Things feel so uncertain. I’m sure part of it has to do with going to Middlebury next month. And maybe it’s also the way things are in our country right now. Everything feels so up in the air. It’s not only the way people are so violently divided about this terrible war. You must have heard about that cult killing in California? And all the children who are starving to death in Biafra? And that woman dying in Senator Kennedy’s car? Doesn’t it feel like we’re becoming unhinged?

I wish I knew what to say about us. I wish I understood what I’m feeling. I hate being this way. I hate to keep you in suspense. You don’t deserve that. I do love you, Lucas. But as I said before, I can’t go back to the way things were last spring. And I’m scared that if we get together again, that’s what will happen. I didn’t intend to become that person last time. So what’s to make me think it won’t happen again?

xoxoxo Robin

My heart swells. Robin’s letter is written on the lavender stationery she last used over Easter vacation, when her missives arrived every day, saturated with Shalimar and professions of love. I bring this one close to my nose. No perfume, but that’s okay. Tears seep through my squeezed-closed eyes as I laugh, and sob, and laugh.

March 1970

Dear Chris,

Did Mr. DiPasquale say anything about you taking off early on Mondays and Wednesdays for school this summer? My father said he’d talk to him about it. I guess it has to be night school, right? After what you’ve been through, it would be totally weird to go back to high school with a bunch of kids.

Man, I still can’t believe that working in the factory may have been what saved your butt. Not that you learned anything about how the postal system actually works, but that’s the army, right? And speaking of which, can you believe that story about all those officers trying to cover up that massacre near My Lai? I sure hope you never saw anything like that over there.

I know what you mean when you say life before the army feels like ancient history. Or maybe what’s ancient are the dopes we were back then. Almost every night after dinner, most of the guys I know go to bars or stay at their places and get ripped. I’m starting to think that it was a good thing that we got most of that lunacy out of our systems when we did. Not that we don’t enjoy a beer and a toke now and then. I mean, let’s be real.