The Lost Letters of William Woolf

by Helen Cullen

  William wrestled the fur head from over his own, struggling like a little boy stuck in his pullover. There was no Clare to wriggle it free and toss it over her shoulder this time. He perched against the white wooden windowsill and smoothed the hairs on the wolf’s face. The last time he had worn it, the mask brought out a mischievous streak in him that now lay dormant again. It had kindled a momentary internal fire which domesticity, doubt and drudgery usually squashed. Was it two years ago? Three? Clare had dressed up as Little Red Riding Hood, well, Little Dead Riding Hood, of course. They repeated the same jokes to every guest at the party, jokes that grew incrementally funnier – to them – each time: ‘I’m normally a wolf in sheep’s clothing, so tonight I’m finally living up to my name’ and ‘I’m Little Red after the wolf has had his way with her.’

  For the party, Clare’s red cloak was torn and covered in mud from the garden. Her tights showed long flashes of skin, her skirt was ripped in a diagonal across her thighs. A red corset burst out from under a shredded white blouse, black ribbons undone. Her hair was a tangled mess with twigs poking out at awkward angles. Red lipstick smeared across her bow lips; black make-up smudged around her eyes. Her feet were bare. With dirty hands, she led William through the party. A terrible guide, spinning him round and bumping him into doorways. It was the most fun they had shared in a very long time. When they staggered home to their flat that night, he fell on his knees and howled at the moon before Little Red dragged him to bed. Why had he not spent more nights like that, enjoying Clare, making her laugh?

  He shoved the costume back into the wardrobe and resumed his search. What was he looking for? Clare’s journals? The thought circled him like a cat of prey. No. That would not help him; there were quite enough of Clare’s words swimming in his head from her letter. Now on a mission to clear out their wardrobe after so many years of neglect, he was completely committed to the task; he just hadn’t fathomed what the purpose was. A hunt for this old typewriter with no ribbon? These old cassette tapes? That battered old biscuit tin filled with Christmas baubles? He spilled the contents of a padded envelope on to the carpet; a set of sepia photographs from Clare’s parents’ honeymoon: Teresa sitting on an inflatable beach ball, wearing a straw sun hat, eating an ice-cream cone; the couple posing outside their caravan, Teresa in a floral-print dress that blew sideways in the breeze, Eddie in blue swimming trunks, sun cream across his nose, his arm draped proudly around her shoulders. Such happiness as you might find only in a Saturday matinee movie from the fifties. He reached further into the shelves and his fingertips touched something squishy and soft. From the darkest recess, he eased the photo album Clare had filled for him as his wedding present.

  Could his wounds bear another lick of salt from more nostalgia? He slowly turned the pages, and images from the past blasted him:

  Clare holding her degree certificate in front of the university gates; she looked small against their might and her smile was shy.

  William emerging from the water after a swim in the Lake District. He had taken his glasses off for the photo and squinted at the camera like a mole surfacing from the earth.

  Clare dressed as a flapper on her hen night, wearing a little black wig and string after string of pearls.

  William and Clare sitting awkwardly in a gondola in Venice, the gondolier hovering over them with a scowl on his face.

  Clare and William sitting in deckchairs on Brighton beach, hands held across the space between them, faces sunburnt but happy, Clare’s broken arm in a sling.

  William closed the album, unable to look at any more pictures, and placed it safely back inside the wardrobe. As he stretched to reach the back of the top shelf, his elbow knocked a sports bag to the floor and a pair of old running shoes tumbled out. William rapped his knuckles on the wooden shelf. Eureka! His beloved white trainers with the navy stripes. He hadn’t worn them in years, but now they had appeared just when he needed them. A run would clear his head, vanquish some cobwebs. He stretched each shoe out of the crippled, bent shape they had settled into. Dust scattered from their creases as he forced his feet into their old shells. The interior was hard and stiff. He sat on the floor and pointed each toe upwards in turn, then flexed each foot, rotated each ankle, wriggling his toes inside their rediscovered home. He stood and bounced on the balls of his feet, hopping from left to right, right to left, then ran on the spot as fast as he could. His lungs surrendered before his feet did but he was ready. He pulled on his brown hooded fleece, zipped the house keys into his pocket, jogged downstairs and out of the front door without a second thought. The abandoned contents of the wardrobe lay strewn behind him; bedlinen, a sewing machine, a red canvas bag full of odd socks and pieces of cloth, Volumes A, R and T of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and a retired Polaroid camera. How had they managed to squeeze it all in?

