Eighteen Letters To Juan Karlos •COMPLETED•

The Eighteenth Letter.

The train was fairly empty when Juan Karlos caught it, settling into one of the window seats across the aisle. He'd gotten away from his security and the higher ups easy enough, just waved them off and something vague about visiting some friends and family while Darren smiled ruefully at him.

The day had arrived. After months of waiting, Juan Karlos was finally going to see Addie. This was it, no matter how cliché that sounded.

He'd done his time waiting, they both had, and today he was getting the chance to say all the things he'd been thinking in the dark, he was going to be able to see her in the flesh and keep her safe and let her know that she was loved. Today he'd be able to know her for real, today he'd be able to hug her and tell her that it would be okay.

And it wasn't that he wanted to be her knight in shining armor, or anything. He didn't want to sweep in there and save her from all her demons. She could do that herself, and he knew that. She was so strong, stronger than anyone he'd ever known, and maybe it was more her that needed to know that. That was what he needed to say to her, he thought as he pulled out the worn package of letters out of his bag, fishing around for the last letter he'd saved up until now.

Because even after knowing all of her life, after being chosen to have Addie open up her heart to him, he'd never once thought she was weak.

Dear Juan Karlos,

Things are getting bad. Things are getting really, really bad and I-I don't know what to do. Maggie and her girls, they're slowly pulling me apart. I'm failing most of my subjects. Teachers - they don't get it, they don't get it - they don't understand that I'm too tired to go home and revise even more, that I can't sleep at night and it makes me droopy in lessons. Can't they see that I don't care, don't have the energy or place of mind to worry about signing my planner? All they do is nag and talk and ask persuasive questions, and I just want them to stop, please stop.

The loneliness is the worst, though.

When I was younger I was always surrounded by people. I don't know if I was just good at making friends back then - I'm definitely not now - or if it was just the fact that I was young and would talk to anyone that would listen, but there was always someone to play with. Always someone who was there, a familiar face or voice or just the comfort of having a person sitting next to you. My parents, despite dedicating the majority of their time to my sister, were still always asking me how I was, what I did today, and though they might have been fetching pills out of the cupboard or cleaning up in the bathroom while they did it, they still listened.

No one asks me stuff like that anymore. I guess that's why I started writing these letters, somewhere to pour out all the useless nothings of the day, just to feel a little less lonely. It's sad, but my life is sad. Sometimes, it doesn't feel quite real, like a tragic story some struggling writer dreamed up.

Juan Karlos wondered what she'd say, if she knew that he was listening. Would she feel better? Or more scared? Addie had never written these letters with him actually reading them in mind. Which brought back the question; how did he get them in the first place?

I miss them so much, JK. I miss my mom and her terrible singing. I miss dad and his cheap cologne. I miss their flaws and their virtues, I miss their unconditional love even when I was wrong. I miss every little thing that I never noticed before they were gone because I was too ungrateful, too stubborn.

I should have appreciated them more. I see that now. At first I was so angry, you know, mainly at myself but also them - I mean, they left me. It was so unfair. They'd left me alone with no family I could turn to, (Mom was an only child, and her parents had died a while back, and Dad hadn't spoken to his brother in years after his dad died and Grandma ended up in a care home) with a dying sister.