Last Summer

the letter

Dear Ivory,

I don't want you to reply to this, call this a rhetorical love letter if you please.

I don't expect you to read this all, maybe you'll get distracted halfway through. Find something better to focus on. I'm not good with words, or apologies for what it's worth. Sorry is a short word, most people say it just to get by with a warning, yet they do whatever they did over and over again. Although it's a shitty word in many ways, there's no other word to help describe that feeling.

So sorry is what i'll use.

I'm not quite sure how many fucking times i've tried to write this, each getting increasingly harder. Sometimes the pen just doesn't feel right, or the introduction looks choppy, or maybe even my name just doesn't look perfect.  Sometimes i'll re read it and hate everything about it, i'm writing this part on my phone, you're fast asleep next to me. We're on the log, our log.

Writing this now hurts, because just hours later I left you. There's no way I can justify leaving you in the forest alone, hoping to god that a vampire wouldn't steal you from me.

I was panicking, like I always did.

But you couldn't see me like that, I couldn't show you that side of me.

There's paper crumbled all over the cabin, picture that.

I know you are.

My entire life theres been this hole, deep beyond my stomach. And i've searched for something, not even sure what that something was. I tried tattoos, drugs, alcohol even though I couldn't stand the taste. I needed something, whether it lasted two minutes or two hours, I needed something to make me feel complete. I tried every method of self destruction, and yet.

There was always something missing.

Nothing has ever come close to making me feel the way these last months have felt with you.

Every moment we spent together was something new, sometimes simple, but new. I spent my days on the edge of my seat, wondering what kind of question or stupid idea you'd have in mind. I waited for a new story, a new memory that you would share with me, words never seemed so lovely before.

You shared moments with me that I hate to share with myself.

No one has seen me like you did on the bathroom floor.

No one has seen me like that, before you.

It was bittersweet,that moment we shared, me in your lap like a fucking child. I was panicking, out of control. But you were there, and just that made it all seem alright for some fleeting seconds.

You said to me that you would never leave me, and I think that's my favourite lie you've ever told me.

You see when you attempt to kill yourself, it doesn't exactly strengthen your relationship with your parents. It doesn't matter if I had killed another human, or myself, the view that people had on me would be different. Whether your parents claim to be progressive and accepting, the moment they realize you're not okay, their view on you changes.

You're this monster, in their perfect child's body.

All they saw was a gun.

Not the shaking hand who held it.

I cant express my emotions in a way that you may understand, the panic attacks are just a cute little side effect of my suicide attempt. I used to like them yknow, a reminder that I could've done it, and I still could.