There had been a lot of letters from Eduardo. A few months after we met, we were separated for a while. I went back to Indiana to finish school (which I didn't do, not then) and he stayed in New York. We broke up soon after I returned.
During our breakup, I threw a shoebox full of his letters in a dumpster. I did a lot of things during our breakup that I later regretted. I thought all the letters were in that shoebox, but I found one a few years ago. And then 2 more yesterday. I also found, clipped to one of the letters, a scrap of paper with his phone number written on it, which he must have given me when we met.
I guess it might seem strange for a happily married man to be so enamored with past love ephemera. But my husband knows I'm obsessed with this kind of biographical archival stuff, and also it was over 30 years ago and Eduardo is dead. So.