Tear-Catcher, Highlight, Sky-High, Dust, Cliffhanger, Highway and Ray of Sunshine

Mister Tear-Catcher,

Your sister received the letter I wrote her today. She let me know through chat, and she was specific about it too."I just received your letter today at exactly 11:20 A.M. I finished reading it by 11:40 A.M," are her exact words, but that wasn't it. Not near.

She then told me that when she read it, she cried and cried and cried and cried, and she told me how thankful she was, so much that she couldn't express it. I never met her before besides exchange a few texts, and yet now she was grateful to me because of how she was moved from the heart. She said she was speechless and she told me she loved me and cherished me. She said she appreciated the effort I made.

And I believed her. This period of her life would be the hardest for her than anyone, but I guess I didn't believe her enough, or maybe it's more true than I thought that action is more powerful than words, because then, she let me see a glimpse of her world -- a short clip of the tears falling down her face, and her breath shaky as she read the words I wrote her, and when I saw that, I broke down too.

She doesn't know it, but I couldn't help but to cry for her. I didn't notice the tears slipping down my cheeks until they caused so much blur that I couldn't see straight, and that's when I realized -- these were the moments that you were here for. You were the one who would lighten the mood or joke lightly enough so that we'd be back to smiles again.

Yet now, you weren't here. You couldn't be.

Still, I'm glad I let her know how even though I didn't know her, I felt like I did because of you. I will never forget how you would talk about her like she was the best thing in the entire world and how proud you were to show her off.

Her and I cried about such a fact, unknowingly to her, together, despite all the distance between us and for some reason it felt good to not be crying alone. It felt good to be crying tears of empathy while I cried tears of pain. Even if I was hurting from the inside out, I was glad that I could be there for her for just a second.

She's your sister. Of course I treasure her exactly how I treasure you.

More than ever before, I don't care who thinks I'm crazy. I don't care at all about what other people think. I'm looking forward to the day when I get to watch her embrace you back in your arms. I look forward to the day that she doesn't have to miss you anymore, and all she has to do is love, love and love some more.

That's the kind of life she deserves.

And that life will come, no matter what people say.

I know it will.

-C.L.

-

Mister Highlight,

People say falling in love with someone is terrifying, and even though each of those persons have their own reasonings and experiences, it all comes down to one thing specifically: the fear within ourselves, and as much as fear can be the very thing that protects us, it's also the thing that breaks what felt like everything apart.

That's why I hate that fear exists.

Looking back at what we had from the beginning to the end -- it might not have been much, but it was beautiful. While I lived in those moments, I faced my own terrors, but they were terrors that were worth facing.

I worried a lot about making things as perfect as I could, even though I knew that not every little detail could go perfect. For a while, I wasted time I didn't have suppressing the true me because I didn't want to scare you away, and because I wanted everything to be a smooth ride.

I shouldn't have been so freaked out. If I would've shown myself from the get-go, I would've seen that you were someone that didn't judge me for the person that I was, and I've learned recently that those who do aren't the ones that I'd want to spend my time around. That I would be better off losing them.

But with you -- I wish I would've felt free from the very start. I regret spending my seconds overthinking if I'm doing what would impress you or would make you want to hang around me. I wish I would've made decisions that I was scared to make before, and that I wouldn't allow myself to follow through with.

I should've taken the risk. I should've trusted you entirely with my heart and gave you the power to break me in every way, in the days that you wouldn't have because now that you're gone, I can see it's the only way I could've been broken when it came to you.

While I had you, I was supposed to spend that period being happy with you, and now that I didn't, it's going to be a while until I can again.

That's what I've noticed in life. No matter what we do, there will always be regrets. We start out scared that we'll do something we regret, and as time passes we look back and hate ourselves because we didn't do something.

I know I've said this so many times and I know that by now, if you could hear me, you'd be tired of it, but it's what's on my heart and on my mind and I can't change that so simply. Besides, both of us know darn well that we speak what's on our heart. It's human nature. It's the way we're built. I have to be this way, and trust me, I wish I wasn't.

I just want to go back and start all over. I wish life gave us second chances and let us better understand what's coming.

But it's too late now.

Were we too late from the beginning?

Is this how we had to be?

-C.L.

-

Mister Sky High,

I feel privileged to be a person to know to say "congratulations" to your sister. Of the many people that you and her knew, she made sure to tell me of the accomplishments she reached and the more and more she continues to achieve, and I got to tell her how proud of her I was and how I'm supporting and cheering for her all the way.

She would've loved to hear it from you, and I know that you would've let her know just how happy you are for her if you could. She's following right in your footsteps.

Honestly, I did too. You paved the way for both of us. You inspired us in ways that nobody has ever been capable of before, and I truly don't know how to thank you for that.

I thought that on a day like this, we'd being to meet up with one another and pull through ever forward, being proud of what we became because we know full well that we reached the very definition of success, and that through all of that, we'd be able to laugh together, knowing that we made it. Clearly, not everything goes as a person might imagined.

