Jack Stewart
4503 Carson Avenue
Mason, Missouri, 63000
filler!
Dear Jack,
Do you
remember all the time
we sat around being stupid
for no reason and we would
laugh at ourselves and at
everything else,
not caring about or even thinking about the
things we were supposed to
be doing,
we were so busy
enjoying each other’s
company?
I’m not sure when
you changed or even why,
what shifted in your head,
or your chemistry,
or whatever,
that made you change. It’s like
one day I had you and the next
I had your shell,
your memories, the bits and pieces
that were you once
but all of a
sudden were more like
corpses in my hands. I
promise I
cried when it all went down
the drain, when you
stopped answering my
calls and responding to
my letters, when
you left me, gave me the cold shoulder, like we
never had anything.
filler!
You had really been leaving
me for a long time,
you turned into a ghost before my very eyes and
I didn’t even notice. I
didn’t notice when you grew
white like a sheet and
started fading into the air,
but now, you’re
full-on invisibility cloak and
it’s too late for me to
stop the process, to
pick up the broken pieces and
glue them back together,
because I made a mistake
by loosening my grip when
you started to slink away.
filler!
I always wonder
if I could have
fixed things by
holding tighter and
refusing to drop the amazing, fragile thing
we had.
If I had only realized that
you were wriggling towards
the light, and that
in your eyes, I
was the dark, then maybe
the wounds could have
healed before they were sunk all the way,
before the bleeding
became fatal and
before the glass piercing the skin
was too deep to come out.
filler!
Do you remember the
promises you made
me? I know that
you have a strong recollection
of the ones I made to
you, the ones I didn’t just break, the ones
I shattered, the ones
you brought up time
and time again. But
you never acknowledged or even
apologized for
the promises you made
that were empty when
you made them, that
you tossed on the ground
and ripped apart with
your bare hands,
like what you did to me
when you left,
like what you did when you discarded
me at the side of the
road like a cigarette butt or
a straw from McDonald’s,
like that was
all that I was worth,
like that’s all the humanity you saw in me.
filler!
I suppose this is a letter, Jack,
to say I’m sorry,
and say that I hope
you’re sorry, too.
Because every day
I wither a little more,
because there is a gaping hole
where there should be you.
I look the same,
but on the inside I
have nothing, like
a Barbie doll, I am hollow,
made of 100% outside.
The outside was all you ever
seemed to care
about, though, and once
you were through with that part of me
you pushed it away
like the rest didn’t
matter at all.
filler!
So, this is it, Jack.
This is the last
bundle of words
that you will get
from me,
this is the last time I’m going to try to explain how hurt I am,
how dejected, and this is the last time
I will ever think that
there’s a way to
talk sense into you, and I can
assure you of that much,
because I know you’ll just recycle this letter and
get back to whatever you were doing,
like chopping carrots, or watching
reruns of Friends like we
used to on Fridays, or maybe
making out with your
shiny new girlfriend who
isn’t looking for commitment yet.
This is the end, el fin,
no more once upon a time
or fairy tales or happily ever after,
no more movie nights or
little play fights about who will buy the popcorn or
holding hands and swinging them,
no more us,
no more Jack.
It hurts to say goodbye like this, not
seeing your eyes when I say it or
getting a goodbye kiss, but it
had to be
done like
this because
you’ve changed your number
and you’ve moved very, very
far away. Just
know that every day I
wake up and I’m
less alive, that
it will be a long time until I’m
whole again, that
even after I think I’ve
moved on, there will
still be a little part of me that
remembers you and
blocks out everyone else,
that someday I will
move on for real, and with someone
great, and then I’ll
be happy, that I hate
needing someone,that
I hate myself, that
I hate being told I’m loved when I’m not.
filler!
This is it, Jack.
Have a nice life.
filler!
Yours truly,
Olivia
mikkiaaron 