mcfly-slash .. Realisation
*coughs* yes, i am still ill. and i've just gotten out of work because spare me, i can't be ill at the moment, especially not at work.
but but but i'll see jared leto again on monday so i am not bothered at all! i've been missing the man since i haven't seen him for a whole week already, lol.
and i think my birthday is pretty much saved.
oh .. and i've wrote the sequel to "the hardest part of this is leaving you". the idea was too good .. i couldn't have not used it. so here goes. oh .. a wee surprise at the bottom of the page ;)
Title: Realisation
Author: me
Rating: PG
Chapter: 1/1 … Standalone
Genre: Drama
Pairing: PoynterJudd
Summary: Dougie reads the letter that was left for him.
Disclaimer: nope, still not true
Dedication: my Cazzabum and those who read the previous part … kirstini, stfoosa, ktandtf4life and ichnal
Author’s note: This is the effort of a sequel to "The hardest part of this is leaving you". Written from Dougie’s POV as he reads the letter that Harry had left for him.
The hardest part of this is leaving you.
===
God, I have no idea how many times I’ve already read that. And it still hurts as much as it did for the first time a few hours ago.
===
It’s almost noon when I wake up. I keep my eyes closed but let my arm wander over to the other side of my bed to rest on him, like I always do after waking up.
Only, this time, he’s not there.
I am wide awake in an instant. He isn’t there and from what I can tell by the coldness of the sheets, he left a while ago.
I listen up to maybe hear the shower running or some sounds from the other parts of the flat. Nothing. It’s dead silent.
I sit up and that’s when I see it. An envelope with my name written on it in his neat handwriting. I finger for my glasses on the bedside table, put them on and take the letter out of the envelope.
===
Morning,
sorry that all you’ll find is this one. You know I would’ve stayed if I could. But I couldn’t.
I don’t know whether it’s clever to say this right now but you won’t like how this thing here goes on. You won’t like it one bit. You’ll probably read this through to the end because curiousity once more got the best of you. But I can assure you that, as soon as you’ve finished reading, you’ll wish you would’ve stopped right here.
===
Oh god, I really don’t like the sound of this. I can immediately tell that, whatever is there to come, it won’t be good. I contemplate to read on even further. And I do. I figure that I will sooner or later enough find out what this is about anyway, so why wait?
I fold the letter and put it back in its envelope. At least I need some coffee. I can’t read that on an empty stomach. I trudge down into the kitchen and make me a cup. I also prepare me a bowl of cereal.
When my breakfast is done and ready for me I sit down, getting the letter out again.
===
God, this is so much harder than I thought it would be. And that’s me thinking that a letter would be the best way to tell you. You know, to save me from the look on your face. But I know you like no one else does. Actually, I know you so well, I already see your questioning face expression while you’re reading this right in front of my eye. I can see it already and I haven’t even gotten to the bad part yet.
So, I should get it out finally, eh? Like pulling off a plaster, quick and as painless as possible. But you know what? When you pull off a plaster quickly it might be painless at first but you always find yourself shuddering just thinking about the way your skin stung when you pulled it off. So, the quick way might be the painless one but it leaves you with unpleasant memories of it.
But then, the slow way is just as cruel. The pain just doesn’t seem to stop, stretches on forever. And it also leaves you with unpleasant memories, the knowlegde that you feel just as uncomfortable as you did when you pulled the plaster off quickly.
I’m thinking, is there even a good way to pull off a plaster?
===
What is this guy on? What is he talking about plasters and the ways to pull them off? Doesn’t he have anything better to do than put so much thought into it? He really needs a hobby … or more time with me to save him from thinking about stuff like that.
Though I must say, he has a point there. No matter what you’ll do, there isn’t a good way to do it, pull a plaster off.
But then, what does this have to do with anything? I don’t get it, just as he knew I wouldn’t.
But even though I don’t fully understand what he’s on about, I still don’t like the whole sound of that letter. Again, I think about just not reading on but I can’t do it. I take a sip of my coffee and continue reading.
===
I know, I’m rambling. I tend to do that when I’m nervous, but you know that of course. I forgot that, not only I know you better than anyone else, you also know me better than anyone else. I think you know me even better than I know myself.
I bet you already know what I’m trying to tell you here. You have that weird feeling in the pit of your stomach that this isn’t gonna end pretty. You’ve always been good at sensing things. People might think of you as the slightly stupid and immature guy but they have no idea. They have no idea that all you need is one look and you can immediately tell what is going on in other people’s heads.
===
No, I actually don’t know what he is trying to say. Yes, I do know that it will not end good but I have absolutely no clue what he is trying to tell me.
But the fact that he is indeed rambling, I catch that. I imagine what it would have been like if he told all that to my face. It would have taken him three days I suppose, always switching the subject and talking about anything but the topic at hand. I can’t help but laugh slightly as I imagine how this conversation would have been.
