"My father wrote letters when he found out about the cancer. He wasn't much of a letter writer before. I don't know if he ever wrote. But he spent his last two months writing obsessively. Whenever he was awake." I asked why, but what I really wanted to know was why I started writing letters after Dad died. "He was trying to say his goodbyes. He wrote to people he barely knew. If he hadn't already been sick, his letters would have been his sickness. I had a business meeting the other day, and in the middle of our conversation the man asked if I was related to Edmund Black. I told him yes, he was my father. He said, 'I went to high school with your dad. He wrote me the most amazing letter before he died. Ten pages. I only barely knew him. We hadn't talked in fifty years. It was the most amazing letter I'd ever read.' I asked him if I could see it. He said, 'I don't think it was meant to be shared.' I told him it would mean a lot to me. He said, 'He mentions you in it.' I told him I understood.

"I looked through my father's Rolodex—" "What's that?" "Phone book. I called every name. His cousins, his business partners, people I'd never heard of. He'd written to everyone. Every single person. Some let me see their letters. Others didn't."

"What were they like?"

"The shortest was a single sentence. The longest was a couple dozen pages. Some of them were almost like little plays. Others were just questions to the person he was writing to." "What kinds of questions?" "'Did you know I was in love with you that summer in Norfolk?' 'Will they be taxed for possessions I leave, like the piano?' 'How do light bulbs work?'" "I could have explained that to him." "'Does anyone actually die in his sleep?'

"Some of his letters were funny. I mean, really, really funny. I didn't know he could be so funny. And some were philosophical. He wrote about how happy he was, and how sad he was, and all of the things he wanted to do but never did, and all of the things he did but didn't want to do."

"Didn't he write a letter to you?" "Yes." "What did it say?" "I couldn't read it. Not for a few weeks." "Why not?" "It was too painful." "I would have been extremely curious." "My wife—my ex-wife—said I was being crazy not to read it." "That wasn't very understanding of her." "She was right, though. It was crazy. It was unreasonable. I was being childish." "Yeah, but you were his child."

"But I was his child. That's right. I'm babbling. To make a long story short—" "Don't make it short," I said, because even though I wanted him to tell me about my dad instead of his, I also wanted to make the story as long as I could, because I was afraid of its end. He said, "I read it. Maybe I was expecting something confessional. I don't know. Something angry, or asking for forgiveness. Something that would make me rethink everything. But it was matter-of-fact. More of a document than a letter, if that makes sense." "I guess so." "I don't know. Maybe I was wrong to, but I was expecting him to say he was sorry for things, and tell me he loved me. End-of-life stuff. But there was none of it. He didn't even say 'I love you.' He told me about his will, his life insurance policy, all of those horrible businesslike things that feel so inappropriate to think about when someone has died."

"You were disappointed?" "I was angry." "I'm sorry." "No. There's nothing to be sorry for. I thought about it. I thought about it all the time. My father told me where he'd left things, and what he wanted taken care of. He was responsible. He was good. It's easy to be emotional. You can always make a scene. Remember me eight months ago? That was easy." "It didn't sound easy." "It was simple. Highs and lows make you feel that things matter, but they're nothing." "So what's something?" "Being reliable is something. Being good."

"And what about the key?" "At the end of his letter he wrote, 'I have something for you. In the blue vase, on the shelf in the bedroom, is a key. It opens a safe-deposit box at our bank. I hope you'll understand why I wanted you to have it.'" "And? What was in it?" "I didn't read the note until after I'd sold all of his belongings. I had sold the vase. I sold it to your father." "What the?"

"That's why I've been trying to find you." "You met my dad?" "Only briefly, but yes." "Do you remember him?" "It was just a minute." "But do you remember him?" "We chatted a bit." "And?" "He was a nice man. I think he could see how hard it was for me to part with those things." "Could you please describe him?" "Gosh, I don't really remember much." "Please." "He was maybe five foot ten. He had brown hair. He wore glasses." "What kind of glasses?" "Thick glasses." "What kind of clothes was he wearing?" "A suit, I think." "What suit?" "Gray, maybe?" "That's true! He wore a gray suit to work! Did he have a gap between his teeth?" "I don't remember." "Try."

"He said he was on his way home and saw the sign for the sale. He told me that he had an anniversary coming up the next week." "September 14!" "He was going to surprise your mom. The vase was perfect, he said. He said she'd love it." "He was going to surprise her?" "He'd made reservations at her favorite restaurant. It was going to be some sort of fancy night out."

The tuxedo.

"What else did he say?" "What else did he say..." "Anything." "He had a great laugh. I remember that. It was good of him to laugh, and to make me laugh. He was laughing for my sake."

"What else?" "He had a very discerning eye." "What's that?" "He knew what he liked. He knew when he'd found it." "That's true. He had an incredibly discerning eye." "I remember watching him hold the vase. He examined the bottom of it and turned it around a number of times. He seemed like a very thoughtful person." "He was extremely thoughtful."

