Turkeys Voting For Christmas

dear nija,

     Dear Nija,

     I suppose I should start this letter out by telling you what I wanted to tell you the most: in all these years I have never once stopped thinking of you, just like in all those years, when we were all but little girls dancing around each other too scared to admit what was going on, when I could never stop thinking of you.

     I still don't know what it was about you.

     You were wild, I guess. Untamed. Free. I think I needed that. You were like fresh dew drops resting on lush green fields during early spring mornings and I was like the cold ice perched on windows believing I would freeze everything I touched. I needed the refreshing air that you were, and I believed you needed me to be the anchor you had always longed for.

     I'm sorry I hesitated. I didn't mean to.

     In all these years, you never once believed anyone could love you—but I did. I really did love you, and the truth is, I love you still.

     I still don't know what it is about you.

     Maybe it was the fact that before you came rocking into Torres, that before you literally crashed into me — no one had ever willingly approached me and genuinely wanted to befriend with me. No one until you.

     You were stupid and breaking rules came to you like inhaling oxygen did, every second you were either thinking of pranking this or that person or actually pranking them while I was secluded, convinced that I did not need friends. I was hurt myself plenty of times when I approached other kids my age as a child and watched them turn back and run around horrified. I had convinced myself that I did not need anybody but yet, deep down, I'd yearned for someone to lean on. Someone who wasn't my sister.

     Sharon knew. Of course she did. She'd watched me grow up, seen me isolate myself after each disappointment and seen me run around other kids to catch their attention, loneliness in every stride. She'd also seen me develop, from the shy kid to the closed off teenager to the bitter woman I was becoming. But somewhere in between, you waltzed in and she knew.

     You were chaos since the second you walked in, slamming in and over and against all the walls I'd put up — dragging them to and fro from hell with impressive immunity to my intimidation. To anyone's intimidation in fact, you were impossible to scare away. I don't when you'd figured it out, how you figured it out; but I know that you'd known long since then that I was nothing at heart if not lonely.

     And I wanted to tell myself that no, I did not want to be friends with you. That I didn't care about you at all. You were just annoying in the way a street cat was, persistent but selfish. All I had to do was ignore you until you left on your own but I did not know how to ignore those stares, those enthusiastic grins and that stupid voice chiding out wherever I went — it was irritating because I had always managed to ignore everything, those hushed comments on how arrogant I was and those side-eyeing students who often talked about how I did everything in my power to be different from everyone else.

     But you. You were the one thing I couldn't block out.

     It did not help that you were everywhere. You were in the room next to me, you were in my art club, you also lounged around in the infirmary during the gym slots and ate lunch anywhere I was. It was almost like — like you'd genuinely wanted to be friends with me. And I told myself that couldn't be possible, that there was no way someone like you could ever, willingly, want to be friends with me. 

     I didn't know how to keep someone like you away and you didn't want to stay away even after familiarizing yourself with all my characteristics that made me someone people didn't want to be friends with. It got me confused, it got me vulnerable. How do I deal with someone like you?

     At first, I hated you jumping around. But you were smart. And you were funny. And you were creative and strategic and talented and you made me feel less lonely. I taunted you like you taunted me and I kept silent when you appreciated me, lips inches away from complimenting you back. I didn't understand this — any of this.

     And then, for a while, you were gone.  I don't know where you went or what you were doing, only that one minute your uniform was flirting around everywhere as you mocked my attitude and the next you were nowhere at all. It was then that I realised that I wanted this, that I missed you. I felt worse, not knowing if you would ever come back and annoy me again.

     I wanted to be with you. You made me feel different, wanted. You never missed an opportunity to compliment me and you always liked stringing your arms across my neck while pulling me along the way to wherever the hell we were going. You made me feel like I was okay, like I was normal, and that maybe I deserved to have people I could call friends too. I wanted to hear me call me once more, to say my name so I could commit that voice to my memory. I missed you and I wished you were around.

      I missed the closeness of being with someone who wanted to be with me because they liked my company, not because of some kind of obligation or familial tie.

     I missed you so much it hurt but I could never say it, not even when you came back. But here's what I want to tell you if I ever see you again: from very early on, it was impossible for me to not give in.

     To not fall for you.

     Love,
     Destin