One Hundred Letters for James

032

032:

Halloween

(My roommate went out last night and hasn't been back since. I'm kind of worried, but not really. I'm more worried about you, but when am I not?)

This fear might sound normal. It seems completely rational to be afraid of a day when tons of kids dress up in horrifying costumes and prance around with glee.

But that's not why I hated it. Of course not.

Grade 10. Or maybe it was 11. Sometime around then. Sorry if this letter isn't as coherent as you'd like, I'm too tired and worried right now to care, and contrary to popular belief, I've never really been able to construct a sentence of any sort of literary worth. It was around Grade 10 or 11, and, out of pity, you'd invited me to be your +1 at some Halloween party. I didn't want to go, I really didn't, but you forced me too, saying how fun it would be and maybe I'd meet someone? but that's not what convinced me, your prospects of potential boyfriends. It was almost the opposite.

It sounds horrible, but I didn't want you to meet anyone there. I knew how these kinds of parties went down, I knew how the girls dressed and how they acted, and I didn't want you to hook up with any of them or anything like that. So I went with you.

I wore a hideous dress, the first that I saw in the costume shop you brought me to. It was too tight in all the wrong places, and it poofed out to mid thigh into a mass of tulle. The bag was labeled Princess Dress.

I didn't feel like a princess. I felt like a skank, wearing the stupid plastic crown. You assured me I looked great, and that we needed to get going 'before all the beer is gone!'.

We walked into the house with me on your arm. You'd dressed up as a prince or something like that, because 'it matches a princess', but I knew you just wanted to wear a crown and have a cape. I wondered of people would think we were together because we coordinated costumes.

We separated about twenty minutes in, mostly because I didn't really know (or like) any of your friends.

I didn't know anyone there, actually. I felt really horrible, sitting on the couch alone and watching you mingle and joke.

I never really had a lot of friends. Most girls hated me because of my snide attitude, and all the boys I knew were gross and perverted. You always said it was because they thought I was cute, but I doubt it. They acted that way with each other, too.

I found myself intently searching for you in the dense crowd, and I didn't even notice the strange boy that sat next to me, his face covered in green paint.

I don't remember his name.

I do remember noticing him getting closer and closer to me as we talked. I nervously realized that there was no more room on the couch for me to scoot back, and all of a sudden his lips were on mind and I couldn't breathe, couldn't move, and all I could think about was you, smiling at me earlier, saying how much fun I'd have.

The boy sat up straight a second later, realizing that I wasn't kissing back, and he looked so hurt, and I felt horrible.

"I- I have to," I stuttered, standing and moving through the crowd, looking for you so I could leave and get it over with and I told you, I told you I hated parties and this was why, I didn't know anyone and I couldn't make friends because no one liked me, just you and you weren't even there.

I don't know what's gotten into me James. I'm crying, all over this stupid letter you're making me write, and I miss you so much.

I remember sitting in the kitchen, alone, and waiting waiting waiting for you to come looking for me and say 'Kathleen, I've been looking for you all over! Let's get out of here,' but that never happened and I had to start looking for you again.

I found you with some girl dressed as a doctor, holding her hand and smiling, and I should have thought nothing of it, because I knew that you were drunk, but I ran to the bathroom and wept.

How could you, James? How could you leave me like that? And now, how could you leave me now, when all I wanted was for you to be there for me and help me out and give me advice and talk to me, I wanted you to talk to me, and give me advice, and make it so I didn't have only one person to talk to, a roommate that didn't even like me.

This isn't what I thought University would be like. Is that bad? I thought maybe I'd make friends. Isn't that supposed to be a given? I've only met boys, boys that want to do more than be my friend, and I hate it. Do I look easy, or something? Am I easy?

Please talk to me James. I'm sucking my happiness out from the inside, and I don't know what to do besides sit and wait to die.