The Heart-shaped Box

The box is kept in the second drawer of my bureau, along with a cerulean blue silk tie rolled into a neat round, a gold Cartier watch, a Waterman fountain pen, and some coins from my travels. I’m rather proud to say that the box’s heart-shaped form is still intact since it has been carefully transferred time and again into at least five bureaus over the thirty years since Maya gave it to me on Valentine’s Day in our tenth grade English class.  

I was a newcomer to school and Whitebridge that year. Maya was open-hearted, slightly plain, but possessed a radiant smile. I sat in the seat behind her on the first day, and just before class began, she turned around and said: “Oh hi, I’m Maya. You’re new. Do you like English?” And with that, my youthful nervousness quickly faded, and I began to look forward to both English class and Maya’s entertaining impulsive quips, her naïve pen and ink drawings, and her energetic laughter. I suppose one could say we became friends, in so far as a boy-girl friendship is defined in one’s teenage years in a small town. As time went by, I found myself glancing over at her in the cafeteria during the lunch hour to confirm that she was in good spirits, surrounded by her circle of like-minded friends. They were the popular group, each knowing their place in the world, secure that tomorrow would bring more of the same and yet happily seeking distractions to broaden their youthful excitable minds.

On afternoons when she wasn’t playing sports or lingering by the river with the smoker crowd, I would catch up with Maya on her way home from school. My house was a stone’s throw from the school, while Maya’s was in the more affluent neighbourhood up the hill - affluent only in a relative sense since Whitebridge was dismally in need of a coat of paint. 

It was never awkward on those short walks and Maya would often continue chatting on the sidewalk, only twenty feet from my front door. I would have been mortified had my foster mother, or worse, foster father, come out to fetch me, but it never happened, and so my boyish worries were all for naught. On one such occasion, my birthday as it happens, Maya and I left the school together and walked lazily across the road, towards the side street where I lived. As we stood on the pathway leading up to my house, Maya presented me with a birthday card: a pen and ink drawing of a tall three-storey turn-of-the-century brick house, which she’d copied from a book cover. Maya was shyly proud of her drawing and I was both surprised and delighted to receive it from her. I placed it in the heart-shaped box she’d given me the year before. 

Having arrived in Whitebridge when cliques were already established, I never formed a significant set of friends there. Instead, I spent my time developing my skill in drafting, which would lay the foundation for my later success in obtaining an honour’s degree in architecture. While my cohort was out on sunset road cruises, learning about sex, substances and male camaraderie, I was drawing structures with secret rooms, behind moving panels lined with library shelves, sitting at the very desk where I had placed Maya’s heart-shaped box. She had given the same box to most of the boys in our class. You didn’t think I was the only recipient, did you? 

I left Whitebridge after high school, and by the age of twenty, I was in the city in my second year of college, studying the theory of structures and excelling at maths. Once I graduated, I secured employment at an excellent architecture firm. With the ambition of a hungry tiger stalking its prey, I began winning design awards, speaking at conferences, having my work featured in architecture magazines, and making enough money to purchase my first home in Rosedale, which I renovated and then flipped for over a million. I repeated this cycle seven times, and by age forty could afford to live comfortably and travel annually to fascinating places. 

In contrast, Maya remained in Whitebridge and married a man named Tony who worked for a local insurance broker. Maya and I stayed in touch and although she invited me to the wedding, I declined due to previous commitments. I sent her postcards from my travels and would invite her to lunch when my schedule allowed me to drive down her way. The bleak drive to Whitebridge never seemed to change and I wondered how Maya maintained her cheerfulness, working in the purchasing office of the municipality. I reflected on how the tables had turned. Maya peaked in high school, and then - I hope you don’t find it unkind of me to say so - stagnated, while I went on to achieve fortune and renown. It was both coincidental and ironic that Maya had given me a drawing of an old house, and that I had later chosen architectural design to be my path. 

Maya was devastated when Tony died suddenly at age forty-one of pulmonary edema, having had no previous health issues and a fairly staid lifestyle. I attended his funeral, and briefly spoke with Maya, expressing my condolences. Maya barely heard me, poor thing, but I feel certain that my presence must have provided her with some comfort. 

Six months later, I made a point of getting together for lunch with Maya. Shock is a destructive force. It callously watches as the target buckles, and then, having chosen its unexpected moment, pitilessly leaves unrecognizable rubble in its wake. Tony’s death had shaken Maya’s world, not only because she missed him, but more so because it came without warning, causing Maya to recalibrate her belief system. The rug could be pulled out from under one’s feet and one couldn’t possibly prepare for it. 

I found Maya’s new worldview to be refreshing. She no longer wore those irritating rose-coloured glasses and had downshifted to a more apt survival mode. Her body appeared denser and her eyes darted about each time the bell rang when the restaurant door opened. She shared with me that she had little interest in attending the various social events frequented by the couples in her and Tony’s circle. Eventually they stopped inviting her, which, while seemingly cruel, could also be attributed to Maya’s reclusive tendencies following Tony’s death.  