  William’s muscles scanned his body for memories of how to move. There were faint whispers of long runs in the woods during adolescence, occasional bursts about the streets of London, but nothing recent enough to train them for this sudden expedition. He refused to acknowledge the burning sensation on the soles of his feet, the tightness in his chest, or the slowness of his pace. The strain in his calves could not conquer him. His heart pounded in his ears and drowned out the Greek chorus in his mind. Glorious oblivion. He pushed past the rain spitting on his skin, shook his hair into the wind and clenched his fists. The streets stretched out before him like a call to arms; puddles splashed cheers around his ankles, the city watched him run. All along the Bethnal Green Road, he pad-a-thumped, his right leg stronger. When he reached Weavers Fields, he slowed down to do a lap of the lawns, before dropping on to a bench. He arched his spine over the backrest and let the sudden downpour of rain run down his cheeks, drip from his chin, along his throat and under the collar of his hood. Never had discomfort felt so luxuriant. He closed his eyes and called to mind two letter writers: one, his wife; one, a ghost. Whose call would he answer?

  Indecision paralysed him. He must push his heart harder than he had his feet. He must take control, take action, take responsibility. It was time to make some decisions. First, though, he must find enough power in his legs to run home.

  XIII

  William sat in the depot, lost in a daydream of letters; on his typewriter, he typed furiously for hours the stories he had been mindfully collecting. Clare had told him she was coming home tomorrow, and the prospect filled him with anxiety. He needed to escape his own thoughts and drown in other people’s worries, their words and their worlds. Marjorie’s voice cut through his concentration; she sounded even more excitable than usual, if that were possible. Poor Trevor was on the receiving end.

  ‘This is my favourite bit,’ she gushed. ‘ “I miss talking to you late into the night, but I’m saving my stories for you. Hurry up, now, dear man. The nights are drawing in.” ’ William watched her pause for dramatic effect and put her hand to her heart. ‘’e’s ’er Great Love. Oh, I wonder what became of ’er, or if she ever found ’im.’

  A sickening dread crawled over his skin as his eyes found the midnight-blue envelope tucked under the arm of Marjorie’s fluorescent pink blouse. How had this happened? Those letters were meant for him. He tried to feign nonchalance as he strolled towards her.

  ‘That sounds interesting. Can I take a look?’ he asked, hoping his inner desperation was not showing on his face. Marjorie wagged her chubby forefinger at him. ‘Oh, no, no, no, when I wanted to champion the valentines, you ’ad no interest. Why now, eh?’ she asked. ‘You’ve barely said a word to anyone in weeks. This is my discovery and I will take care of it, thank you very much.’

  She perched on the edge of Trevor’s desk, despite his wilful attempt to ignore them both, and read the letter again, mouthing the words to herself and emitting little sighs. William was flabbergasted; this could not be borne. Winter’s letters were not a remedy for Marjorie’s lonely heart, something to add to her private collection.

  All morning, he surreptitiously watched
her idling away her time, working as little as possible, and realized he was a victim of his own success. It was no wonder Ned was upset with his diminishing productivity if they were depending on Marjorie to actually carry her own weight. She had Winter’s letter in the back pocket of her stonewashed jeans. The indignity of it! He watched and waited for his chance.

  Eventually, she took the letter out to read it again at her desk. This was his moment. He slipped into the corridor, sidled along it with his back against the wall, head darting left and right for any colleagues passing by. Then, before he could change his mind, he triggered the fire alarm with gusto. The shrill screeching was shocking as he dashed back into the office, on the pretence of grabbing his blazer.

  ‘Leave everything!’ Marjorie commanded, thrilled to finally put her fire-marshal training into action.

  William deliberately stalled to evacuate last, and swiped Winter’s letter as he slipped past Marjorie’s desk, tucking it into his interior breast pocket. Little beads of perspiration gathered at the nape of his neck with the intensity of the moment. His obsession had reached new heights.

