Month of L

Eight

To my favorite internet friend, the one I ruined everything with,

There's a lot I want to say to you, and I'm almost 100% sure none of it will make a difference, but it has to be said anyways. I just wish I could have actually sent this to you, in painstakingly neat handwriting and scratched out lines and fine paper, because these formatted letters feel cold. God knows you already think I'm winter in Antarctica.

Number 1: Nothing you say is stupid, not if you care about it. From when I first met you, you always seemed to be putting yourself down in small ways. It would slip into conversations about the simpliest things. This is fine, I thought, no one likes everything about themselves. At the time, your depression was just a suspicion in the back of my mind, unrealized and hazy around the edges. I don't know how you're doing now but if you take anything from this, please let it be this: NOTHING YOU SAY IS STUPID, NOT IF YOU CARE ABOUT IT. And I care about you, so I would love to hear you talk about all those not-stupid things again, if you would say them to me.

Number 2: I can't remember how we ended, or if I ever pressed the send button on that final message I had written. I don't know if it would have helped anything, because I think you were already done with me. I think I wanted the tightness in my chest to be gone, to turn off my phone and forget all the mistakes I had made. I smiled at my family and friends that day, trying to shuffle your last words off the cliff edge at the back of my mind. If it was over, it was over. Back then, I was too tired to keep hanging on. Tell me, is there anything I could have said in that last conversation, that would have changed your mind? It doesn't matter now, that's not what I want to remember when I think about you.

Number 3: To every single fucking person you will ever be friends with:
No, it's not easy putting effort into adult relationships. Sometimes it's going to choke you, how you can't hug her or actually give her any comfort. But you know what will be easy? Laughing at her horrible puns. Waking up to a bombardement of notifications, all saying nothing more than hey, I thought of you today. The inside jokes--oh, all the inside jokes (one of my biggest regrets is never making those "I'm a Slut for Shrimp" t-shirts and physically sending them to her house in Wherever, Pennsylvania). That will be a breeze.
So you. You're going to need to get past the thick ball of fear in your throat and every instinct you might have to run from whatever problems you find together. If she misunderstands you through however many miles you're separated by, keep going. Set her straight and don't give up.

Number 4: What the fuck even?? Who cares anymore. If this is the last thing you ever read from me then I have to say what I need to: I FUCKING MISS YOU AND FUCK ALL THE TIMES I DIDN'T TALK TO YOU. YOU'RE A BRIGHT LIGHT IN MY LIFE, EVEN NOW.

Sincerely,
This idiot right here