My work and travels kept me away from Whitebridge the following year. Maya wrote to say that she’d met a man she was going to marry and invited me to the wedding. I declined due to previous commitments but sent a silver and gold heirloom coffee set from Dubai, with my heartfelt congratulations that Maya had overcome her grief and found a loving companion with whom to spend the rest of her life. In truth, I was concerned that Maya’s neediness was clouding her judgement and I regretted that my busy schedule prevented me from visiting my old friend more often. 

I went to Whitebridge to meet Maya for lunch a year after she married Edgar. Shamefully, I often struggled to remember his name, but Maya would smile forgivingly and remind me. She seemed more settled. I noted in the photographs she proudly set out on the table in the Tartan that Edgar was younger, dashingly attractive, and seemed well suited to his work in advertising for a local business media company. Maya asked me if I ever planned to marry, and I replied that, indeed, I fully intended to do so, though privately I felt marriage was best left to more courageous souls than I. 

Less than six months later, Maya telephoned to say that she thought Edgar was cheating on her. It was unlike Maya to call me and to discuss distressing personal matters. Although I felt a familiar protectiveness towards her, I was at a loss for words and mumbled platitudes about her perhaps imagining it. I promised to arrange a lunch soon, and I kept my promise by driving down to Whitebridge the following month. 

On a grey day, seated in our usual spot at the Tartan, Maya was beside herself. We looked an unlikely pair – Maya wore a faded green blouse with a threadbare brown sweater and a long floral skirt, her hair unruly, while I, neatly coiffed, wore a crisp white T-shirt, a fitted grey wool jacket, and pressed jeans. Her shoulders caved in towards her chest, while I sat tall against the back of the Tartan’s green booth. By then I had moved into one of my own designs, a splendid south-facing renovated warehouse loft in a gentrifying neighbourhood, overlooking the lake and within walking distance of fine dining restaurants. My professional life was stimulating. I couldn’t think of anything for which I was wanting. 

Maya had found lipstick on Edgar’s collar, a different bottle of aftershave in the car, unfamiliar smells on his clothes, a long red hair on his jacket; and claimed he’d been taking unexplained absences. When I inquired if she’d confronted Edgar with the accusations, she explained that he denied everything. I conjectured that, short of catching him in the act itself, she had little choice but to believe him. She shook her head. After lunch, as we walked together in the drizzling rain to the car park, I noticed that a couple of residents averted their eyes as we passed.

Distrust in a marriage is a tenacious force. It watches silently as the object holds his coffee cup or folds a towel, finding infinitesimal discrepancies between today’s and yesterday’s mundane actions. Gaining strength, it criticizes the object’s slightest foible and wonders aloud if his taking an evening stroll to pick up milk at the convenience store is necessary. It eventually roots itself in the fabric of the object’s weaknesses, debilitating him. 

Edgar soon left Maya, but never admitted to having an affair, and Maya never found proof. 

I felt concerned for Maya’s well-being. Maya’s friends had been affiliated with Edgar; hence they not only disbelieved Maya’s accusations of infidelity but also spoke ill of her among Whitebridge social circles. Maya found herself isolated and alone.

I called to arrange to have lunch with her on Tuesday of the following week, but Maya didn’t pick up the telephone. I tried again several times but she neither picked up nor returned my calls, so I left her a message confirming that I’d meet her at noon at the Tartan on Tuesday. With only faint trepidation, I drove out of the city on a glorious day, the sun shimmering off the lake, and headed southwest. Exiting the highway onto the country road that led to Whitebridge, a dull grey settled over the dreary landscape. 

At noon sharp I entered the Tartan, sat at our usual spot, and, having tucked an Architectural Digest under my arm as I was leaving the car, ordered a coffee and flipped through the magazine while awaiting Maya’s appearance. The Tartan was a microcosm of Whitebridge. The green and chrome décor presented a snapshot of days gone by and better left behind. The vinyl covering of the stools and booths had gaping slits, exposing yellowed foam, dirtied with age. The din was familiar now, as was the homogeneous clientele, and for a moment I felt locked in a film loop, sequestered from the world, as in an insane asylum. 

It was half past noon and still Maya had not appeared. This was unusual, and while you may be thinking that I don’t like the unusual, Maya’s absence assured me that things were unfolding according to plan. 

I had managed it all with customary stealth. I had looked after Tony – the poison was untraceable. There was a vile hidden in Maya’s house, which she would never find, but which the police will have found upon being prompted to search for it, which is where Edgar came in. Planting the evidence of Edgar’s fictional affair had been a rush. Maddened by Maya’s relentless accusations of infidelity, Edgar had his own axe to grind, and, having recently happened upon an article pertaining to ricin poisoning, had developed a theory about Maya’s first husband’s death. Edgar will have notified the police and planted the suspicion of murder, which will have launched the investigation. 

Maya is most certainly in custody now. Being just an old high school acquaintance from out of town, I haven’t been notified. If you’re asking why I did it, it’s simple. Maya brought this on herself when she gave the heart-shaped box to more than just me.