From a (bitter) romantic

Dear Dr. Anderson,


You haunted Helga throughout her story. She was madly in love with you. Maybe you knew this. But you married her closest friend anyways. And it seems that you perhaps fancied her too. Why did you kiss her that evening at Tavenor’s? Please don’t blame it on the drink. Why did you not only cheat on your wife, but also with one of her closest friends? Did your kiss with Helga really mean nothing to you? It clearly meant a lot to her. Hurt and repelled by you, she fell into the easy arms of Reverend Mr. Pleasant Green. Helga moved to the South, yes, to embrace her race and to find a place of belonging––but also to escape you. Ultimately she didn’t find belonging there either, and her story ended in an unhappy marriage, trapped in the South by her love for her children who she couldn’t leave. She struggled her whole life to find where she belonged. Yes, Helga was impulsive, but her decisions were always fully hers. With you she felt wanted, and like she truly belonged, in your arms. How couldn’t you see that your kiss––immediately retracted because, as Helga described it, you wouldn’t “give up one particle of [your] own good opinion of yourself”––would hurt her? Would leave her with no place in her Harlem social life? Do you feel any guilt? Do you feel any responsibility in her ultimate fate? Does any part of you still love her?