candy striper :: l.h.

bonus chapter » fallon's letter to luke

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Luke,

   I don't know if I'll end up having the willpower to give you this. We've already said our goodbyes last night, spent hours with one another, and somehow, I still don't feel like I've said everything I need to say.

I don't know how to write letters. Or essays. Or stories. I always have so much to say and I never know what exactly to focus on. I don't know whether this letter should be me reminding you that I'm sorry, or me reminding you that I love you. The reality is that I want you to hear both. I need you to hear both, for the sake of my own sanity.

I know that you're convinced that pushing me six thousand miles away will somehow unlock this prodigious summer for me – the sort of two months that I'll never, ever be able to forget. And what makes this so pathetic is the fact that I can't even properly blame you. Had you asked me three months ago, I would have said hell goddamn YES. I would have ripped out both my kidneys to get away from that hospital, to get out of having to see you every day and force conversation and pray to God every night that the next day would be a little less of a calamity.

Now, it feels wrong, not seeing you even for a day. Conversation with you flows just as easily as running water. The only thing I pray to God for, now, is that you'll wake up the next day. And I don't even fucking NEED a plane ticket and a hotel in Rome to make this summer memorable – I have you for that. That's why I love you.

I can overlook nearly anything and everything, for you. I look at you, and I see my entire life right in front of me, Luke. I look at you, and suddenly that ominous, blurry face of the person who'd be standing next to me and my two kids, one boy and one girl, slipping a ring onto my finger beneath an arch of white roses at our beach wedding, tucking me into bed every night after a shitty day at work – it's you, Luke. That's who I see.

And so, when I think about actually leaving you at a time like this, I think about all those times that I've looked at you and imagined what life with you could would be like without those stupid walls confining you. I think about the nights that I haven't been able to sleep, only look up at my ceiling and count all the crevices and wonder if you're still breathing, if you're in pain or if you're thinking about me the way I'm thinking about you. I think about that night that you answered my phone call because I couldn't stand the idea of walking down the aisle and taking my diploma without Dad being there to see it. I think about the way you made it feel okay. I think about the way I feel when our knees touch when we're both struggling to fit in your bed, and the first time we kissed whilst we were high off Red Bull, and the hour we spent alone in the chapel. I think of the daydreams I have, of you giving our kids a bath and watching a How I Met Your Mother rerun with me before we go to bed (and you totally not crying).

When I think about leaving you at a time like this, I think about us. About what we were, about what we are, about what we could be – and every bone in my body tells me that it's not worth leaving you.

And here I am, doing it anyway. Because I know that that's what you want. Because I know that if I don't go, you won't forgive me.

You know what, though? If you die, Luke, I'm never going to forgive myself, either. Ever. Because I could have spent even five, chaste, extra minutes with the first love of my life before sending him away to die, but instead, I'd be in a van, on my way to the airport.

In the end, it isn't up to you. I keep telling myself that. Our cards are unpredictable, the kind of deck that everyone at the poker table would groan after receiving. I love you, Luke. Through whatever our cards end up calling for, through whatever happens within the next twenty-four hours – I love you. After those twenty-four hours, I'll still love you. Weeks, months, years from now, I'll still carry you with me. And I swear to you, now, that love will be just as adamant and upright as it was that night I called you, before graduation. It will be just as strong as it was when I first felt it.

   You're my first love. A messy, confusing, but spectacular first love. No matter what happens, no matter whether or whether not you come back to me, I will always come back to you. Always.

   Yours Forever,

   Bambi