[STORY] The Letter

The Letter

By Angelique Roux

I did not mind helping my mom out with her letters. I even attempt to reply to some of them with the experience and knowledge I have gathered through seventeen years. The only thing that came to bore me was the countless pink or red boyfriend issues.

It’s been almost a year now, but when it comes to losing the one you love to a car crash, time seems like an irrelevant factor.

“All wounds heal,” I signed off the reply to another purple on pink letter from a heartbroken thirteen-year-old. Sighing, I stood and stretched my legs. It was getting late. The sun burned the horizon, merging with the cold sea. In my appreciation, I caught a glimpse of something in the corner of my eye.

A letter.

I picked it up from the floor where the breeze must have knocked it from the desk. The silver envelope shone white-gold in the last rays of daylight. Switching on the light, I opened it curiously. There was no address. It must have been delivered by hand. The hand-writing was rough, but not rushed, in silver in on sky-blue paper.

I plunged right in.

“To my dear angel”

I frowned, maybe my mother had an admirer. I fought a smile and proceeded eagerly.

“The day I saw you, ten years ago, I knew I found an angel. Your hair seemed to lend the sun its glow and your smile warmed hearts.

That selfsame day I asked you where you kept your wings. The question was so innocent and naïve – much like we both were back then. I wonder if you can remember. Your cheeks turned bashfully rosy as your sad, lonely eyes lit up. Those starry eyes that captured my soul in their warm embrace, are engraved in the back of my eyelids for eternity. If only they could see me now. I wish I had a choice… Well, don’t let me get carried away.

“Every time I think of you, my heart smiles with a tear. Every night I watch you sleep, staring when your face become’s like a child’s. I’m sorry, I know it’s rude to stare, but that is all I can do. I wish you knew I was there. I see you weep over photos of us and I embrace your shoulders lightly to keep you close.”

By then I have forgotten it was a letter and considered it to be more of an extract of some fantasy novel that hooked my eyes to the little glyphs in the dreamy blue paper like a drug.

“The moon looks like a sleeping pill that I dream to reach, but even that will never soothe this restlessness. This must be the worst pain – to touch you, to be with you without your knowing. I have to remind myself constantly of your ignorance. Maybe it is better this way. I wonder what you would say to what I have become.

“I look up at the stars, but I dare not question their ways. I cringe, like a timid fo, as the coldness of your unresponsive presence claws at my insides.

“I wish I could take your hand and run. Then we’d spread our wings and taste the sky. Freedom – one of the many things I miss so dearly. I want the freedom to feel your warm skin; to indulge in your subtle honey-peach scent; to trace the soft contours of your sun-kissed face; to brush your cherry lips with mine and lose myself in those sapphire moons…

“I curse the spaces between my fingers where yours once fit in perfectly, and hate the hard air that fills the circle in my arms where your body once have been. I recall the days I held you to my chest and never wanted to let go. I remember our chats – light-hearted, but sincere – and our quarrels that always came to be unnecessary.

“I would have brought you breakfast in bed: sunny-side-up eggs, toast and crispy bacon – the way you liked it. I would pamper you and I would spend every waking second with you if I was given another go at life. If I could go back in time I would erase all our fights, so that you had only good memories to remember me by.

“If only I could let you go. If only you could forget and move on and be happy and be strong. If only I had said goodbye sooner, but I had to let you know…

“I’ll always love you, Shelby.”

Pain clutched me in its poisonous clasp and drained the blood from my face as I read his name in a faltering whisper: “David.”

It has been almost a year…