Ashes of Vile

50

CHAPTER FIFTY
Dear Cassidy

It was the day of Cassidy Idgen's passing. There was no holiday that celebrated the great sacrifice a young girl needed not to make. August Vile stood on the same spot she held her dying body, and she stared at the ground that she almost could make out the blood stains. The lack of substance of an individual from sobriety is the perpetuation of perplexity. August Vile held an almost empty bottle she drank as she walked to the spot. The blade of the sword was strapped to her waist and it dragged on the floor with an irritating sound.

She sat down and stared directly at the blinding light of the sun. It had been three years and the place where Ashgrim once stood was overgrown with bright green grass. There laid the tombstone of Cassidy Idgen where people occasionally visited, the ones who really knew. From the distance, Lilac Evergreens and Jude De Mevius stared at the unknowing assassin. "The world really has a way of making people feel left behind." Lilac said.

And the two only watched as they let go of August Vile. She was ready to leave, long ago. And frankly, they were tired of keeping her back. She clearly had nothing worth to live for anymore. She waited three years for the moment to come. For the moment where life could maybe hold some kind of meaning. But it had been three years. Three years of August Vile getting drunk, hurting people with not just her daggers but with her hurtful words, and endless grieving.

So they watched. They watched August look at her blade as the sun bounced off its clea reflective blade. She had cleaned off the blood long before. She dropped her written letter on the tombstone that spelled out Cassidy Idgen, savior. And she pierced the same blade that had killed her into the same exact spot. And she bled on her grave, slowly and painful, but somehow with the most peace she had ever felt.

Her eyes closed. Her soul let go. And her body was not the usual tense. It was young, human, and live. It was rare for a dead body soon to be rotting to look more alive than it usually has been. But with August Vile, she was an insufferable divergent.

Dear Cassidy

It's been a year since you died. It's been a year I've stared at this goddamn paper but really can't jot down any words. 525,600 minutes I have had the opportunity to write something. But now as I watch these fireworks blast into air and the happy faces of these people in a new developing world, I realize how truly unhappy I am. I set off those fireworks Christmas night, you should've seen your face. It lit up so beautifully. My desire to light up fireworks every night since then should've been enough sign for me about how much you really meant to me. The truth is, there was no one to blame for my behavior. I am who I am. I tried to find a way to explain me but not a single word fit into the story, it was plain and simple, I am who I am. Complicated yet so plain. You could pull out every heartstring that makes up my whole and you'd only be left to discover that it is all meaningless. I am August Vile, and I still could not find it in me to love you the way you loved me. So here I am, doing what I truly do best: to hurt. And maybe, just maybe, this could make up even half of the pain I caused you. And maybe it could paint the picture of what love could have meant to me. Just as it did for you.

I wish I could blame Oceanna Vile. But she had her nightmares, so did I. But she was never really the reason for them. The past year I kept thinking hard. About how to explain it all. But then I remember all the words you have said to me. About how you loved me despite it all, and I just keep thinking, fuck why am I trying so hard to explain something you obviously don't need to hear? You couldn't care less about my upbringing. All you wanted from me was reciprocity. What kind of hypocrisy could I hold that even that I couldn't give. Most tragic love stories, in death, there would be a few last words shared. In the dying hands of their one true love, they get to say what they always wished to say. But that obviously wasn't the case for us. Because there would've been so much I wish I could say to you, but when the moment I least expected came, I was just lost for words. And you, you Cassidy was always just so selfless. Even in your dying breathe you just could not choose the easy way out. And it pains me with regret that the last thing you ever heard in your life, especially from me, is that you are a coward. You are far from one, you are the bravest and strongest. And I've met a lot of people. I've ended a lot of lives.

I read your letter. I don't think I deserve to read such beautiful words. I don't think even the world deserves to read it. You just could perfectly encapsulate shit, it annoys me... I hate this. I hate it because I wouldn't change a thing. I was me and there's no one to blame but myself. I don't even know when it went all wrong. I don't know a time in my life since I had met you to change for the better. Because no matter what piece I move, the board would still be the same. I am daft, I am not a true lover. I knew the only change there would be if there was an option, is to never meet you. But selfish I am, even if I knew the end, I would still know how the story would go and that I was loved by someone like you. So I would make you go through it all over again just to see you. Even if it means putting you through all that pain one more lifetime, I would make it happen. Do you still love me as I say this, Cassidy Idgen?

Afterall, you gave me a subconscious reason to live for after years of having none. So why would you shortly leave and take that reason away just when I started to get used to it? You know you deserve only the best, Idgen. But unfortunately, I cannot decide that for you. Only you know your true worth, only you get to decide your limits. And only you get to decide how things will end for you. If you would've wanted to chase the highs and impossibles because that's the least the world can give you, then I would have supported you. But you chose to groven and bury yourself in the deep, captivated by the sorry being you are. I am telling you right now that I don't support it. But it's too late for that now, right? You pursued it, and I didn't stop you in time. You should be able to choose your own road, as you have never been able to your whole life. It's only unfortunate that that road didn't lead to me.

I only hope our story will be told beautifully and painfully. Just like how I remember how it felt. Because I'm a coward who couldn't do it. I just hope our story lives on forever, I hope your being lives on forever in these people's hearts. Because I can't do it for you. You taught me love, I'm sorry I only taught you sorrow.

This was never my story or anyone else's. It's yours. And now I bear the greatest punishment given by whatever is out there, whatever higher being had given you unfathomable power, the greatest punishment, to live a life without you. So I made sure the world knows you are the reason why they can still continue to love. To feel love. To experience love. And it will be forever shameful that you never got to write your own story. So I hope, I hope, I really hope, that I got to justify it. Somehow.

This isn't the ashes of vile, but the ashes by vile. I killed you, the first, last, and only love of my life. You may think you have given me the life you thought I deserved. And maybe you're right. Maybe I just did not deserve to have you, Idgen. It kills me everyday to walk this cruel world with such a cruel fate. So, now that my words are finally flowing, I realize: these words do not travel in a path not dug out for its purpose. So how will you ever know all my words unsaid? It is insulting to you, so let me be bold. It is much easier to write this than to say it. And now, three years later... I can finally mean it. I love you. I wish I got to tell you I would bear your scars. A million times over. I would make them my own. I would bleed. I would die. For you.