I have to admit, by now I actually am curious about how this will continue. Or well, it’s a weird feeling. Call it morbid curiosity maybe. You know, like, when you walk down a street where there’s been an accident. You know that there might be loads of blood and other ugly things but you can’t help yourself, you just have to look.
That is what I feel. I know deep inside of me it will be painful but I still keep reading.
===
This is it.
===
Okay, what is what?
This just doesn’t make sense. I mean, at first there’s him talking about inane things like plasters and suddenly this is supposedly ‘it’?
He really doesn’t mean for me to see through all of this after I’ve just woken up, did he? He knows me, as he had already said, so he knows that my brain just doesn’t function for the first hour after I’ve woken up. He can’t expect me to see through all his babbling.
===
Okay, so that might seemed easy. Sure, when you read it, it’s just three words. But you have no idea how hard it was for me to write those three words down.
They’re so final. Putting an end to everything.
===
Hold on … end? When did we start talking about ‘putting an end to everything’, what did I miss out?
What does he want to end?
Oh god, he surely doesn’t mean his life, I hope. But that isn’t a thing he would do, not in a million years. He never had a reason to anyway. He has a good job, a loving family, great friends (though, I have to admit, this guy he knows, Danny, he can drive you to the edge of suicide sometimes because he is well insane and he just does not shut up, never!). He has everything he had ever wanted. So no, this definetely isn’t a suicide note.
He can’t mean him and me either. Just … no way. We are both happy in our relationship. Happier than happy. There is no need to end it. Sure, there still is that bitter taste to it since he technically is in a relationship already but …
Hold on.
I think I am a genius.
Does he mean to end things with his girlfriend finally? Let’s face it, he stopped loving her long ago. I think she did as well, only used him as a human sextoy or whatever. I mean, fair enough. I knew how it was to have sex with him, I wouldn’t want to live without it either.
But then, if he is ending things with her, why did he write me a letter? He should have written it to her and not to me. She is the one to be left.
Or isn’t she?
With a mixture of anxiety and excitement I keep on reading, turning the page.
===
I’m sorry for ending it. You know I don’t want to. Every piece of me is against it. Or well, almost every piece of me.
There’s this thing called ‘better judgement’. And that’s the only part of me that has to make me end it, made me take this final step.
I have to stay with her. I don’t want to but I have to.
===
Wait a second.
Stay with her? With HER?
He is going to stay with that woman? Why for heaven’s sake?
Ever since we met he kept telling me that he was getting the feeling that she was using him (which she probably did) and taking advantage of the fact that he came from a wealthy family. He kept complaining how he always felt taken for granted by her and all.
And he is staying with her?
Oh no.
If he is staying with her that indeed means that …
He is leaving me.
But he doesn’t want to. He said it himself, he doesn’t want to at all.
His parents! Yes, it must be them. They must have found out about our relationship and then they forced him to end it. Probably threatened to disown him or erase him from the family alltogether. From what he told me, his family is keen on traditions and all so that wouldn’t surprise me much. I bet his father gave him a proper talk about it and told him to get rid off me because otherwise he would take care of it. Old mafia-style or something.
But then, he wouldn’t let anyone put him into this situation. Sure, he loves his family but he always made it clear that there was them on one hand, and him and his life on the other hand. He has done things in the past that had upset them but nothing ever happened.
He actually has an exessive history of ‘mistakes’. He has piercings and tattoos (his first almost gave his poor mother a heart attack) and he had told me about the numerous times of when he got detention while he was on boarding school. His parents surely weren’t happy about any of that but they never stayed mad for too long. Even when he left them to have a life without their money and all, they didn’t stop him from it. They welcomed his independence, even.
He also told me that his family never liked his girlfriend much. She never had the best manners whereas they were quite posh.
Okay, so if his parents aren’t the problem …
What is?
===
She’s pregnant.
===
At that point I make a little mess on my kitchen table. I was just about to raise a spoon-full of cereal in milk to my mouth. But then I read that and drop the spoon right back into the bowl sending splutters of milk all over the table.
He cannot be serious!
How the fuck did she get pregnant?
Okay, I know how to get pregnant but I mean … how?
He’s not stupid, he knows what to do to not have babies.
So, this whole pregnancy-thing must have been an accident. Like, I don’t know, a ripped condom or whatever.
Or maybe she is on birth control. From the way he described her moods she surely is. And then she forgot about it, slept with him and ended up pregnant.
And honestly, from what I’ve heard about her, chances are that the baby isn’t even his. Maybe she got knocked up by some guy from her weird surroundings. And then she figured that it’d be quite stupid to have some loser taking care for her child when she had him who had the money and the backround to do it.
No, I know what the reason is. She knows about me and him. And that is her way to keep him. By now she is used to have him around, pay for her stuff. And she was sensing him slipping away from her so she had to do something to tie him to her.
