My brother borrowed two thousand dollars from me in 1993. For a business that never got off the ground. I never asked for it back.
Last fall, a package arrived. No return address. Inside, a bottle of cabernet from a vineyard I didn't recognize. Taped to the neck, a note: 'This is the last of the good years. I'm sorry it took so long.'
He'd been dead for sixteen months. It was his son, my nephew, who found the case in the basement and sent one to every person on a list.
I sat there holding the bottle. The upstairs neighbor started stomping again—that kid never stops. I looked at the takeout menu on the counter for the Thai place my wife and I love. Its margins were full of her handwriting: 'too spicy,' 'ask for extra basil,' 'call A about the leaky tap.'
I opened the wine that night. It was fine. Not great, but fine. The debt, I realized, was never really about the money. It was about the fact that he remembered to send it at all.
The neighbor stomped until midnight. I poured another glass. My wife told me to stop being sentimental. I told her some debts take thirty years to settle, and you're lucky if they ever do.