The Other Wife · Eleven Steps From the Edge · Pulse Beat
Peter wrote to him from Munich, a letter of four pages. It was in careful English, in a spidery hand. I have been trying to write this for six weeks. I do not know how to begin. I am alive because of…
Peter wrote to him from Munich, a letter of four pages.
It was in careful English, in a spidery hand. I have been trying to write this for six weeks. I do not know how to begin. I am alive because of Dorje. I know that. I have not been able to say it, even to myself, without wanting to disappear. He had lost three fingers on his left hand. He had been in hospital a month. He had stopped working.
I think of your friend every day. I do not know what I owe his family. I cannot send money, because it would feel like an insult; I cannot send nothing, because it would feel like an insult too. I think perhaps the truth is I owe them my life, and there is no way to pay it.
I know it was not your fault. I know that this is what people say. But I wanted you to know that I have not stopped thinking of you either. If it helps, in any way, to have someone else who is carrying it, then please consider that I am.
Tashi read it twice. Then he laid it on the table, and for the first time in four months he put his head on his arms and wept.