Demon Stories

Josephine: The First Letter, 1957, Trans-Atlantic Crossing

Josephine

The First Letter

1957, Trans-Atlantic Crossing

Crystal my dear,

You must know this letter will reach you with my tears. It is with deep regret how I write this. My dear, do not be sad, for the one you came to know is not the true identity of this one. Though the tears will not be less, please be comforted in knowing the one you knew was never alive. I lied to you, and you should not care for this one anymore for that reason.

You deserve an explanation, and I will provide one. However, I must make my intentions clear. I will be returning to France, but that is where the trouble starts.

For you see, I am not French as I led you to believe. You are so trusting and kind. No, I am from England. My being French is just a story, one you believed and let shape you and us. It was my fault, and my burden, to have allowed this. 

I am not anything you were led to believe. I am not even of this world, though this sounds to be another lie. If you would trust this one who does not deserve to be trusted just once more. 

I am a deviless, the diablesa as you say. I was born in 1799. I am over one hundred and fifty years old. Bit of an age gap, but this is no time for jokes. 

I remember when in the kitchen you were cooking one of those lovely Puerto Rican dishes, and I thought you had stepped out to use the restroom down the hall. Do you remember how you stood there in the doorway and heard me singing a Schubert opera melody? I wanted to tell you the truth then. How much you admired it. If you had only known I had seen the original in concert. I wanted to tell you. I wanted to tell you how I wish I could take us back through time and hold your hand as we took in that concert together. 

But this and among other things are why we can not be together. We are not so different, you and I, but we are different. You are human, my dear one, and I am demon. This despicable thing, this creature... If you knew what I did every two weeks you would be so fearful and it makes me want to die. This thing I must do... I must kill someone every two weeks in order to keep animated. You love the porcelain dolls. Well I would be your life size porcelain doll if I did not feed off of the living. I can not show you this part of me. I do not want to frighten you. It breaks my heart.

When I told you I would be going on vacation to France to see my mother, I was lying. You wanted to come with me on this voyage, but you could not. I am leaving you, and we will never see each other again. You will grow old and I want to crumble to ash knowing I will miss it. I want to hold your hand forevermore and love every wrinkle, soothe every ache. But I will never grow older. I realized this some time ago, and how I wept when I knew you would notice I was not of this world due to my lack of aging. This was when I really knew I must leave you. Seeing your smiling face as you saw me off, that was the nail in the coffin of my heart. 

Writing this now, I know I can not send you this letter. To let you know what I am is not safe for you. You could become a target of things I can not mention even though you will never read this letter. But my sweet, my darling, please be safe. Please be safe. I love you, you are my heart. My heart. I will cherish you forever, and every time I see a yellow rose I will think of you. Your yellow rose is forever in my memory.

Love always and forever, 

your darling Clementine