In every way that I thought of this, you were there. You were always there. You were part of all of our growths and our new heights. That's just how life was meant to be. This wasn't the way we planned this to go. You would know that yourself. You wanted to be here.

But don't worry. Don't fret whatsoever.

I promise that I'll be there for her. I'll lift her up as high as I possibly can when she's down, even if it's not as high as you were able to lift her. I'll hold her as tight as I can when she needs a shoulder to cry on, even if it isn't as tight as your arms have ever held her. Yes, I promise that I'll encourage her when she can't keep her head up anymore, even if the impact isn't as great as yours.

I know that I can never equal you. I looked up to you for a reason. Because you've always been above me, and because that's where you rightfully belong. I can't replace you in the way you were there for you, but I can do my very best if that's what you would of wanted.

I'll take care of her. I'll make sure she's okay. I'll make sure she'll continue fighting, and I'll let her know that though it's okay to feel weak and disheartened, that it's possible to be strong. She'll help me a lot along the way, even if she doesn't realize it.

I think I need her as much as she'd need the littlest support that I can give her. We both need all the help we can get, because even if we had the cheers of the entire population, it's still not superior to you.

I mean it. Don't worry. I'll help her to be okay.

And in my mind and heart, the congratulations I gave her was from you, like it should've been.

-C.L.

-

Mister Dust,

Sometimes people complain about being tired, and I guess I can't go off at them for doing that, because I've done the very same thing myself, but now that I'm here like this, I've come to realize without option that there is much more than a basic physical exhaustion. There's a whole list of ways to be completely sick and tired of continuing on with life.

I'm tired of all the endings. I'm tired of new starts that make the pitter patter in your chest yell louder than the worst rain of the season, or feeling that distinct spark inside every inch of your bones, for it only to meet at finish at some point. I can't live the way I am now, continuously dreaming and hoping for more, until I finally think that I'm happy again, and right then the heartbreak comes.

Some might say that I'm making a big deal about nothing. They might say that this is the circle of life, and even though it might not be fear, it's the way things are. They just expect me to move on, but you know that I've always been the type to make a big deal about little things. You saw that for yourself.

Why is it that people try to make that sound like such a bad thing? I didn't like to think it was. I thought we made good memories that way.

Because I made a big deal about little things, we got to have our moment simply admiring the sky and the clouds it beheld. I thought of it as a gift that we were blessed with everyday. After all, it's not like as imperfect people we deserved to see such a beautiful thing, but it was a good reminder that God is generous and wants us to enjoy life.

You are the sky and its every little cloud.

We have pictures taken with the sunset making us look like nothing but silhouettes, and though I never thought of it to mean anything at the time, I did start to see now that we're small creatures in this vast universe, but you still made me feel like I was the most beautiful person within it.

You are the sun itself.

But even so, when I'd look up at the moon every night, I'd think about you and how even though we were separated by miles, we looked at the very same piece of creation, and we were connected at all times.

Somehow, you were the moon too.

And every single one of those songs that got stuck in my head when I thought about you -- I could swear you were the inspiration of every single one, so much that I wouldn't get out of my car until those songs were completed.

People tend to call these things "little", but if you really think about it hard enough, they're not at all. They're far, far, bigger than us, but because it's so normal we forget. We don't like things unless they're rare and even then eventually we get tired of them. We forget to appreciate things that we see everyday.

Yet you were nothing of that sort. Though I know you're not more than mere dust, I got more attached to you than I expected to myself.

That's the reason why I'm in awe of the little things.

Nothing else but you.

-C.L.

-

Mister Cliffhanger,

Isn't it heartbreaking that the day for tying the knot is also the acceptance of one within the pair dying before the other? I know, that's not what's going through anyone's heads on the day of, but both of them and all the people that came to support them are aware of it, even if it's only unconsciously.

But the thing is, that unconscious fear that's hidden into the depths of our soul doesn't start from the day of the wedding.

It started at the moment two paths collided, whether that be as a friend, a brother, a boyfriend, a girlfriend, a parent or whatever else. It might not be as prominent as our other fears, but somewhere in our bones, it's there. Though we tell ourselves that the day's not tomorrow or anytime soon, we know in this world at least, we don't live forever.

Every stranger that becomes more than what they were at the start, connect to you with strings of different colors -- some in the shade of love, others in the shade of friendship and still, others in the shade of coworkers, classmates -- or maybe enemies for some, which of course, you didn't have.

And for some reason, the thought of it makes me quiver. I don't even know what color string connected me to you, or if it's possible that it changed over a period of time, but I'm filled with terror just thinking about what this has come to.

I'm scared that I'll be miserable forever because I don't know how to forget you, and I know it's likely wrong that I'm even thinking this way to begin with, but I want to pretend to think that it's okay, because honestly I'm absolutely petrified that from now on I'll never fall in love again.

I won't be able to fall in love again simply because they're not you, and there's no other way I can describe it, and no other reason to tell.

I don't care if what I'm meant to have with you is just a friendship. I don't care if I will never reach the stage of anymore than that. Heck, I don't care if all I get with you is to watch you from a distance, falling in love with someone who is beautiful and cares for you properly. I don't care if all I get to do is continue to watch what you had with her, staying completely out of your way.

