the f i f t e e n t h letter

68 20 4
                                    

Dear Hunter,

The day after Valentine's Day after spending it alone is always the worst. I've learned this from my three years of experience, so I knew exactly what to expect today, but this didn't make it any easier to cope with.

It's the hardest because you begin to contemplate why. Did I do something wrong? Is there something wrong with me? Should I stop trying to be myself, and change so you can like me in that way? Am I not perfect enough to you?

Again, I wonder if you spent yesterday, the most romantic day of the year, with some other girl. Someone who's more beautiful, funnier, smarter than me, someone who deserves your love much more than I did, do and ever will. Are you with that girl Ashlynn who I caught you kissing behind the bike shed and ignored? The pretty, badass one who used to hang around you, Brett and the others?

Or are you sitting alone in your room, the lights dimmed and your hand moving across a piece of paper, just like I am?

I'm going to stop with the rhetorical questions now. Asking them is an old habit of mine, one that I've never managed to break. You never used to know whether to give a response to anything I was saying, because you were unsure as to whether I wanted an answer or not.

Yet again, I wonder whether you were with Ashlynn yesterday. I don't think you found out that I knew about the kiss, and part of me hopes that you never do find out. But the pain that I felt when I went back there to retrieve a football and saw you kissing her with a more fierce passion than anything you'd ever shown me? That was like a blow to the stomach, leaving me helpless, gasping for air and unable to breathe.

Last night, I slept in your jumper again. It makes me feel closer to you.

All my love, always,
Maia.

Twenty-Eight Stamps [#Wattys2017] || ✓Where stories live. Discover now