BLUE

fourteen

I've found myself hanging out with mum more often than I ever have, I feel safe with her like she'll never leave. I've come to appreciate the people in my life, knowing they could disappear any day.

Laying on the couch, cocooned in blankets I turn the channel's until I stop by the news, where the reporters have grief in their eyes. "A teenage boy's body has been found at the bottom of Lake Vinci, four miles east from Conni. It was noted, there was no will to fight from him as his body gave out. His body has been retrieved and is up for identification. Please contact the authorities if you have any idea of anyone missing in your area."

"Allah yerhamo," Mom sighs as she goes to turn off the tv, her hands still soaked in the reminiscence of raw dough, in the middle of making cookies. She's a stress baker.

I hum agreeing, but there's disdain gnawing at the pit of my stomach, I think I'm going to be sick Blue. Because how much do I bet that that's not you? You promised to search the world, the bottom of a lake close enough for you?

I shake the thought out of my head, no. My Blue isn't suicidal, he wouldn't want to die. He hasn't found who he was looking for, why give up when he hasn't even reached his six-hundredths try.

Then why do I feel my heart beating and my feet retreating into the laundry where I slip into my Air force ones, rushing out the door. I know where I'm heading so I don't bother taking any belongings as I race down the streets, looking for the bikes that are laced with all kinds of memories.

Pedalling as I've never done before, I have yet to reach the final shore. Winds blowing on my back, as rain pours drenching me in icky escapism.

Tilly's. I don't have to ask to know, her eyes are red with mourning. "Blue?" I ask. She doesn't meet my gaze.

"No. No." The words come out broken, the birds have stopped chirping, there are no more leaves under my feet, the cracking is one of my heart. "This is all my fault!" I am yet to breathe.

"No, don't say that." She comes to comfort me, your aunt.

"I showed him the place, called it home. And now he's dead." I shake my head again and again and again, Tilly holds me close to her chest, the warmth of the bakery nestling me.

"Did he at least find what he was looking for?"

"He found something better, he found happiness, he found you Lilac."

"I wasn't enough," my voice breaks, realisation settling in.

"Hush, you were more than enough."

"What was he looking for?" What was my Blue looking for, that he could not find?

"He was looking for reasons to live, he was looking for himself."

And you helped me find myself instead.

I don't speak for a while, basking in misery at the thought of how close you once were to me. Not even four miles away Blue, and yet I thought you were in a different state. Regret like parasites eating away, at the hope I had formed that you would return someday.

"He left you a letter," Tilly speaks after a moment, "he came in one day, without you. I think it was when he planned to leave, Lilac, but you've got to understand people like Blue, aren't our forever and more, their temporary diamonds we have to hold close to our hearts."

"A letter?"

"It's in the kitchen, you can read it in there."

I let my feet carry me in the direction, finding a lilac coloured envelope on the counter. You're writing still month fresh as ink bleeds into each other at the top, assigned to me. As if it'll slip from my fingertips, as you had once before, I pick it up daintily afraid my touch will turn it to ice-cold snow.

• • •

My Lilac,

I hope if you find this I'm halfway across the globe, I hope when you find this, you're happier than before.

I wish I could stay and promise you the world, but I've never been one for ideologies.

When I was four my parents had a nasty split, which left my mother high on drugs and dad in a different continent. I was left with instability, my mum turned our house into a brothel when I was five. Up until I was eleven whenever there were customers around and I was next door, she'd let them in my room for extra money. I fought at first, I swear I did.

But I'll spare you the details because they're more gruesome than that, but I remember the first time It happened, I was praised by her. You need to understand, why I am the way I am. She only ever gave me attention after I'd made her money, so some days I'd leave the door open, not struggling against the older men and women.

I was beaten, I was raped, I was carved out  - that's why I've got the scars. But you never made me feel ashamed, you'd loved all of me. I don't like companionship because whenever I'm left alone with people, I remember those nights.

I gave up when I was eleven and a half, after I was left bleeding out for days, one of the women that worked in the next room over, offered me a pad.

I tried killing myself after that, I got a chair and a rope and you know the rest, but then he came in. One of the regulars and he'd tied me with it,  he'd thought it was foreplay. I was so close.

I stopped eating at all after that, my mother only cared about me when customers complained I was harder to grab onto, they didn't like the skeletal appeal. She'd thrown me out, so I broke in at the dead of night and took the money I knew she'd been saving up.

I took it and I ran, and I met a lot of different people. You were my favourite though.

There's this line in Virginia Woolf's letter, that reminds me of you My Lilac. 'If anybody could have saved me it would have been you.'

Please keep make me a last promise Lilac, that you'll never tell Tilly what happened. I don't want her to feel any guilt.

- Phoenix Aisling.
Your Blue.

• • •

I don't come out from the back of the kitchen for a very long time, I sit there and weep and count the hours that go by.

I know your name, how unfitting you dont know mine, My Blue.