At least I got to do more than I am now. At least I fell in love with a beating heart, and at least I got to see you grow and thrive as the person that you deserve to be, but loving your heart when it's already still is a shard of glass to my skin that I don't know how to handle.

Whoever I was supposed to be in the story of your life, I'd take it as a privilege, as long as your story was still being told.

Let me be a side character, even. A character who only says a line and nothing more, or maybe nothing at all.

I want you to have a story to tell. It wasn't meant to end.

I'll be included in anyway as long as it isn't over.

-C.L.

-

Mister Highway,

I admit that it was tormenting to watch us grow apart, but I was wrong to think that that was the worst thing that could possibly happen. It sucked to let you go, when I had no power or right to take even a step toward you when you walked away, all me being able to see being your back.

I would still consistently sit in the same corner of my room and melt into the floor, hoping that soon enough maybe things will change. That even though you found happiness with somebody else, it would hit you one day out of the blue that you were happier with me.

I thought I had logical reason to feel that way, but now I see that I didn't, and even if I did, I shouldn't have taken advantage of that. I should've been glad that you were happy, and I should've left it at that, but being me, I didn't. I waited and waited, and I let myself expect, yet nothing went uphill. Everything went down.

Not just for me, but for so many people out there. For every person who knew you.

But the people who weren't blessed with that pleasure just don't understand, and they're the very people that tell me the nonsense I always hear. I feel bad to say that, because I know they mean well and that they want to be comforting, but I have no way of pretending that they are. They're shredding me like I'm paper and not bones and blood.

I've heard it all.

There's people that have said that this -- your death -- is just a lesson for me. They tell me that eventually I'll figure out what I'm supposed to take from it and I'll construct myself into a better person, but whether or not it's true, it doesn't make me feel any better. A lesson doesn't replace the person, you know? Regardless of what I get from this in the end, there is still a pain there unbearable and that is determined to stay close by if not attached.

I'm not for those ones that say the life or death of a person can count as a learning moment. As much as learning is a good thing, I don't believe that everything we live through teaches us something, and if it does, with as painful as it is, is it even worth it?

I would rather live through the heartbreak of not being loved in return until I die myself, if that meant you were still alive.

I would rather learn to have to forgive and forget so that I could give you the space to roam free and find happiness than accept they the world still goes on spinning without you.

I would rather take the judgement of every person out there that looked down on me for seemingly "not" choosing you and then choosing you later on, when they didn't know the whole story if that meant that you were able to share more kisses with the woman you did end up calling yours.

I would rather have hardship in growing, having to watch you find home in someone else's arms if that meant I didn't have to hear so bluntly from a man that didn't know you as well as I did, "he's dead".

However painful the situation was before, this is a whole lot worse, and I'd take you getting into a car with the love of your life and driving to the opposite side of the earth right before my eyes than accept this.

I just want things to be okay again.

You were the glue that held everything together, no matter how far you were.

-C.L.

-

Mister Ray of Sunshine,

At least there's one thing I can say I don't regret. When I thought I lost you the first time, simply because I fairly gave you up when I shouldn't have, I never once resented you. Sure, I felt pain, but I knew the entire time that you didn't have fault in that, and no matter what, I could never bring myself to blame you.

If I did, I don't think I could ever forgive myself. With the way things are, I already can't, and if it were up to another level, I don't think I could live with myself. In whatever scenario, I know that I deserved the grave more than you did, but doing such a thing like that would only escalate it.

We didn't make it. We didn't work out in the time we had that I had absolutely no idea was limited -- and that caught us all by surprise -- but we don't have to be an item for you to be as precious as you are to me. Do you even understand that yet? Do you actually comprehend that I cherish you so much? Or did I not show it to you well enough? Did I not make myself clear?

For a person like me that always makes communication awkward by the snap of the figures because of my natural introverted ways, I felt comfortable with you -- with someone, for the first time in my entire life. Unless you count preschool, when I didn't develop a sense of embarrassment yet. If you think about it, you're the only person out there that brought the happiness of my childhood back to me, and this time, I didn't have to be naive.

I loved having you as a best friend, and as generic as this sounds, that's because of how sweet and funny you are. Whenever we would laugh together, it would get chaotic and crazy, and it was only organized enough for the two of us to understand. The connection between us only got deeper as time passed on, and there wasn't a second in time that it got weaker. It was one of the strongest forces of the universe. I'd bet everything on that.

That's why I knew that I could enjoy life with you, in whatever shape or form it was in, but it was more than just my own comfort. When I was with you, I felt calm and like I can actually breathe in the oxygen around me. I thought more positively, and I believed in myself more, because you hyped me up so enthusiastically.

With your help, I received such a good influence that stuck to my soul, and it's fact that once something strikes the soul it's impression will never leave the body, but because of your humbleness and meekness, you always gave me the credit for having the good influence on you and you made me feel like even if I don't make a big difference in this world, I already made it far enough because I made an impact on you.

Seriously. You changed my life for the better.

I hope you knew that.

-C.L.