I heaved a sigh as I pulled into the gravel drive, having spotted the hand written sign  from the road: “NO DONATIONS TODAY PLEASE” and “NO DUMPING” scrawled  across a battered piece of foam board. I kneaded my brow with one hand, swinging  into a parking spot with the other. Looked like the back of my car would be full of  wheelchairs and clothes for a while. The store must be hurting for volunteers again, I  thought, my resentment immediately replaced by the guilt of not being able to  volunteer myself to help out. With my two and a half paying jobs, several full time non paying roles, and what felt like a million other responsibilities, just imagining losing my  last hour to care for myself at night filled me with irrational desperation and fear. Just give yourself a break, my sister would tell me, and check if they have any shoes my size, hey? I smiled, knowing I’d catch heck if I came back home with no goodies from  the Free Store, and headed toward the entrance. 

I noticed the smell of fresh lumber still lingering in the walls as I entered and shut the  door behind me softly. “Boozhoo!” A muffled voice floated over from behind a  mountain of fabric. No wonder they weren’t taking donations—they would have to  make the building bigger to hold any more stuff. “I’m just over here folding clothes!  Holler if you need anything, ‘kay?” 

“Oh sure, thanks!” I called back, glad for the chance to browse in silence and just zone  out for a while. I walked over to the baked goods table and grabbed a pack of my  favorite dinner rolls. I never knew who donated them, but they were so soft and moist  that I always had trouble understanding why someone would let us have them for free.  It felt like getting away with something, and I never could resist. Across the room, I  spotted the signature color of my sister’s growing dinnerware collection, and walked 

over to scoop up another few pieces for her. I toted my slowly growing pile around the  store, stopping at a rack here, and a cart there, to pull some cute clothes that looked  our sizes. A crop top with an iridescent dragonfly called to me, and I relished its  softness as I hugged it to myself. 

I was walking the empty hangers over to join the others waiting to be reused when I felt  it: a warm breeze drifting over my neck and massaging my shoulders. I looked beside  me: none of the clothes were rocking on their hangers; nothing else in the room  indicated a movement of air at all. I looked up, searching the ceiling for a nearby air  vent. Nothing. Weird. Then, a stronger sensation radiated through my stomach. A  magnetic pull drew my body and my gaze toward a shelf that I had not noticed was full  of books until just this moment. And—had I just seen?—it almost looked as though the  entire collection of books, for just a split second, shimmered with a wave of pink and  green light, incredibly bright but so brief that I immediately questioned whether I had  seen anything at all. I blinked and shook my head. Obviously I was overtired, and I  wasn’t sure that feeling the room tilt and seeing flashes of light was normally an  indicator of good things, health wise. I tried to shrug the feeling off, more so to  suppress the host of new worries that could arise with phantom sensations, balance  issues, and hallucinations of flashing colors. I do not have time to get sick, I thought,  I’m already taking care of two…no, three…wait…huh?… 

My usual spiral of burdensome thoughts was cut short as I noticed a familiar spine in  the lineup of books on the shelf—very familiar. Eerily familiar. Too familiar to just be a  coincidence. My handwriting, scratched and faded, was clearly identifiable in the label  on this book: Home ‘99. What on earth was my photo album doing on this shelf? I 

snatched the book down and flipped it open, and sure enough, there on the first page  was the photo of our old house, wagon in the front yard next to the lilac bush, and the  bent mailbox down in the corner of the frame. 

Heat surged into my face as I prepared to get angry at whoever had decided to dig  through my possessions only to give my most treasured ones away, but before I could  even put a name to my imagined perpetrator, my fingers slid into the one corner of this  album that didn’t feel familiar: a crisply folded edge among the well worn and very  handled photos tucked into the pages; a bright, sealed envelope with a message  stamped neatly onto its surface in handsome ink: 

Hello Auntie! I had to borrow your book to deliver this message to you, I hope you don’t mind! It’s how we make sure our messages reach the correct recipients. This letter is for you, enjoy!  

