Faithful, Kindness, Joyful, Self-Sacrificing, Goodness and Firework

Mister Faithful,

I wrote your family a while back, and your girlfriend too. The letters haven't arrived to them yet, but I'm really hoping that they do make it there and don't get lost on the way. I feel better at least trying to let them know that I'm here for them.

What face would I have if I didn't? I've wished myself death more times than I've ever in the past, and yet your sister whose relied and bonded with you since the day of her birth, your parents that have to go through the undeserving pain of losing a child, or your girlfriend who lived her life loving you and feeling your love in return -- I can't believe they're still standing and are managing to keep on trudging ahead.

I myself have been dying for someone to talk to. I really do need a shoulder to cry on to fully accept and move on, but I can't, because the people that I'd usually confide in are the very ones that are closest to you. How terrible would it sound to rant about my pain to the very people who were in a rightful position to love you? I never was. I didn't take the chance when I had it, and now it feels like I'm not allowed to hurt.

So, to feel the slightest bit better, if I can't help myself, then it's probably for the best I be the person to those ones that I've been longing for. I'm not meant to receive condolences or have people to console me for a hardship like this, and I accept that. It's better I'm the comforter rather than the comforted.

I see why you fell in love with that woman you found, and I'm so happy that you had the opportunity to feel love in the way it's supposed to feel. She lifted you up in every way, and pushed you to become the brightest person you can be. She did everything she could to make sure the relationship worked, and you balanced that out for her.

She's lucky, and so are you. You're lucky to have found your other half, because as you might know, not everybody does. As much as she is hurting right now, I know that she'd never take back meeting you. She'd never take on the chance to forget even if she could.

Congrats on having beautiful people to support you. I've imagined so clearly what it would be like to attend you and hers wedding. You were planning to pop the question. I know you were, and I could see just as clearly your family and hers crying absolute tears of joy.

She said so herself, she's going to wait for your season two. She's awaiting the time that your interrupted love story will he completed and until the happily ever after comes along.

And as jealous as I might've been from the start, it would've been a privilege if I could've seen it. I know you would have been the best husband you could possibly be and as your friend, I'm so proud of you for that.

That woman you found is a fighter, and she's helped me tons too even though she might not know it yet. She's kept my mind off the hurting and gave me a break from reality. She's a real sister to me now. A true friend.

Maybe in another life, you'll live your dreams.

That dream that we all rooted for.

And honestly, I'm excited for that. I'm excited for what's best for you.

Cheers to the future!

-C.L

-

Mister Kindness,

I've apologized so many times I can't even count the more I reminisce you, and some might say I should feel embarrassed for that, or that I should feel awkward, but I don't think that's the case. I have to say it one more time, and who knows? I might have to say it way more in the meanwhile.

For the time being, yes, once again, I'm sorry. You put up with a lot to see me the first time as it was, but when you returned, you put up with even more. I'm sorry, really.

My girlfriend wouldn't leave me alone. She sent me text after text after text and she called over and over and over again. Once word got out that you liked me -- which somehow it did -- she went crazy.

Some can call me a bad person for even spending time with you after knowing that your intentions were courtship, and honestly, if it were any other way, I'd call myself a bad person too, but my girlfriend had the freedom to hang around anyone she wanted, even people that I wasn't comfortable she hung around, and she right afterward gave reason as to why I shouldn't be comfortable with it. She walked around cheating on me, and treating me like garbage -- she did what she pleased and yet wanted to deprive me of it.

And so I hung around you against her wishes. What would I be losing if she gave up on me? I don't think anything. I can't let go of someone who wants nothing to do with me unless it's out of her own benefit because I'm afraid of letting down people's hopes -- but if she's the one who got fed up with me, isn't it actually an easy way out?

It sounds selfish. Maybe it sounds like I was using you, I know, but the bottom line is, I wanted to spend time with you, and so I spent time with you. That's how I looked at the situation at the time, and in my view, I was justified in doing it.

