PART 2 – “THE YOUNG SAILOR GAVE ME HIS GRANDFATHER’S LAST LETTER — AND WHEN I READ THE NAME WRITTEN INSIDE, I FELT LIKE TIME STOPPED”

My hands were shaking as I held the envelope.

In front of me stood the young sailor, Theo Lambert. He had the same gray eyes as his grandfather, only his own were filled with a strange worry.

“Your grandfather…died in September?” I whispered.

— Yes, Mrs. Josian. On the seventeenth of September.

I clutched the envelope to my chest.

Nine years.

For nine consecutive years, every November 11, Gérard Lambert came to our little café in Saint-Nazaire and ordered two coffees.

One was for him.

The other always remained untouched.

I had never asked him who it was for.

Maybe because I was afraid of the answer.

Maybe because I understood that some absences don’t need explanations.

— So? Nathan’s annoyed voice came from behind us. Will the gentleman order something or will we continue to obstruct service?

Theo slowly turned towards him.

— My grandfather sat here every year to honor a man who never returned from the war.

Nathan shrugged.

— I’m sorry, but we have work to do.

Then something happened that I didn’t expect.

The elderly gentleman sitting by the window put down his newspaper.

— I have work too, young man. But today I will wait.

A woman at the next table agreed.

— Let the lady read the letter.

Nathan blushed.

But I wasn’t listening to anyone anymore.

I had opened the envelope.

Inside were three things.

A folded letter.

An old black and white photo.

And a small metal button from a military uniform.

I took the photo first.

Two young men were standing in front of a ship.

One was smiling broadly.

The other had a serious look and was holding his friend’s hand on his shoulder.

I took a closer look.

And suddenly I felt my legs buckle.

— Oh my God…

Theo approached.

— Do you recognize him?

I couldn’t speak.

The man on the right…

His face…

His smile…

It was the same face I had been looking at since I was a child in a photo hidden inside an old box of LU cookies.

My father.

The father who had died in Algeria in 1962, when I was just three months old.

— He… I said in a broken voice. This is my father.

Theo closed his eyes for a moment.

As if he had expected exactly this reaction.

— I know, Mrs. Josian.

I looked at him in fear.

— What do you mean you know?

Show the photo.

— My grandfather talked about him until his last day.

I looked at the second man.

It was Gerard.

Young.

Without the deep wrinkles I had experienced.

Without the shaking hands.

But with those same gray eyes.

I brought my hand to my mouth.

— Did my father… and Mr. Lambert… know each other?

Theo nodded.

— They were more than friends.

Then he showed me the letter.

— Please, read it.

I opened the folded paper.

The letters were irregular, as if the person who had written them was struggling with time and illness.

“My dear Josian,

If you’re reading these lines, it means I didn’t manage to come for our tenth coffee.

Forgive me.

There’s something I should have told you from the first day I walked into your cafe.

I didn’t choose the store by chance.

I didn’t sit at table four by chance.

And the second coffee wasn’t just for an old friend.

“It was for your father.”

I stopped reading.

The paper blurred before my eyes.

“For my father?” I whispered.

Theo bowed his head.

— Continue.

I took a deep breath.

“Your father, Henri Petit, saved my life in 1962.

That day, shortly before he died, he confided in me something that I have never been able to forget.

He gave me a little letter about his wife and their baby.

He asked me to deliver it to them, no matter what.

I didn’t keep my promise.

And this is the biggest shame of my life.”

A cold shiver ran through my body.

I looked up.

— What letter?

Theo took a second, smaller envelope from the inside pocket of his uniform.

He was yellowed.

Its edges were worn.

On the front were a few words written in blue ink.

“For my little Zozia, when she’s old enough to understand.”

I don’t remember how I ended up sitting down.

I don’t remember who brought me a glass of water.

I only remember holding in my hands something that my father had touched more than sixty years ago.

A letter he had written for me.

A letter I never knew existed.

“Why didn’t you give it to me?” I asked.

Theo didn’t answer immediately.

He looked towards table four.

Where the second coffee waited untouched.

— Because, Mrs. Josian, my grandfather believed that your father had died because of him.

I felt my heart beating fast.

— What happened that day?

The young man clutched his white sailor hat in his hands.

— There is something else you should know.

— Tell me.

— My grandfather didn’t come to your cafe nine years ago because he just discovered you.

I looked at him in surprise.

— Then why?

His voice lowered.

— Because that year he finally found a person who knew what really happened to your father.

My breath caught.

— But… I know what happened. He was killed in Algeria.

Theo looked at me with immense sadness.

— This is what the official report says.

— And what else could have happened?

The young man took out a third envelope.

This one wasn’t old.

He was new.

On it was a date and a word written in red ink.

“WITNESS”.

— My grandfather spent the last years of his life trying to prove that the story you were told about your father was not the whole story.

I felt my blood run cold.

— What do you mean?

Theo looked around, as if he was hesitant to continue in front of the other customers.

Then he came closer and whispered to me:

— My grandfather discovered that your father had managed to save three people that day. But his name never appeared in the report describing what had happened.

— Why?

Theo lowered his gaze.

— That’s what we need to learn.

At that moment, Nathan approached again.

— Mrs. Josian, we have already wasted enough time. I would ask you to return to your work.

For the first time in the twenty-two years I had been working there, I took off my apron in front of everyone.

I carefully placed it on the counter.

— Not today, Nathan.

He looked at me in surprise.

— What did you say?

I picked up the old envelope.

— Today, after sixty-four years, I am going to read a letter from my father for the first time.

My voice was shaking.

— And no coffee in the world is more important than this.

Nathan opened his mouth, but said nothing.

Theo pulled out a chair.

I sat at table four.

In front of me was the untouched coffee.

I slowly opened my father’s envelope.

The paper smelled of dampness and old ink.

In the first line it read:

“My little Josian, if you ever read this letter, I want you to know that your father didn’t leave because he didn’t want to come back to you…”

My tears fell onto the page.

And then I read the next paragraph.

A paragraph that made Theo bow his head and me look up in horror.

My father had written the name of a man that my mother had forbidden me to mention my entire life.

And next to the name there was one last sentence:

“If I don’t come back, this man knows why.”

CONTINUED IN PART 3…