Sweet Little Nothings

Yolanda was separated from her boyfriend by 2,000 miles – the distance between her university in Los Angeles and his university in Milwaukee. They talked on the phone as often as he wanted, but not as often as she wanted. And of course they emailed and text-messaged and left jokes on each other’s Facebook pages, but it all felt too distant for her. She wanted hugs. She wanted to interlock her fingers with his.

So in late January, when he sent her a letter – a real letter, postage paid, not an email – with a single pink candy heart inside that read "Let’s Kiss," she was overjoyed. She went out and bought two bags of candy hearts and promptly mailed him a letter back, with two hearts inside that read "I Luv You" and "Be True."

Yolanda knew that they didn’t have any plans to get together for Valentine’s Day, but she really wanted to, and she hoped he would surprise her. He hadn’t said anything about Valentine’s, which either meant he had forgotten it completely or was trying to fool her. So when a huge envelope came in the mail on the Thursday before the day of love, she had high hopes.

Inside was a big poster. On it he had made a message by taping candy hearts to the board and writing words in-between: "I’d like to ‘Do A Duet’ with you because ‘U R So Cute’ and I want you to ‘Be Mine’ ‘My Baby’ because you are ‘So Fine.’" Even though the words were sweet, she was devastated because the message didn’t mention anything about him coming to visit. On an impulse, she searched the bag again, and at the bottom found another envelope. Inside was a round-trip ticket for her to fly to Milwaukee.

She shrieked and danced on her bed and then carefully ate every candy heart he had ever sent her, every flavor reminding her of a different dessert they had shared, or making her dream of candy they would share in the future.