Post Office

The wall of identical boxes into which our Aunt Sticky sorted the daily mail was at the far end of her dining room, and from the private side looked like a fancy wallpaper upon which peonies pushed through a white wooden trellis, or sometimes like crates of chickens stacked all the way to the ceiling. I'd learned by then – I was a little boy – that a thing can look like one thing on one day and another on another, depending on how you might be feeling. There were times when we were there, having our coffee and sweet rolls, when some woman on the lobby side would with a click unlock her box and leaning down, peer inside to see if she had mail, and see us at the table, Mother and Father, my sister and I and our postmistress aunt, and call out, "Yoohoo, Sticky! I see you have company!" and waggle her fingers, waving hello.