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Mr. Grumpy Butt: Wow, that’s great. I can’t wait to hear it. I bet it’s beautiful...everything you do is beautiful.
Both of us stopped typing for a moment, and then I saw the text bubbles pop up, and he sent another one.
Mr. Grumpy Butt: You’re beautiful. I miss you, Songbird.
I wanted to say I miss you too. Tears started forming in my eyes. If I start crying now, I will spiral. I know saying I miss you would add insult to injury, so I just said what I thought I was supposed to say.
Me: I’ll see you for my birthday, right?
Mr. Grumpy Butt: Yeah, I’ll be here. I can’t wait to be near you again.
Neither one of us sent another text.
The following day I was sitting in my room, working on the song when Brielle walked in.
“Hey, Callie let me in. Hope that’s okay.”
I looked at her like she was being stupid because she was. “Bean, you have a key… of course it’s okay,” I laughed.
She sat on the edge of my bed and held what looked like a card in her hand. She was tapping the edge of it on her palm.
I pointed to it. “Is it for me?”
She looked down at it and then back at me. “Yup, Callie asked me to bring it up. She was leaving when I got here.”
I stared at her for a second, trying to figure out why she was being so weird. “Are you going to give it to me or what?”
“I haven’t decided yet?”
“Brielle.” I waved my fingers in a give-it-to-me motion, and when she still wouldn’t fork it over, I grabbed it.
“If it’s mine, you have to—” I was staring at my address, and I knew the handwriting immediately. I swallowed the hardened lump that was now in my throat. I looked up at her. “Lincoln sent this?”
She shrugged. “That’s what the return address says. It came by overnight mail by the looks of it.”
I took a few deep breaths to calm my heart because it was palpating so fast. I don’t think this is something I want to open in front of anyone else, so I placed it on the bed. I realized I didn’t know why she was here yet.
“Forget this for a second. What are you doing here?”
“I just wanted to make sure you were okay. I decided to stay in the dorms this semester so I won’t be home.” She paused, “I don’t know. I just wanted to make sure you were good, I guess.”
I love how protective she is of me even though she’s my younger sister. She is the perfect sister. I grabbed her hand and squeezed it. “I love you, Bean. I’m good, I promise.”
“Good. Then can I give you the bad news, and you promise you won’t get mad at me?” I looked at her worriedly but didn’t say anything so she would continue. “I won’t be able to come to your party in Tennessee. I have a super important group test on the Monday after that trip, so I’ll need to be home to study and be here for my group. God forbid the flight gets canceled or something. I can’t miss it. I’m sorry.”
I let out the breath I was holding. “God, Brielle, don’t do that. I thought it was something horrible. That’s not bad news; it’s okay. It might be better with fewer people there anyway, with everything happening. You and I will celebrate with each other after school is done. Don’t sweat it.” Her birthday is only 13 days after mine so we normally celebrate together.
Now that I think about it, I should tell Callie and Nick to stay behind too. They would be driving since Nick is terrified of flying, and I was already feeling bad about it and considering driving with them. It’s just a long weekend, and I can celebrate with them when I get back. I sent them both a text as well as one to Liza so she knew not to plan for so many people.
Brie left a few minutes later, and I wanted to open the letter immediately. I held my breath and ripped the seal. A few folded pieces of paper fell out when I opened it, but one was labeled “read first”.
Dear Songbird,
I hope you’re doing okay. I miss you like crazy. You haven’t even been gone for twelve hours while I’m writing this, but I figured I would start my promise to you immediately. I promised to be a penpal. I know one of your dreams is to have letters and love notes written to you, so I figured I would start now… technically I started when you first told me that during one of our very first conversations about our families. I wrote you one for every time we did something I wanted to commemorate. I didn’t send them all, but I sent you the first one. I wanted you to know my initial thoughts about you; we were just friends if you can call it that. It was after our night at the bar where we danced for the first time. I want this to be the beginning of the perfect love story Aubrey, and I hope we get to keep writing it forever.
With Love,
Mr. Grumpy Butt