I hope you actually saw it the same way as I did when my phone was going off insanely in my back pocket. I hope that you had as much satisfaction and relief as I did when I turned my phone off and didn't touch it again for the rest of the day. I hope that you didn't see that as me being a disloyal person to the one I was already committed to. I hope you realized that for the time I had with you, I wanted to prioritize it.

I still have no idea what went through your head, and you didn't give me a clue either with the power of your words. You were silent, and once I shut up the landline to the epitome of unfaithful, we walked together into the cinema.

You don't know this -- I know that you didn't, but my hands itched to reach out and interlock with yours. My arms were stinging out of it's longing to wrap around your shoulders, so badly, I can't even explain it. Looking back, I can't believe I managed to keep that a secret, but I did.

Together, we walked into the darkness of the room lit up by only the screen, and the most I could allow myself to do was pattern to your footsteps. I liked the feeling of somehow being aligned with you.

As we sat in a row of seats, in a near empty theater, I looked up to notice the movie you've chosen.

It was a romance.

And quietly, I longed to be the couple on the screen.

In that land of make believe.

Because that's the most we'd ever be.

A product of imagination.

-C.L

-

Mister Joyful,

I kind of envied you for that. Your joy. "Envy" might not be the right word, but it's got to be close to it. It's just in a way that's more soft and admirable than pure envy.

They say when you're jealous of someone, you want what they have, but when you're envious, you want to take what they have for yourself -- and in a way that's what it is. I do want to take what you have for myself, but it's not physical things. It's your qualities, and those can't be taken. They have to be developed.

If "envy" is the proper term for a situation like this, then I'd have to say that at some times, envy actually is a good thing, even if it doesn't sound like it because it forces someone to learn, pursue, and to chase what's better for themselves.

I've made a name for myself as a buzzkill, way back before we met for the very first time. Everyone knew me as that kind of person. I didn't want to be part of activities that would give me a lot of attention and I avoided as much communication with people as I could if that meant I didn't get that attention. When we did meet, I saw that in you too. That's why I related to you from the beginning, or it was at least one reason we formed a connection.

But there was a thing about you that I couldn't see in me, and I always wondered why you did it. Even though you're shy, and would never long to be in the spotlight, you never turned down an offer for fun -- even if you were embarrassed or felt humiliated. It seems like you live for the memories you could collect; what you would later regret if you didn't take the chance when it came, and you found it in you to enjoy it while it was here.

I didn't understand it at first, but I think I'm understanding it now. I didn't get it then because I always thought if that anxiety or the pitter patter in your chest can be avoided, why not avoid it? Why would you put yourself out there in a way that made you red in the face?

It's because you wanted to be able to look back on that day and said that you did this or that you did that. You wanted to live your life fulfilled and do everything that the world offers you to do. You wanted to have fun the way we were meant to, without a care about what anybody else thinks.

And as I think about you, I'm starting to realize how right you are. Why it doesn't matter how many eyes are on us if what we're doing is for the sake of laughter and good times. Why it doesn't matter if we're good or bad at the things we do or how insane we might look when we do them, but rather that we can go home knowing that there's a memory in our hearts that's never going to leave us.

But it worries me too, my friend. It really does, because that's not something that just anyone realizes unless it registers in their minds that they're running low on time. The books and the films always depict that perfectly -- how certain ones with illnesses that can't be cured go other there into the world and check off everything on their bucket lists.

Did you know you were running low on time?

Maybe I shouldn't ask, because if I was supposed to know such a thing, you would of told me. Maybe I shouldn't ask, because if it's true that you knew, none of your closest friends did.

But I can't help but to ask because that was quite a heavy secret to carry all by yourself. I wonder if I could've done better in being there for you instead of hurting you. I wish that I would've known better so that our time together would be a happy highlight of your life.

Still, I guess the question that's more important to ask is, did you complete your bucket list?

I hope you at least got that much, after having to leave us much too soon.

I hope I didn't get in your way.

-C.L.

