Vanilla

Sent

To: leroy.j.cox@gmail.com

From: v.j.white@chronicle.edu.com

Subject: Valentine's Day

Dear Leroy,

I recall the two of us coming to a consensus about the unnecessary nature of Valentine's Day some time ago while you were over at my apartment for dinner on a random evening very much like today. As I write this email, the clock is ticking and with every passing second, edges dangerously close to the fourteenth of February, which the majority of human beings regard as a day to express one's romantic or platonic affections. More so the former than the latter.

Si Yin and Ariq (a classmate of mine) have made plans for a Single's afternoon tea tomorrow, and my best friend had the audacity to refuse me an invitation. Something along the lines of 'people like you make us feel lonelier than we already are.' It was quite the shock of my life.

Apart from being excluded from tea parties, I suppose nothing much has occurred over the past couple of weeks. I understand that we haven't been keeping up with the daily video calls, which, given our busy schedules, have been rather idealistic in the first place.

I am writing this email because it has come to my attention that our everyday texts have seemed to lose their authenticity and initial spark over the past month or so. Indeed, we have been confiding in one another about our new experiences—myself, currently in the second semester and somehow given a spot in the top twenty academics, and you in your brand-new restaurant, production-kitchen life. I find it odd how the fireworks of new information can settle and how, after hearing the loudness of a boom, silence can become further quiet in the darkness of the night.

I sent you something. A week ago, perhaps. It should arrive very soon, if not by today. Inside includes a letter. Actually, this is the letter. I'd kept a digital copy because, well, why not. And sending it to you here may or may not eternalize it, seeing that I am unsure if you'd somehow misplace my writing and, knowing you, would have liked to have a second read. Not because you like reading, but because you probably would not understand it the first time.

That was a joke, if you could not tell.

Either way, Leroy. I know what we said about Valentine's Day. I know I said, as I'd once believed, that there should be no special occasion for the true expression of love for what is true should, therefore, be practiced in every present moment. I now understand the importance of special occasions; the strange spark of anticipation in waiting, looking forward to something quite out of the ordinary and perhaps finding it a celebratory event that one can somehow experience alongside the rest of the independent world.

Sometimes, things like that are nice.

As such, I would like to wish you a very happy valentine's day.

Yours,

Vanilla

P.S. I do hope you never check your email because now that I've written this, it is terribly embarrassing but I've also already sent out the parcel and good god, how I regret decisions.