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Letter to a Friend
Please, oh please, let me write. Knowing that you won't read this actually makes things better – I don't have to worry about anyone reading between my lines and misinterpreting them. This will be a pretty straightforward letter, though. You would be able to understand it. Unlike last time.
I guess I should start by saying "hi". How are you doing, really? It's been months since we last talked... and at least a year since we really talked. It seems like centuries since we last laughed together.
Yes, I know this is unexpected, and I know what this looks like. I want to clarify this before anything else. I don't like you anymore, in that way. If what I felt for you could be called love, then I don't love you anymore. For ages. Since you left. That was one year ago. In the appropriate state of mind, one year can be called "ages".
This letter won't go like the its predecessors. Yes, there's a plural there. Before the first letter I wrote you, there was another one, to somebody else. Surprise, surprise. But I'll let you wonder about the intentions of that mysterious first letter of all. Love or hatred? Passion or friendship? Stupid teenage hormones or something real?
Yes, these were also the doubts of our own relationship. Too bad you never cared.
Do you remember the first letter I wrote you? One year ago, just after you embarked for a 6-month trip to Germany? I must confess something about that. It really wasn't my idea. It was the idea of a friend of mine. You remember her, she was the one who actually gave you the letter.
Do you actually remember what was written in it? I admit, I don't. I really don't remember what I wrote you. he only thing I remember about the contents of the letter is that, when I let my friend (that same one) read it, she told me she'd cry if she was the one receiving the letter. I felt awkwardly proud of that.
It was funny, though. I felt the need to send you a couple of presents with the letter. You surely remember them. A 4cc bottle of absinth, and a drawing. Of yourself. The one you had asked me to do, long before that time. I did, and sent you.
You were just starting your exchange student carrier in Germany, and I was here at home. I still remember your answer through the computer, though.
You said, "Thanks for the gifts. You really know my taste for spirits well!"
I thought, of course I do. Show me one regular teenage Brazilian lady without a taste for anything more than half made of alcohol, and I show you a billion-to-one chance.
You said, "Thanks for the drawing. It was really creative of you."
And I thought, oh yeah?! "Very creative of you"? You never talked like that, you'll start talking like that just now? Come on. If you didn't like it, send it back. It was one of my best jobs.
You said, "About the letter... I didn't understand it! You explain it to me, bit by bit!"
And then I thought, told ya. I really knew you wouldn't understand. It was one of the reasons that made me write it like that. You were never too bright, girl. That letter was too much for you. And I, silly me, made the mistake of answering you. Through the computer. I really explained the letter on the internet.
After that, we wouldn't talk again for at least 8 months or so.
People think differently, but it was not until late 2006 that I started liking you. Yeah, we knew each other for almost 2 years before I even started having feelings. I hate that "love-at-first-sight" thing. I hate cliches.
Even though you always had a terrible taste for men, even though you seemed to settle for anyone who remotely liked you, I could never win one point with you, could I? It reminded me of something I heard long ago, "women don't like men who like them too much". I liked you a lot. Too much, perhaps. And that's why I never managed to feel the touch of your lips on mine.
We learn something out of each rock we stumble upon on our path, and I learned a lot of things from you.
Never enter "friend zone."
Don't give her a chance to reflect on you.
Remain mysterious: don't open up.
If I hadn't respected you, if I hadn't given you the chance to think – and thus become more entangled in your own confusion – then, maybe, I could have had you. Maybe. Too late for that, now.
Every time I tried winning you over to me, I failed epically. You must remember. These were all nights you stayed with someone else.
No point whining about it, now.
So, our relationship was the typical un-corresponded love? Boy like girl, girl ignores boy? No. As I said, I hate cliches. Cliches don't happen to me.
In the cliche, the boy always gets the girl in the end.
I could go and say you were a typical little biznatch. A girl who knows the boy likes her, but stays friends with him nonetheless – gives the boy hope. And the hope builds up, and the boy finds out the girl isn't interested, and the boy collapses. All the girl's fault.
But that'd be another cliche. Cliches don't happen to me.
I blamed it on me. "I didn't do it right," I'd tell myself. "I didn't try hard enough." It's funny, how you can use that excuse for anything.
And I kept trying. Harder and harder. Always failing in the most humiliating and excruciating ways, always telling myself to try harder.
"I'm not trying hard enough! Everything's possible if you try hard enough!"
Foolish dream.
I did try hard enough. Oh, I tried so hard. But you know what? In the end, it doesn't even matter.
Oh yes, I'm quoting Linkin Park. That's another thing you never knew and will never know about me: I love Linkin Park. It's one of the few bands I really like and not just listen to. You don't care, do you? I thought so.
Usually, I state the purpose of my long letters right away. This time, I left it for the end. I'm writing this letter because I can't remember your face.
It's true. No matter how hard I try, I can't remember your face for the hell of it. I remember how it felt like to look at you, back in the day, but not the exact lines of your face. It's true that we have only seen each other no more than 10 times this past year, but I think I can't remember you because I was able to forget you. You mean so little to me now, I can't even remember your face!
And you mean so much that I'm writing you a letter.
The real reason for me to write this is because I saw your face in a dream last night.
No, I still can't remember your face exactly... but I woke up knowing that I had seen it in my dream. I have no idea what the dream was about... but your face stealthily sneaked in it. It's the only thing I remember.
How the subconscious parts of the brain work is a mystery, but it seems you still lurk in mine.
I still want to see the drawing I made of you again. It was my last big drawing, you know. I'm even curious to know what you did with it. Even if it was hanging on the wall of your bedroom in a frame, I probably still wouldn't care much.
This time, I won't apologize for stealing your time.
Because this was spontaneous and not a dumb planned letter like the ones before.
If it's confusing or you don't understand it, I don't care. Even more so because you'll never read it.
I love you, girl.
– You know who
Last edited by TheGnasher on January 3rd, 2008, 12:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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