I Capital L Love You

like a boomerang

January 26th
Dear Oliver,

After Thanksgiving, your mom still wasn't getting better. You and I found out that she found out about her cancer in February, but didn't tell anyone except for your dad. She told my parents and Kent during the summer, but we didn't get to find out until October. A whole 9 months later. Ouch.

With each day that passed, the life faded from her eyes. And the happiness faded from your eyes, Kent's eyes, and your dad's eyes. Your house became a haunted house, occupied by ghosts of the previously lively Lawsons.

I was selfishly worried that it would change things between us. As expected, things gradually changed. You stayed strong for the sake of your parents, but broke down when they weren't watching. So many nights – too many nights – you would walk down the street, find your way into my bedroom, and collapse in gut-wrenching, silent sobs next to me.

     Your brave face took a physical and mental toll on your body. Anyone with a working set of eyes could see the permanent dark circles under your eyes and the weight you were losing.

It got exponentially worse after her funeral two days after Christmas.

For the entire month of January, you didn't speak a word to anyone. Not me, not Meredith, not Kent, and certainly not your father. You no longer came crawling through my bedroom window to have a good cry. You didn't even cry when I was around, which was 24/7 for the first few weeks after it. You just sat on your with a blank face, occasionally saying that it wasn't fair and that you should have spent more time with her. Other times, you were too busy throwing things at the wall to talk to me.

Then one day, you snapped out of it and smiled at a joke I told you. You smiled for the first time since that rainy October night when everything was revealed. It was the longest five and a half months without seeing your smile.

I don't know how it was possible, but the font size of the capital L increased, and some higher power hit the bold button. I fell in Love with you even more after seeing that smile.

It was like the spring when you see all of the flowers and trees blooming. You forget how beautiful nature can be during the winter, but as soon as the Earth thaws, the memory of how pure it is comes flying back to you.

And that smile – your first smile in five months – was the return of everything. My Love for you bounced back like a boomerang, more radiant and tenfold stronger.

The Love never went away during that period of suffering, but I did my best to ignore it until you were better. I guess that I just forgot the magnitude of it and was surprised when it had grown.

     And with that smile, I thought everything was fixed. I allowed for the mental dam to burst, and the water flowed in. I allowed myself to feel happy about my feelings and how much they had developed. I finally didn't feel guilty for being content and for being so in Love while your family was crumbling.

Despite all of that, I was still naïve to think that we would be able to have a happily ever after so soon after a tragedy.

You started smiling again, but you buried your grief as a broken fifteen-year-old.

You drank. You partied. You slept around.

The knife in my stomach plunged in deeper with each conquest. The smile boomerang gave me false hope. It took the knife out of my stomach, only to plunge it back in and twist it around each time you slept with another girl.

Meredith was hurt by you, too. I guess something was going on between you two in September (after your first date), but you shut her out two weeks later when you found out about your mom's sickness. You told me that there wasn't time for anything but family until your mom got better.

Meredith still cared, though.

And somehow, she was the one to get through to you the summer after freshman year. She was the one who got you to stop drinking and sleeping with anything that had a vagina.

I couldn't help you, but she was able to. That hurt worst of all.

You guys started dating (for real) in the beginning of sophomore year. And like I said earlier, I tried my hardest to be happy for you two as you attended homecoming and went on dates. Things were finally looking up for you after almost an entire year of being sad. You deserved the world, and Meredith was able to give it to you.

And no matter how much I tried to hate her, I just couldn't. She was perfect — everything I wasn't. She had long, shiny blonde hair. I had long, black hair that was always tangled. She was tall (like you), and I was short. She was thin, and I carried around a few extra pounds. She was beautiful, and quite simply, I wasn't.

You and her made sense. You were a perfect couple on paper and even looked good together. She was able to bring you out of that darkness, and I will be forever grateful for it, no matter how much I wanted to hate her.

I just Loved you from afar, clinging to the hope that you would come to your senses and break things off with Meredith to be with me.

But the winter of sophomore year bled into early spring, and then into summer. Each season brought no change in your relationship status.

I fell further in Love with you as you fell in love with another girl.

~•~•~•~••~•~•~•~