  After the commotion of the false alarm, the depot settled back into its usual routine, with the exception of Marjorie, who lamented her missing letter for the remainder of the day. Trevor joked about the irony of her losing a letter here, of all places, but she wasn’t amused.

  ‘You seemed very interested earlier,’ she said to William. ‘Are you sure you don’t know anything about it?’

  He stared her down. Indeed, he impressed himself with his coolness.

  ‘Positively certain. I have far too much of my own work to be getting on with, thank you very much.’

  The relief he felt, however, was palpable.

  That evening, he was the last to leave. All Winter’s letters were laid out across the top of his desk, the earliest ones now thin and a little grubby along the creases from too much folding, excessive holding and reluctant hiding. The one he had salvaged today, however, gleamed fresh and crisp before him, despite Marjorie’s interference. Still unnerved by not having found it first, he questioned what this could mean. Had he taken too long to find it so the forces at play intervened and threw it in his path via Marjorie? Was it supposed to propel him into action? If he didn’t act, would the opportunity be taken from him? Or was he simply the victim of Marjorie’s meddling on the fourth floor, where she knew he didn’t want her to interfere? There was no easy answer, but he settled down to read it for the second time.

  My Great Love,

  I wonder if I’ll instantly recognize you when we meet? Even in some subconscious way? Will our great potential love be immediately obvious, or is the greatness something that will emerge over time? What if I mistake someone else for you and don’t realize until it’s too late? You could be sitting across from me on the Tube from Monday until Friday and never even look up from your newspaper to notice me, or the fact that I was reading your favourite book. You would look up, though, wouldn’t you? And notice something in particular: that I have worn down the heel on my left shoe more than the right, that a real handkerchief was stuffed in my pocket, how my left eyelid droops a tiny bit more than the right? Anything? Any question it burned you to know the answer to. You would feel compelled to ask, even though good manners had taught you not to. Please, do ask.

  I said a prayer for you today, lit a candle in the chapel in Hoxton Square. I don’t believe in the church, not any more, but some traditions tug at my heart strings. Lighting candles is one; sitting in the peace of the pews stills fills me with a sense of calm like no other. I suppose it’s just meditation, really, but I grew up learning to call it something else.

  William paused. How do you know if someone is the one? You have to trust your instinct, he supposed. He remembered asking his father the same question once, and he’d answered, ‘When you know, son, you know!’, but he thought he had known about Clare, and look at them now. He turned his attention back to Winter.

  Yesterday, I heard a mother drag the strangest promise from her teenage son on the Tube. She made him swear that, if he ever dropped anything on to the tracks, he wouldn’t jump down to try and save it. He argued that he wouldn’t do that unless he was sure he could reach it in time before the train came. His mother’s eyes widened, and she squeezed his arm; ‘That’s exactly what scares me,’ she said, ‘You would always believe you could make it. Always. But you wouldn’t. Promise me you’ll just leave it there.’

  It was as if his mother had already succumbed to a self-fulfilling prophecy that she would one day lose her son by his own hand, if not one way, then another. She could try and enforce her nurturing over his nature, in as many instances as she could think of, but one would eventually slip through. I could imagine her warning him about not running into traffic, not talking to strangers, not having unprotected sex, not taking drugs, not drinking too much alcohol, not climbing high walls, not skateboarding on busy streets, not giving cheek, not walking with too much swagger, not standing too close to the ledge, but his mammy’s voice would soon get drowned out by more seductive ones; those of girls with long ponytails and short skirts, boys with long Saturdays and short attention spans. How often split-second decisions define us; how we expose ourselves when we don’t have time to decide who we want to be. My mother always reminded me what Maya Angelou said: when someone shows you their true character, believe them the first time.

  William looked up from the letter again. Was that why he procrastinated so much? Was he trying too hard to decide what was the right thing to do instead of just trusting his instincts?

