Wherever You Are

Chapter 9: Jonah's Unsent Letter

October 12, 2015

Dear Felicia,

I started college about a month ago. I've already met some really cool people. There's this one guy, Jefferson. He's pretty cool. I met him in one of my classes. He's a sophomore and plays on the football team. They aren't very good, but he says it's fun. I might join next year if they let me.

Jefferson also took me to a few parties the first week of school. They were kind of celebration parties. Celebrating the new school year, with new opportunities and new people. There weren't a lot of freshmen there, only a few. One was a girl named Avery. She was really cool, but I didn't think of her as anything besides a friend.

I drank a lot at the parties. Not the first one. At that party I only had a few drinks, but at the second, third, fourth, and fifth I drank a lot. Avery got me trying this really cool stuff. It helped with the pain. It also just made me relax and enjoy my time at school. It's LSD. It's a tablet that you put in your mouth. It made me feel really calm and it let me have more fun at the party. I also smoked some weed which helped too. It was fun.

It was the first time I had done drugs. I know, I know. Surprise, surprise. You would have expected me to have tried this stuff a long time ago. I just never had the desire to. Until now. I wanted to forget about my life for a little while. I wanted to forget about the pain I caused you, and the pain my mother is in. I just wanted to forget for a little while.

Emma and I went to a party last night. It was sort of an early Halloween party type thing. My school has them the whole month of October, one each week.  I invited her to come with me, since she came here to visit. She decided college probably wasn't for her. We dressed up in different costumes for each party. Emma and I went as cave men to this one. She was in a skimpy tiger print dress and I got to wear a leopard print cloth around my waist. That was all I wore.

When we got to the party, it was filled with people dressed in this exact outfit. This was the go-to college Halloween costume. As I walked into the frat house, girls looked me up and down. I felt very uncomfortable at first. It was long until I got to the kitchen and was downing six shots with Emma. After the sixth one, she was swept away by a guy dressed as a firefighter. They started dancing and when he got a little handsy she decided to throw a drink in his face and go dance with some other girls dressed in caveman costumes.

As I was drinking my seventh shot, a girl came up to me and started to whisper something in my ear. She rested her hand on my shoulder and tugged at my hair a little. She got me up and dancing. Grinding was never my favorite type of dance but it was all this girl knew so I went along with it. After a few songs and a few more drinks, she attempted to get me up stairs, but Emma came in quickly and rescued me, posing as my girl friend.

"Get your filthy hands off my man," she said in a prissy voice. She grabbed my arm and pulled me toward the door, both of us trying to hold in our laughter.

As great as it would have been to have some fun with a girl, you are always on my mind. I just can't seem to get you out of my head. I try to distract myself with other girls, but you always seem to come back in. If I had gone upstairs with that girl, I would have ended up having a panic attack like the other times. I try to move on and give myself to someone else but I feel claustrophobic and I start to lose my breath. My hands start to shake and my mind drifts off to how I'm betraying you once again.

It's hard you know, being away from you and knowing what I did to you. I wish I could go back in time and change what happened. I wish I could fix things between us. But you're better off without me. I hope you are doing better. I hope you have moved on and found someone else. Someone better. Someone who treats you right and takes care of you the way I never could. I just want you to be happy again.

I still love you,

Jonah