Sincerely Me

Chapter 6

Sam and May continued to sneak around, hiding their friendship from everyone they knew. The tree had become their home, a place they could find shelter from the reality they lived in. Together, in each-others company they didn’t have to be anyone other than themselves.

The two spent weeks meeting up, learning all there was to know about one another, then pretending as if it meant nothing to either one of them when they were around people. May didn’t notice how truly hurt she was that Sam so easily went from calling her special to completely ignoring her existence. She hadn’t thought about it until she was walking out of science one morning and one of Sam’s friends walked into her, causing her to drop her books. Instead of apologising, he laughed and Sam joined him. It was in that moment that May felt herself become undone. Suddenly, May realised that Sam could never really care for her or at least enough to choose her over his so called friends.

As the day went on, May couldn’t get Sam’s laugh out of her head. She couldn’t handle how drastically Sam changed when his friends were around. May started to think back to all those times Sam treated her like this and how many times she just accepted it because she thought it was okay as long as they had each other. May had started to wonder if she had ever really had him. All this time, May thought that she had finally found someone who understood her, someone she could open up to and be herself. Now she couldn’t help but feel as if she was wrong.

May wanted to forget about Sam. She didn’t like the way he only treated her like a human when it suited him. As much as May knew she deserved more, she still let it happen. Although she was aware of what was going on, she didn’t change a thing. She wanted so badly to walk away, forget about the letters, and ignore the boy who took up the majority of her thoughts. No matter how hard she tried to force him out, she continued to drop everything to go see him whenever he called. It was as if he had this compelling power over her. He made her lose control and she hated herself for it. She hated it because she felt so strongly for him and they weren’t in a loving relationship, he wasn’t her boyfriend and he had never once expressed any deeper affections for her and yet, she still went when he asked her to.      

Day after day, she watched him ignore her and day after day, she would let him because she hoped somewhere within him, deep within his heart, he cared about her.

This went on for weeks before she finally snapped. Sam had sent her a letter, a short one-sentence letter asking her to meet him at the tree after school Friday night. Not being capable of declining, May went to the tree. She sat and waited. She waited for hours but Sam never showed up. May re-read the letter, cautiously reading the words again, making sure she got it right. The longer she waited, the more she felt her heart break. Eventually, she lost hope and left. She later learnt that Sam was out partying with his friends. Seeing the photos of Sam, May couldn’t contain her tears. Spilling from her eyes, she curled herself into a ball and let all the pain in. She let all the hurt wash through her until there was nothing left to feel. She promised herself that she wouldn’t let someone make her feel like that again. She refused to let someone have so much power over her. She was determined not to let someone in close enough to hurt her like that again.

She stopped replying to his letters and she stopped going to the tree. She forced herself not to look at him because she knew that it would kill her to see him moving on with his life and forgetting her as if she meant nothing. She knew he would not look phased by the lack of communication. May felt empty inside. Sam had so quickly made such a huge impact on her that without his presence, she felt lost, completely pulled apart. It was as if she was made of string and Sam was slowly pulling at her thread, tugging away at her until she was no more. She could feel herself losing her very being. She could feel herself becoming erased.