  There is a jukebox playing fifties songs in the corner of this bar, and any one of them could be a letter from me to you; it seems all the singers were just looking for love. I wish I knew what your favourite songs are. Maybe you’ll make me a mix-tape one day. I love how they breathe new life into old songs, arming them with superpowers that allow them to creep in through the back door of your heart. The lyrics are a language you can borrow for all that you feel but cannot find the words to say. And so songs can become ghosts that haunt us. They are time machines to old flames, lost cities, melancholy summer days and nights danced away. We breathe them into our composition like a cold fog. When the songs surprise us, as they often do, by being played in the most unlikely of places, years fall off our faces and we are sixteen again, or twenty-one again, in Paris again, or holding your face again. Emotional arrest. I hope we have our own song one day.

  I miss talking to you late into the night, but I’m saving my stories for you.

  Hurry up, now, dear man. The nights are drawing in.

  Yours,

  Winter

  William shuffled all the letters together with a new sense of purpose; he had stalled for long enough, and it was clear to him that the time had come for action, to take back control of his life. He could not resolve things with Clare one way or the other while the ghost of Winter haunted him. She must be banished. Or summoned. Secreting her away into a dark space inside him, a spot reserved exclusively for her, would not work. He knew her shadow would creep from her cubbyhole into any light he could use to search for Clare. In unguarded moments, it lingered overhead like a black star. What was he to do? He could not endure these two voices competing in his mind for attention. He listed his options on a clean new page.

  Shred the letters and try to squash each memory of them as it arises with one of Clare. An act of active forgetting.

  Try to find Winter and allow the reality of the woman to confront the fantasy.

  He knew that there was no choice. Not really. Find Winter, he must. Or he’d be tortured for ever with the question of what if? Was he completely giving up on Clare if he pulled the thread of Winter? No. It wasn’t that simple. He wasn’t abandoning his marriage. He was just clearing up a mess he had stumbled into unwittingly. Winter held so much power only because of her mystery. He would illuminate that room of speculation where his imagination so happily festered and expose the truth. It could just as
easily save his relationship with Clare as destroy it, couldn’t it?

  William stood and stretched his calf muscles, still cramped and sore from yesterday’s spontaneous sprint. What a fool he had been to force his body to such unexpected extremes. He kneaded the knot of tension at the back of his legs and remembered the last time they had seized up on him like this. Clare had cajoled him into going for a hike in the Coventry countryside for their anniversary. When they finally arrived at the inn after ten miles of tramping in the rain, they might have been celebrating their fiftieth instead of their fifth year together. They collapsed into bed, soggy and sore, almost too weary to make love. William ordered hot ports and roast-chicken sandwiches up to their room, and Clare ran a bath with lavender. Their shared suffering was a sweet one. Not like this teasing throbbing that taunted William and felt punitive and mean.

  He walked twice around the office floor anticlockwise, lifted his leg on to the desk and felt the stretch burn through him, before turning back to survey the evidence before him. All those letters. They must hold dozens of clues. Would they be specific enough to help him find her? Wasn’t that his job? Surely, now, he could put all that training and experience into good use for a personal mission. Was this why he had found the letters? Could it be that he was the only one who could use them to find her? He was facing what could be the most important letter mystery of his career.

  He started with the postmarks, the first stage of any letter investigation. They reconfirmed what he already knew: all London – but the italic font told him that nearly all had been processed through the Bethnal Green sorting office, as close to his own front door as the grocery shop where he bought a pint of milk nearly every day. He could have passed her in the street so many times. It was no wonder he thought he saw her standing at every Tube stop, buying fruit at the market, waiting at the traffic lights to cross the street. He traced his finger over the pale-blue postmark and noticed that the collection time was the earliest possible on all but one of the envelopes. Was she a night owl prowling in the dark or an early sparrow flitting through the dawn? Did she slip them through the brass slit in the wall of the post office or feed them to the silent mouth of the red post box in the street? Maybe she held her ear close to hear the soft thud of paper landing on a blanket of envelopes. Maybe she kissed the seal before she let the envelope drop. Or did she toss it quickly in before dashing up the pavement, putting footsteps and seconds between real life and her foolishness as quickly as possible? Winter could never have imagined that her messages in a bottle would float to shore so near to her home. If it came to it, he could knock on every door in the borough. Could he? Wasn’t that the sort of thing people did out of desperation when they were looking for a missing child? How could he ever explain what he was looking for? The letters pulled his attention back. Tug. Pull. Drag.