What a shame to say that I understand you now.
Well no, I understood you before now. What I mean, rather, is that I am now able to understand how you felt, why you felt the way you did, why you reacted the way you did, in regards to myself. Hellish, enigmatic, beautifully tragic, whatever you would like to call me.
I’ll stop myself now before I digress into me, you, who we were together and who we are apart, as I have found that a mental torment that ultimately leads me nowhere. I chose to make my bed and have spent the last years sleeping in it. I will continue to do so. So why am I writing you?
I could easily sit here and tell you that the events within the last 7-9 months or so have sent my world crashing down, but after sincerely thinking about the matter for far longer than is good for me, I have established that my world fell apart long ago, and that recent events have only sent me reeling into that realization. I am not writing to ask for a pity party or your sympathy.
How can you tell that the world is falling apart? How can you tell that the sky is falling?
The beginning of the end does not start with a giant shift in the tectonic plates, a catastrophically high tsunami wave, or the Earth concaving. Rather, the beginning of the end starts with this summer being hotter than last summer. And next year’s summer will be hotter than this summer. And the pattern repeats itself again and again until the world eventually microwaves itself to death, but global warming and climate change, though a topic I think we could discuss for hours, is not why I am writing you today.
How could I tell my world was falling apart?
Hindsight gifts you clarity, and although I look back at my memories with ease now and am able to pinpoint instances, I can’t honestly say that I grew up without questioning the stability of the life around me. And the cracks in the window I saw growing up that I attributed to naivety, ignorance, or anxiety turned out to be true.
No one came and stomped on my heart directly. Rather, I got caught in a crossfire, and now I sit in shambles. And maybe I feel too much, too intensely, or perhaps it’s my inability to get over anything talking for me, but as I sit in ruins, I think of what I’ve done to you. This is why I’m writing.
I can admit this is not the first time I have thought of you since, but I suppose if tragedy can’t make the heart grow fonder, it can make it grow more empathetic. Our situations are not the same. In fact, there’s some stark difference between them, but I suppose if you wanted to know about the details of my life, you would ask around. To my knowledge, you don’t. I’ll spare you.
Everything feels like a blur now. A lifeless, colorless blur. I feel like I go on about my day and sleep just to do it all again. How funny, now that I’m thinking about it: This may be the first time I’m able to tell you how I feel in words, and here I am, telling you that I feel nothing. Is this what I have done to you?
I cannot bring myself to put up a fight against this anymore, and that is my biggest burden. That is the thing I never wanted you to know: I could never put up a fight against you. Rather, I put up one with myself continuously. And something tells me you knew that, yet you continued to treat me the same. My mind still pirouettes with whether or not I want to thank you for not sabotaging my vulnerability, or express my anguish to you for not calling me out. I have this weird paradox with honesty, as you know. I want to be honest with everyone, and I want everyone to be honest with me, but I cannot fathom the concept of being honest with myself.
The shame in understanding you now does not come from knowing you. Not at all. Knowing you, knowing who you were, are, and who you would become was all I ever wanted to do. I wanted us to know each other every step of the way. It pains me to think that we are of the age we once spoke of becoming with our lives ahead of us. Independent, beginning our lives as we would like, and because of what I have done, without each other. There are times where I look at myself in the mirror and ask what you would think of me if you saw me today. Would he be happy for me?
The shame in understanding you now comes from the realization that in fighting my own hell, I have burned you. I sit here wounded in the crossfire of two others, yet I let you sit comfortably in my own warzone for far too long.
But I think I have bothered you quite enough.
My line is always there, always open if you need it, if you want it, if you even remember it. I cannot ask you, cannot beg you to forgive me. It is unjust after all I did. But if you have, or if you will ever, find it within yourself to do so…you will prove me right. You were always the better one of us two.
I cannot bring myself to be selfish anymore. This letter dies with me.
Godspeed.