I wished he could remember even more details, like if Dad had unbuttoned his shirt's top button, or if he smelled like shaving, or if he whistled "I Am the Walrus." Was he holding a New York Times under his arm? Were his lips chapped? Was there a red pen in his pocket?

"When the apartment was empty that night, I sat on the floor and read the letter from my father. I read about the vase. I felt like I'd failed him." "But couldn't you go to the bank and tell them you'd lost the key?" "I tried that. But they said they didn't have a box under his name. I tried my name. No box. Not under my mother's name or my grandparents' names. It didn't make any sense." "There was nothing the bank people could do?" "They were sympathetic, but without the key, I was stuck." "And that's why you needed to find my dad."

"I hoped he would realize that there was a key in the vase and find me. But how could he? We sold my father's apartment, so even if he went back, it would be a dead end. And I was sure he'd just throw the key away if he found it, assuming it was junk. That's what I would have done. And there was no way I could find him. Absolutely no way. I knew nothing about him, not even his name. For a few weeks I'd go over to the neighborhood on my way home from work, even though it wasn't on my way. It was an hour out of my way. I'd walk around looking for him. I put up a few signs when I realized what had happened: 'To the man who bought the vase at the estate sale on Seventy-fifth Street this weekend, please contact...' But this was the week after September 11. There were posters everywhere."

"My mom put up posters of him." "What do you mean?" "He died in September 11. That's how he died." "Oh, God. I didn't realize. I'm so sorry." "It's OK." "I don't know what to say." "You don't have to say anything." "I didn't see the posters. If I had ... Well, I don't know what if I had." "You would have been able to find us." "I guess that's right." "I wonder if your posters and my mom's posters were ever close to each other."

He said, "Wherever I was, I was trying to find him: uptown, downtown, on the train. I looked in everyone's eyes, but none were his. Once I saw someone I thought might be your father across Broadway in Times Square, but I lost him in the crowd. I saw someone I thought might be him getting into a cab at Twenty-third Street. I would have called after him, but I didn't know his name." "Thomas." "Thomas. I wish I'd known it then."

He said, "I followed one man around Central Park for more than half an hour. I thought he was your father. I couldn't figure out why he was walking in such a strange, crisscrossing way. He wasn't getting anywhere. I couldn't figure it out." "Why didn't you stop him?" "Eventually I did." "And what happened?" "I was wrong. It was someone else." "Did you ask him why he was walking like that?" "He'd lost something and was searching the ground for it."

"Well, you don't have to look anymore," I told him. He said, "I've spent so long looking for this key. It's hard to look at it." "Don't you want to see what he left for you?" "I don't think it's a question of wanting." I asked him, "What's it a question of?"

He said, "I'm so sorry. I know that you're looking for something, too. And I know this isn't what you're looking for." "It's OK." "For what it's worth, your father seemed like a good man. I only spoke with him for a few minutes, but that was long enough to see that he was good. You were lucky to have a father like that. I'd trade this key for that father." "You shouldn't have to choose." "No, you shouldn't."

We sat there, not saying anything. I examined the pictures on his desk again. All of them were of Abby.

He said, "Why don't you come with me to the bank?" "You're nice, but no thank you." "Are you sure?" It's not that I wasn't curious. I was incredibly curious. It's that I was afraid of getting confused.

He said, "What is it?" "Nothing." "Are you all right?" I wanted to keep the tears in, but I couldn't. He said, "I'm so, so sorry."

"Can I tell you something that I've never told anyone else?"

"Of course."

"On that day, they let us out of school basically as soon as we got there. They didn't really tell us why, just that something bad had happened. We didn't get it, I guess. Or we didn't get that something bad could happen to us. A lot of parents came to pick up their kids, but since school is only five blocks from my apartment, I walked home. My friend told me he was going to call, so I went to the answering machine and the light was beeping. There were five messages. They were all from him." "Your friend?" "My dad."

He covered his mouth with his hand.

"He just kept saying that he was OK, and that everything would be fine, and that we shouldn't worry."

A tear went down his cheek and rested on his finger.

"But this is the thing that I've never told anyone. After I listened to the messages, the phone rang. It was 10:22. I looked at the caller ID and saw that it was his cell phone." "Oh, God." "Could you please put your hand on me so I can finish the rest?" "Of course," he said, and he scooted his chair around his desk and next to me.

"I couldn't pick up the phone. I just couldn't do it. It rang and rang, and I couldn't move. I wanted to pick it up, but I couldn't.

"The answering machine went on, and I heard my own voice."

Hi, you've reached the Schell residence. Here is today's fact of the day: It's so cold in Yukatia, which is in Siberia, that breath instantly freezes with a crackling noise that they call the whispering of the stars. On extremely cold days, the towns are covered in a fog caused by the breath of humans and animals. Please leave a message.

"There was a beep.

"Then I heard Dad's voice."

Are you there? Are you there? Are you there?