-

Mister Self-Sacrificing,

I could have made a big deal about how romance movies aren't my type, or how it would have been much better if you chose a thriller or suspense film for us to watch instead, but around you, I didn't have the nerve. If you were anyone else, I would've definitely complained. Eventually, I wouldn't have been able to conceal that I was tired of the show. Actually, I probably wouldn't have even given it a chance.

But I wasn't about to waste our time together complaining about your corny choice in movies. I made sure to ponder on the fact that you allowed me to spend time with you to begin with. I made sure that the full value of this moment would absorb into my mind like a sponge. I made sure it was emphasized to me that despite pain, you still chose me over yourself, and in the process of all that I learned that romance movies aren't half bad.

I enjoyed it, being totally honest. It was a change I hadn't allowed myself to have in the longest time.

In that theater, I found a spot next to you -- a place that I haven't ever rightfully had, but that felt rightful when the dark room hid your face and I didn't have to fully accept my personal selfishness. We shared one arm rest, and as funny as it sounds, every once in a while our skin would accidentally graze one another's and I could feel this spark of fire light up my entire spine up and down and up again.

I know you felt it too, because awkwardly we'd both pull back and rest our hands back into our laps, though I can bet money neither of us wanted to keep our hands to ourselves, at least as far as innocence stretches. It's weird that I didn't have to have a single glance at you to know that. I could feel it in the air, and based off that feeling and that feeling only, I just knew. I knew you wanted exactly what I wanted.

It grew even more severe when the scenes were more intense, more emotional, heartbreaking or sweet -- anything, as long as it wasn't neutral, and I consider it pain that we had to sit there and act like we had not a thought in our minds besides friendship at the very most.

I like you. I know that I do, and I find that accepting that comes along similarly to the stages of grief, and as I went up the ladder of each, the arrival at acceptance was a hurt to the extreme in entirely different ways.

After a few, you scoot over a seat. I don't know if a line in the movie specifically triggered you that you were pursuing a man that was already taken, or if you hit yourself in your own conscience randomly, but whatever it was, you didn't want to be pushy. You gave me space, even if you didn't want to.

And as much as I hated that that had to happen, I started to fall for you just a little bit more, right when I didn't think that was possible. I know you weren't showing up at my doorstep out of the blue to ruin a relationship you thought I was happy in. I know you weren't trying to force disloyalty upon me.

It was as basic as you said it was. You came back to repay all the money and time I spent on you, and you held back from making it become anything more than that.

You held a respect and decency that this world forgot about for decades, and anyone would be stupid not to admire that.

I said it once and I can say it a thousand times, you're one of a kind.

-C.L.

-

Mister Goodness,

I miss you, and that makes me miserable. I never thought that 'miss' and 'miserable' would belong in the same sentence, regardless of how similar they sound, but here we are.

I'm miserable out of how much I miss you. I've been forced to learn something new -- that crap like this really happens to a person, and that it's not a tragic event that only comes up in the minds of fiction writers or the outcome of pencil to paper. It's real and it's painful and it sucks.

It didn't exactly register fully in my mind until people started asking me questions. I know they don't know anything about what's happened because I didn't tell them, and I know that they don't feel this hurt that I feel because they don't know you, and I guess as they asked all these questions they meant well, or maybe they were trying to compliment me. Maybe I should be happy with their noticing, but I can't. Not like this.

"Did you lose weight?" They'd say.

"Ah! You did! You look different! You look good. Even better than before."

"Did you start a diet?"

"New exercise routine, bro?"

"You doing cardio?"

I guess I didn't get it at first when they told me those things. I didn't understand what they were getting at because I could barely stand to look myself in the mirror and comprehend that my heart didn't give out on me like it did you, far too soon. I don't think I wanted to understand them.

Eventually though, a person doesn't have much of a choice. They have to take it in. They have to absorb it, and I'm one of those people that's going through exactly that. I realized that it's my sleepless nights and my lack of appetite since you've been gone that's thrown away some pounds, and I realized that every time I'd hear the nonsense that comes out of their mouths -- whatever tactic they think I might've tried or done -- I just smile slightly and say "yes".

