Letters To No One

Letter #22: I Miss You

Am I allowed to say I miss you?

You were the closest thing I've ever had to a soul mate. You knew every horrible thing about me and yet you still loved me.

I wish things could have been different. I wish I could go back to the beginning of the summer and change everything.

Do you remember how you promised me we'd run away together? Off to Salem Massachusetts of all places. You planned out our apartment in detail, you talked about going to school in Boston so that you wouldn't miss me while I was in class.

You'd turn to me on a bad day and say, "Just wait. Soon we'll be in Salem and it'll be us against the world."

I wanted that so much.

I still have all of our photos. I couldn't bring myself to throw them away. I can't look at them without getting sick to my stomach anymore, but I'm afraid if I get rid of them I'll hate myself.

You promised me you'd protect me, said it would be us against the world and you manipulated me. You tricked me into believing you only ever wanted me to be happy.

I hope you know why I stopped responding, why I deleted your number, why I refuse to say your name anymore.

I hope you know I have panic attacks whenever someone asks about you. I hope you know how much I hated you and how hard that was for me.

I don't even know if I do anymore. When I think about us I can only remember the warning signs and everyone who told me to be careful.

I miss you though. I shouldn't. I should still hate you for the way you made me feel. I should hate you for making me feel unsafe in my own bedroom. But I can't. Not anymore.

I have this emptiness in myself. It's as if half of my being has been ripped away and the part that's left is still trying to separate the good from the bad.

I don't really have any friends anymore. Because of you I find myself unwilling to allow people close enough to me to even be considered my friends. I'm scared. I get scared that I'm going to get hurt again.

The last time we spoke you were a stranger to me. I couldn't look you in the face. You were so drugged up you probably didn't even notice.

No one really knows what happened to you. Sometimes I imagine running into you on the streets and I can't decide if I'd turn the other way or if I'd run straight into your arms. I imagine you'd hug me tight and everything would be the same again.

I miss the way you'd never let me leave without hugging me goodbye. I miss the way you would always take just one more picture because you could never have enough. I miss the way we'd plan the future like we weren't stupid kids operating under some delusion. I miss your smell and the sound of your voice.

I think most of all, I miss how things used to be. How no matter how awful everything seemed to be going there was always that feeling that someone out there knew everything about me and loved me all the same.

Am I allowed to feel that way though?

I guess that's the thing about me though. You can break me, and you can destroy me, and I'll always come back because I always hope things can go back to the way they were.