"He needed me, and I couldn't pick up. I just couldn't pick up. I just couldn't. Are you there? He asked eleven times. I know, because I've counted. It's one more than I can count on my fingers. Why did he keep asking? Was he waiting for someone to come home? And why didn't he say 'anyone'? Is anyone there? 'You' is just one person. Sometimes I think he knew I was there. Maybe he kept saying it to give me time to get brave enough to pick up. Also, there was so much space between the times he asked. There are fifteen seconds between the third and the fourth, which is the longest space. You can hear people in the background screaming and crying. And you can hear glass breaking, which is part of what makes me wonder if people were jumping.

Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you there? Are you

"And then it cut off.

"I've timed the message, and it's one minute and twenty-seven seconds. Which means it ended at 10:24. Which was when the building came down. So maybe that's how he died."

"I'm so sorry," he said.

"I've never told that to anyone."

He squeezed me, almost like a hug, and I could feel him shaking his head.

I asked him, "Do you forgive me?"

"Do I forgive you?"

"Yeah."

"For not being able to pick up?"

"For not being able to tell anyone."

He said, "I do."

I took the string off my neck and put it around his neck.

"What about this other key?" he asked.

I told him, "That's to our apartment."        

The renter was standing under the streetlamp when I got home. We met there every night to talk about the details of our plan, like what time we should leave, and what we would do if it was raining, or if a guard asked us what we were doing. We ran out of realistic details in just a few meetings, but for some reason we still weren't ready to go. So we made up unrealistic details to plan, like alternate driving routes in case the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge collapsed, and ways to get over the cemetery fence in case it was electrified, and how to outsmart the police if we were arrested. We had all sorts of maps and secret codes and tools. We probably would have gone on making plans forever if I hadn't met William Black that night, and learned what I'd learned.

The renter wrote, "You're late." I shrugged my shoulders, just like Dad used to. He wrote, "I got us a rope ladder, just in case." I nodded. "Where were you? I was worried." I told him, "I found the lock."

"You found it?" I nodded. "And?"

I didn't know what to say. I found it and now I can stop looking? I found it and it had nothing to do with Dad? I found it and now I'll wear heavy boots for the rest of my life?

"I wish I hadn't found it." "It wasn't what you were looking for?" 

 

"That's not it." "Then what?" "I found it and now I can't look for it." I could tell he didn't understand me. "Looking for it let me stay close to him for a little while longer." "But won't you always be close to him?" I knew the truth. "No."

           

 

He nodded like he was thinking of something, or thinking about a lot of things, or thinking about everything, if that's even possible. He wrote, "Maybe it's time to do the thing we've been planning."

I opened my left hand, because I knew if I tried to say something I would just start crying again.

We agreed to go on Thursday night, which was the second anniversary of Dad's death, which seemed appropriate.

Before I walked into the building, he handed me a letter. "What is this?" He wrote, "Stan went to get coffee. He told me to give this to you in case he didn't get back in time." "What is it?" He shrugged his shoulders and went across the street.

Dear Oskar Schell,

I've read every letter that you've sent me these past two years. In return, I've sent you many form letters, with the hope of one day being able to give you the proper response you deserve. But the more letters you wrote to me, and the more of yourself you gave, the more daunting my task became.

I'm sitting beneath a pear tree as I dictate this to you, overlooking the orchards of a friend's estate. I've spent the past few days here, recovering from some medical treatment that has left me physically and emotionally depleted. As I moped about this morning, feeling sorry for myself, it occurred to me, like a simple solution to an impossible problem: today is the day I've been waiting for.

You asked me in your first letter if you could be my protégé. I don't know about that, but I would be happy to have you join me in Cambridge for a few days. I could introduce you to my colleagues, treat you to the best curry outside India, and show you just how boring the life of an astrophysicist can be.

You can have a bright future in the sciences, Oskar. I would be happy to do anything possible to facilitate such a path. It's wonderful to think what would happen if you put your imagination toward scientific ends.

But Oskar, intelligent people write to me all the time. In your fifth letter you asked, "What if I never stop inventing?" That question has stuck with me.

I wish I were a poet. I've never confessed that to anyone, and I'm confessing it to you, because you've given me reason to feel that I can trust you. I've spent my life observing the universe, mostly in my mind's eye. It's been a tremendously rewarding life, a wonderful life. I've been able to explore the origins of time and space with some of the great living thinkers. But I wish I were a poet.

Albert Einstein, a hero of mine, once wrote, "Our situation is the following. We are standing in front of a closed box which we cannot open."

I'm sure I don't have to tell you that the vast majority of the universe is composed of dark matter. The fragile balance depends on things we'll never be able to see, hear, smell, taste, or touch. Life itself depends on them. What's real? What isn't real? Maybe those aren't the right questions to be asking. What does life depend on?

I wish I had made things for life to depend on.

What if you never stop inventing?

Maybe you're not inventing at all.

I'm being called in for breakfast, so I'll have to end this letter here. There's more I want to tell you, and more I want to hear from you. It's a shame we live on different continents. One shame of many.

It's so beautiful at this hour. The sun is low, the shadows are long, the air is cold and clean. You won't be awake for another five hours, but I can't help feeling that we're sharing this clear and beautiful morning.

Your friend,
  Stephen Hawking