The Post Office Pen.
Tags: Love Letters, Post Office, Los Feliz, Short Story, Pen

Part II.

26 December 2019. 3 Days Later.

1303 Thursday Afternoon. The Day After Christmas.

The chimes and chatter of outside noise fill the room today as people roll through the swinging door and queue up next to our table. It’s now mid-day on the day after Christmas. These past few days have had me write letters of love, forms filled with frustration, angry-angular-ink and so many things in-between. I’m designed exactly for this purpose, I should be pleased, and I am, this is incredible, as long as ink flows down my spine, as long as I can write, is as long as I get to see her…

And if I get to see her I’m happy…

Its hard to say but I feel my ink is just over half full now…

Each day, at the end of her shift, Rita works on her manuscript. Each day she grants me the pleasure of putting her thoughts onto paper, just like I said, from my ink I bring fantasy to reality. Over the past few days I’ve started to get to know her on a deeper level. Through the emotion and intention she puts into her words we converse as she gets to know the intricacies of my ink. Her heart longs for something I wish my place in this world could provide. And in a way I can, her words flow so elegantly through me. But I’m just a simple tool, her tool of choice to share these moments filled with just silence, paper, and ink. Filling the room with her warm tones, I feel her careful well-spaced handwriting, starting slow, allowing her emotions to fall through my spine and onto the page. As her hand begins to gain momentum and speed, her grip loosens, and her thoughtful prose slides into lines of casual somethings. The first 3 lines are always the hardest for her to write. There’s tension there, held back, until it’s finally time to let it out and she feels at ease by signing off each days installment with just ‘R’.

The door continues to swing open as the lunchtime chatter of those sharing tacos across the street flow strong just as a man with a short beard and brown rimmed glasses enters the room while rolling in a black suitcase alongside him. Closely behind him enters a beautiful woman with long dark curls and a similar sized silver suitcase alongside her. They walk toward my table and pause. She looks around the room, making slight observations of the surroundings until she finally lands her gaze now back at him only to find his eyes fixed right back at her. In this moment a slight cheeky smile arrives on his face like he has something to say but remains silent. She turns her body around to move into the queue while looking back at him and rolling the suitcase along. The room suddenly feels like sunflowers dancing through space, bright and eye-catching as I now notice the growing amount of smiles flowing through the faces of all the patrons in the Post Office within my view.

1825 N Vermont Avenue, Los Feliz has turned into quite a peaceful scene. The man speaks in a soft and calm tone beginning the flow of earth greens in many shades emerging from space and into my view with the queue moving just enough so he is now right in front of me painting such a beautiful scene. He stops and reaches over, with a piece of blank paper in hand as he picks me up from the table. Writing slow and using capital letters while looking up and around as if he’s savoring this moment right now, this time he finds his curly haired partner looking right back at him while receiving a similar smile as before. He continues to write on the paper. It’s a destination for these two suitcases, signing off with Ouray, CO before he returns me to the table, they’re going to Colorado. I watch these two in quiet desire for a few moments, her voice lights up deep yellow shades flying every which way, spinning down to the earth greens produced by his subtle thoughtful gleans. A magical emergence of energy flirting with desire continues until a familiar red and yellow wildfire swirls enfolding the scene and flowing through the frame, it’s Rita, I hear her calling out ‘hey you two, common up’. The two excitedly roll up and away on over to the service desk as this remarkable scene fades into background ambiance. Just another story of today’s Post Office…

I’m now picked up by a middle-aged man, well dressed, and wearing a striped scarf. His face looks so soft and kind, despite the absence of a smile. I feel his desire to be careful, thoughtful, and genuine, taking his time with slight hesitation before he begins his dash at short sharp strokes, which somehow now feel latent with a sinking sadness. Before the letter is complete he closes his eyes with a sigh. The sound resonates and I feel dark blue and deep purple streaming from his presence. Once done, he folds it in half before sliding it into a blank envelope. It’s a letter to be sent off to the rainy city of Seattle. He signs off his final strokes as ‘Please be ok, I forgive you and you are always welcome back home. I miss you so much, my girl — Love, Dad’. He licks the glue gummed streak and seals it shut. He remains still, frozen in time, all but for a few deep slow breaths. He continues to breath in a slow and controlled manner as a single tear falls from his cheek and drops onto the letter below wetting the table and leaving a streak stained down his cheek, possibly not for the only time today. He is slow to wipe his tear away before he returns me to the table and walks away. The door swings open, lingering for a moment at its peak before he disappears from sight as I send him a silent wish of good luck.

Many more patrons pass through until we reach the end of the day. It’s getting dark and cold and I’m feeling so much lighter than I did just 12 hours ago. These words, joyous or not, carry the intentions of those who write them through me, they’re real and they hold specific weight. I love this. Ever since the unboxing, ever since new life was born into this Post Office, I have loved, I do love, this role that I play. It’s everything to me. It’s everything. It’s the only thing for me until my ink runs dry, until it’s nothing. And the more I write the sooner I am to being unable to write. I am everything and I am nothing, and that is absolutely something contained within these blurred lines. Such is Life.

Now sitting in stillness, Rita reaches over to the chain hung sign and flips it over again to ‘Closed’. This day is through. Humming a melodic slow tone today as she reaches over to me, I feel her grip, I hear her soft, and I see her strong. She writes slowly. Something is on her mind. She tells me through her fingers, her grip on my body and spine tell me about the tension she feels. She continues to write her words carefully, worded with compassion, but therein lingers the sorrow tone. She sends streaks of the sky through space in the creation of mellow waves and sad eyes. She misses him. His voice, his tone, has not been back for her and she fears the worst. Slowly signing off with ‘R’ as gentle streaking tears fall, one-by-one, landing droplets on her page, and wetting our Post Office table for the second time today…