older, I will bring you here every year. Every year. It’s important to never fully sever the ties that bind you. You’re probably wondering why I haven’t brought you here before. I don’t have a good answer, baby. I knew I could always bring you, you know? I knew nothing would change here. Everything would always be ready for you, exactly the way I left it. Even my house, my room, are the same. The same bed. The same bookshelves. My high school nightgown.
In the mornings, I stand on the terrace and look at the houses below. They’re the same, too, and I still know what tiles are broken on their roofs.
Time stood still here and time just went by, and there was always something else. Like this summer. I’ve come home to work, but you’ve stayed with Daddy and Grandpa and Grandma over there. They have a house in Lake Tahoe. You love it there because you get to go out on the boat, and there are no boats here.
But we’re coming next Christmas. I have it all planned out. We’ll have big parties with your cousin and invite all the kids we know, and you’ll decorate the manger with real moss.