Treading Lightly

It isn't a time capsule, it's a time bomb.

It exploded in slow motion decades ago, but the pieces and parts have been carefully preserved. Several zip-lock bags segregate different types, and they all fit inside a couple of shoe boxes. The bags and box wear no labels, but I know them well.

"What's that?" she asks, helping me cull items from my shed. Some stuff will be sold, some donated, and a surprising amount is trash. I've hauled everything in this outbuilding around for at least two moves, and the upcoming would be the third.

It's time to let things go.

I smile but don't really answer. "It goes in a 'keep' box," I say, pretending not to smell perfumed letters from one of the bags.

She pretends not to notice that I dodged her question.

It's okay. I still pretend to dodge shrapnel from the girl who wrote those letters decades ago, but I’m not very agile.

The folded pages of college-ruled wear the inky scrawl of a teen girl in love with a boy.

She grew up and so did I, but the time capsule of letters from a love that once was makes memory a minefield.