I was cleaning out my truck when I found it. A business card for Oak & Stone Landscaping. We had printed a hundred of them, right before everything fell apart.
The card was bent and faded from sitting in the glove box. Below it, a fold-out map of the county with one route highlighted in yellow marker. The short way to her parents' place.
I still remembered the night we picked the name. Sitting on the floor of our empty living room, eating takeout with plastic forks, feeling like we had the whole world in our hands. Turned out we had about six months.
A neighbor walked by—Mrs. Gable, a retired substitute teacher who always wore a Cardinals cap. She saw the card in my hand and asked what it was. I told her. She said, "You don't have to keep that."
I thought about all the things I'd been holding on to. The card. The map. The last voicemail she left. A pair of her gardening gloves I kept in the shed, like she might walk in and need them.
I put the card in the cup holder, meaning to toss it later. But I didn't. I drove around that afternoon and found myself at the old house. Someone else's kids were playing in the front yard.
That night I finally threw the card away. Not in the trash—I ran it through the shredder in the garage. The map went next. I kept the gloves. They still fit me.
The advice I'd give my younger self: You don't have to keep everything. Some things were never meant to open. But you can still use the hands that tried.