101 Days of Heartbreak Series Book 1: Letters of Heartbreak

Prologue

PROLOGUE 

Dear Kamita, 

There is a twisted similarity between a dream and a reality-the other one is a lie that you want so desperately to be a truth while the other is a truth that you sometimes want to be a lie. 

I do not know what I want. 

Embracing a dream often feels soothing and wonderful. It's an escape. A temporary dimension our minds create so we can forget. 

But it always ends. 

Accepting reality isn't a walk in the park either. Reality is often blunt, straight to the point, brutally honest. 

And it's there to stay. 

Therefore I do not know which hurts more--- the truth or the lie. 

I had a realization a few months ago. A realization that I wished just remained as jumbled thoughts which I cannot make sense of. I prefer the clutter than the clarity. The clarity was harsh. The clarity was reality. 

I'm in love with you.  

Surprised? I surprised me too. When I first felt the signs, I had panicked. I considered you my friend--- a really special friend but just a friend nonetheless. You were special in a different yet unromantic way. 

You're special because we've met in the oddest of circumstances and then reconnected a few years after. You're special because you are loved by millions while I am just an ordinary person and yet we became friends. You're special because our relationship was special; that even though we're separated by a few miles, culture, and lifestyle, we're still friends. In other words, you're really a special friend. A friend who is special.  

So when I woke up one day and realized my heart is beating so damn fast because of you, I wanted to spontaneously combust right then and there.  

This couldn't happen, was the first thought that came to me. I panicked so much I felt like I was about to became deaf because I was shouting the words inside my head. 

I know I think too much, but I also know what this unwanted feeling could bring. Our friendship is already complex in a way. Adding love, a one-sided one at that, into the mixture and it might just... explode and vanish. 

I can't take that. You are so important to me.  

But I need to do something. I have this instinct that whatever I am feeling won't vanish like how I wished them to do. I needed something that will at least help me cope with this.  

So I had to leave. Just for a few days. Only my sister knew where I am. After all, she's the one covering for me. 

I do not want you to know about this. Not now; not in the future. 

So here I am, writing the last of my unsent letters to you. It's a cowardly way, but I'd rather be a coward than lose you. I know there are a lot of dramas, movies, books, and hell, even fanfiction that cater to best friends being lovers (even though we're not really best friends), but it just cannot happen to us. This is reality; not a dream.  

So I wrote you letters. A letter for each day that you took a piece of my heart with you. And as I look back, you've been taking a piece since that day. The first cracks of the first days were minor-unnoticeable; even untraceable. They were merely results of plans gone wrong or untimed consequences. It was the latter cracks that finally shattered my heart into pieces. Because they involved feelings I refused to acknowledge before.  

101 days. I will be gone for 101 days. I need to feel and to not feel. I can only do it if I vanish. 

I will allow myself to grieve and heal for 101 days. When I come back, I will be ready to bury all these unsent letters that I wrote you. When I come back, you will never even have a clue that I had feelings for you. When I come back, you will never know I had move on. 

When I come back, I will completely let go.  

Love, 

Ateera