More confused than anything, I rested the book in front of me, carefully unsealed the  envelope, and tipped out a small piece of folded paper that felt very much like a thin  layer of birchbark, with a silkiness and luxury I never experienced in the cheap lined  

paper I could find around the Rez. Underneath the envelope was a photo I had never  seen before—a photo of me. A photo that, to my knowledge, couldn’t have been taken  yet. From my chest glinted an iridescent dragonfly that I definitely knew I had never  worn, and only just had decided to claim as my own. Somehow, the photographed version of me was wearing the shirt I had pulled off a hanger just a minute before. And  at second glance, there were the pants I had just added to my pile, sitting comfortably  on my hips as I smiled from the shoreline of our favorite spot on the lake, a secluded  spot my sister and I simply called “the water”. In marker lines jotted across the photo, 

in my handwriting, were the words: It’s real. Trust me, it’s easier to just go with it. What?? My thoughts, ever questioning, ever threatening to pull me out of the present,  faded as I unfolded the letter and began to read: 

FROM: 

POST OFFICE GUEST 

3 DOT 11 MIL 211 211 

Miigwans (Tiny’s Girl) 

The Yellow House on Wiinisiibagoons Trail 

New Old Post, Odaawaa Zaaga’iganiing 

JULY 10, 2323 

TO: 

GREAT AUNTIE 

The Trading Post 

Odaawaa Zaaga’iganiing 

August 20, 2021 

Hi Auntie! You haven’t met me yet, but I’m your niece Miigwans from New Old Post in  the Anishinaabe Southern region formerly known as Wisconsin. I made sure to make  this letter arrive to you exactly today because I memorized the date on the version of  this letter that you saved, annotated, and passed down through the family. By the way,  that pattern you sketched out on the back of this page next year is a really popular 

beading design nowadays. Just last month cousin Red added it to his regalia, and he’s  super excited to show it off next weekend at the 351st annual Honor the Earth, 400  year Winter Dam Flood memorial and 250 year Manoomin Resurgence Celebration. I’ve  been going around collecting old pictures of you and all our other heroes all summer to  put up at the displays—can you do me a favor and take a picture of yourself today for  me to include in the collection?  

I know from Colonial History class that yous are still living through the regeneration of  our language but I want you to know that in the world I grew up in, we are all fluent in  Anishinaabemowin. In fact, I hope my English isn’t too formal for you; I’ve been  studying the old United States dialect for years but it’s hard to find anyone whose first  language is European without traveling pretty far. And, oh yeah! That joke you learned  how to tell in Ojibwe at that language group you go to soon has kind of gone down in  family history! Just an awful one too! 

Guess what Auntie? I just passed my practical test and I’m applying for my time travel  license next week, so hopefully I can come visit you soon! I know it will have to be by  projection call because your generation is handling Covid for us but I’m no less excited  to meet the legend behind your name, even if I can’t hug you!  

Until then, thank you for everything you did to care for the community we live in today.  It means the world to us!

Love you Auntie! 

END OF MESSAGE 

My breathing settled in deeper sometime after my hands set the letter down, with the  rest of my self in tow as I slowly returned to my body. How did this letter find me? How did the sender know that I’d be here right now? Uhhh, what joke am I about to learn? All these questions floated briefly through my mind, but none stuck as much as the  yearning for this future to come to pass—imagining my future family welcoming a baby  named Miigwans, feeling the warmth of her hands inheriting the letter that sat in front  of me. The chance that this could be real sent a thrill through me—a lightness that I  hadn’t expected to feel when I walked into the store today.  

My thoughts calculated quickly: If this is real, what does it mean? And if it’s not, what harm could it do to keep the letter anyway? It was in my book after all, and I definitely need to bring that back home… 

I gathered the letter and all my finds, and walked to the front door. The muffled voice  called up from even farther underneath the clothing pile, “Headed out? ‘Dja find any  treasure?” 

“Oh yeah,” I called back, clutching the letter more tightly, “Definitely. Miigwech!” “Giga waabamin!” the voice floated through the door as I stepped out onto the porch  and waved over my shoulder. I reached my car with a sensation of electricity coursing  through me. I’m someone’s great auntie. I flopped down into the driver’s seat. I’m someone’s hero.

I pulled out my phone before putting the key in the ignition. There was a text from my  sister waiting on my lock screen: Get anything good? You know I’ve been looking for those orange plates!  

I smiled and texted back: You know it! I found two more plates and a matching bowl, some shoes for you, plus an outfit for each of us. Omw with the loot :)  Then I added: Hey when I get there, what do you say we try on our new clothes and you take a picture of me by the water? I need a selfie for something…