People really do think I've started cardio, that I get up to work out at 5 am, that I cut out carbs, or that I'm working to better myself, but I think it's actually quite the opposite. I don't have time for myself because I'm giving everything to remembering you. At the moment, I don't even feel like me anymore and I think it's going to be quite a while until I feel like me again. I can barely keep standing on my own two feet, like I have to use someone else's brain to control my body and I don't think that would go very well for anyone.

It feels so wrong, how people react to what's going on at the surface when it doesn't show the reality at all. I almost feel praised for mourning, and when it comes to that kind of sorrow, their concern for me is almost offensive. It offends me that they praise someone whose story that don't know.

Tell me, why does missing you have to be so miserable?

Tell me, how do I heal?

Tell me, why do I feel so stuck?

Where is someone who understands?

Because you hold too much goodness to simply forget like an ordinary yesterday.

-C.L.

-

Mister Firework,

It seems that space was back on your mind the rest the afternoon we spent together. Once the thought of the friend zone creeped into your head, it wouldn't leave, and that one-seated space remained when we walked out from the cinema.

At least I can say I experienced that feeling of there being a glitch in the matrix when you first step out from a theater, with you to witness it, so that I got back up on the fact that I wasn't going crazy and was by all means spilling facts, but that's the most I can say. As fun as it was to have you to joke around with, I had so many mixed emotions in the times coming up.

You were a man of respect. As I said, that's been established because of the actions you were taking, and I cherished that you went out of your way to do that for me, but I also hated that there had to be space between us. That escalated too, the more we walked and explored together. I saw it so much more clearly then, that a one word answer can change your life entirely, and that's what my rejection rather than acceptance did to you.

What you say makes an incredibly big difference. Words hold value. They hold power. They're not useless. They can both make and destroy depending on how you use it. They can be a weapon, or the very warmth of a blanket in the cold.

I thought I knew that, but apparently I didn't know it well enough.

That's why we ended up there, like that, longing for more and being unable to push at the brick wall of boundaries. Before, at least there was a movie for us to divide our attention toward, but there wasn't anymore, and despite the butterflies in our stomachs coming on more strongly or more like fireworks exploding in the night sky now igniting in the small room they had there, we had to find way to make conversation.

We could've had comfortable talk and comfortable silences if I wouldn't have completely ruined us, but I did, and I couldn't turn back time. I didn't have the willpower to explain what was going on either. I didn't even think you deserved to listen to the mess that was my life, and because of that I dragged you into the world of my awkwardness and hesitations. A world where everyone was shy.

You tried to take the wheel in changing that, but there wasn't much you could do, and I was just as lost as you were. We were two people lost in the maze of the mall and simultaneously, the blaze within our skulls. The only thing you had to use to your advantage was anything you'd find around us.

"Do you like this color? I'll buy it for you."

"Are you hungry? Do you want to eat?"

"Come on! You know I owe you. Let me treat you to something."

"Ice cream? Smoothies? Anything?"

As sweet and kind that you were in that moment, especially after seeing that I'd refuse (I'm not necessarily used to being treated) and as much as you insisted and as much as your effort meant the world to me, I couldn't help but to wonder what'd it be like if I was honest with you from the beginning. If I told you how I really felt about you.

Maybe I'd be talking about that one time in 4th grade when I tripped over the lunch basket and the entire class stared at me while I did, and then maybe you'd tell me some sort of story about the time you weren't paying attention in some game and got hit in the face with a dodge ball while the entire section ridiculed you and laughed.

I don't know what we would be saying to each other, but I had that awareness in my gut that there would be ease. We would've been able to learn about each other from the inside out, and appreciate each other more than we somehow managed to and we would have an even more beautiful story to tell.

Then, all we got to talking about is favorite colors and favorite foods, when all I wanted to know was the person inside.

After all, every time I learned something new about you I'd fall for you a little more.

As unbelievable as it seems, I probably could've fallen a lot harder for you than I got to, if I would've opened up the way.

I regret that I kept that door shut. That door was meant to be open.

-C.L.