Willa Frost's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

For thirty years, Willa Frost had written love letters she signed with other people's names. She was the postmaster of Joyce. She also lived above the general store, in a room that smelled of ink and dried roses. Tonight she sat at her desk and tried to write one letter that told the truth. It was for Henrik, the man who had read her words for a decade and believed another man wrote them. Her broad hands held the pen the way they held reins. Steady. Sure. But the page stayed white. Willa had written vows, apologies, confessions of longing. Every one wore a stranger's name at the bottom. She had never once written "from Willa." The words would not come. She did not know her own voice. She tried anyway. "Dear Henrik, I am the one who—" She stopped. The sentence felt like a lie, though it was the only true thing she had ever started. She crossed it out. She wrote, "You should know the letters were—" She stopped again. Her hand shook. Thirty years of other people's hearts, and she could not find her own. She pushed back her chair and went to the window. Below, in the yard behind the store, the wild stallion stood in the cold. He belonged to no one. He let no one near. For weeks she had left him oats. For weeks he had watched her and refused to come. She had written whole romances about courage she did not own. Willa pulled on her coat and carried the oats down. The stallion raised his head. His mane shifted. His ears pinned back, a warning. She stopped at the fence and did not reach over it. She just stood and spoke, plain and low, the way no letter had ever let her speak. "I'm tired of hiding," she said. "I've said other men's words so long I forgot I had any." The stallion did not run. He took one step toward her. Then another. His breath fogged the dark. He lowered his head to the oats in her open hand and ate. His whiskers brushed her palm. Willa stood still and let him. She understood then. She had been trying to sound like a letter. A letter was not the truth. The truth was plain and shaking and hers. She went back upstairs. She did not reach for fine words. She wrote: "Henrik. I wrote them. Every letter you loved, I wrote with this hand. His name was on them, but the heart was mine. I am sorry I let you love a man who never wrote a word." She read it once. She signed it. For the first time in thirty years, she wrote her own name at the bottom and left it there. Then she sealed the envelope. Tomorrow she would carry it across the frozen roads herself. And Henrik would learn who had been writing to him all along.