Stupid selfish bitch she is!
===
Yea, I can’t even grasp it fully myself yet.
===
That makes two of us then. But I think he has other reasons than me.
I bet it was a great shock to him when she told him he would be a father in a bit.
He doesn’t want an own family. Not just yet anyway. Sure, he had been talking about having one in the future. He loved the idea of adopting a baby to give it a better life with a partner he loved (which would have been me, by the way). But he also always pointed out that there would be some years passing by until he would actually do it.
And now, there he is, soon to be a dad. Now he has to worry about so much more than whether he wanted curry or pasta for dinner.
So, I guess I really am the one that’s left in this scenario. And I’m not left for another man, nor this stupid woman. I am left for a baby, someone who isn’t even born yet.
He is right, I don’t like this, I don’t like this at all.
I sigh and feel tears coming up. I blink them away before I keep on reading awaiting what is there to come, how long this goodbye will drag on, what else he will tell me.
===
She’s not overly happy about it either. But she made the choice to keep it. She’s a good person, she couldn’t kill a human being that isn’t even capable of defending itself.
And I am going to stay with her, give this child a family.
I can’t leave her with the responsibility of taking care of something, someone, that I created with her. She needs someone by her side, someone to help her. It’s my responsibility to be that someone.
It’s my responsibility to stay with her and the baby. I couldn’t cope with the fact that I brought a new life into this world but not properly taking care of it. So many kids have to live without a proper family, a mum and a dad, I would never want my child to be another one of them.
===
Mind if I laugh? What suddenly makes her a good person? Okay yes, you have to give it to her that she won’t get the baby … well … removed, but that’s all I guess.
However, he reacts just like I think he would have.
No matter if she planned it or not, but he’s doing right what I expect him to do. He stays with her, not because of her, but because of the baby.
He told me about many nights when he was laid on his bed at boarding school, missing his family so much. And I can understand it. He was a kid and he never had his family around. Until my late teenage-days, I wouldn’t have made three days without my mum either.
But there’s one thing I don’t get. He doesn’t want his baby to grow up without a mum and a dad. But I don’t see the problem in it.
I mean, I never knew my dad, he left when I was too young to keep any memories of him. All my life there’s been just my mum. Sure, my grandparents and uncles and aunts were there too but I never had a real dad. Of course, when I was young I always wondered what had happened and why my dad didn’t like me but as I grew up I learned to live with it. And I learnt that it never was my fault, but his.
And it wouldn’t be like his baby wouldn’t have a dad. He could always go visit them. Hello, his girlfriend would have insisted on him taking part (she needed the money after all). Yes, he wouldn’t be around permanently but the most important thing was that he would be around at all.
So, he knows from knowing me that it isn’t the worst thing in the world to grow up with just one parent. Why is he making such a big deal out of it? Why does he forget about his own happiness? Doesn’t he think about that, with him being unhappy, his child might be unhappy as well?
===
I know you’ll understand me. Maybe not now, maybe not later today, maybe not tomorrow, not next week, next month or next year.
But I know that one day, eventually, you will understand me.
You will understand that there was no other way than to leave. Stuff my life into my car and leave this town with the people who will soon be my very own family.
You will understand that there was no way I could have stayed here. Here, where everything brings back memories of you, of us. Here, where I know you still are, always being tempted to come back to you and hurt you all over again.
===
The fuck I will understand! I don’t understand it now and I never will!
He’s actually a coward. Does he really believe that it’s better to not just leave me, but the city as well? Does he think that the memories of me and what we had will vanish as soon as he passes the city limits?
How stupid is he really?
Angrily I fold the letter back up and toss it to the side. I get up from the table and grab a towel to wipe the milk of the table. I wipe forcefully, as if trying to get rid off some waterproof pen and not a few droplets of milk, in the process always throwing angry glances at the folded pieces of paper.
“You’re an idiot!” I keep saying to the pages, seeing him behind them, “You’re a stupid, silly coward!”
I fall back onto my chair, taking another sip of my coffee, my gaze never breaking from the letter. I stare at it intensly, hoping to change what he is saying with the power of my thoughts.
I highly doubt that whatever else he has to say will hurt me more than those words I already read but I still find myself reaching for the letter again, opening it and looking for where I stopped reading.
===
I wish that you could hate me. I really wish you could, but I know you can’t, you won’t be able to. Even though I put you through all the pain you will not be able to hate me. Simply because you are the person you are, the person who I got to love so much that it physically hurt sometimes.
I hate myself actually. I hate myself for letting you fall in love with me. I hate myself for putting you through all of this. I hate myself for going to make you cry many times in the following days.
===
This is the first thing I’ve been reading that is absolutely true to the point.
I don’t hate him. Even though what he did was stupid and of no sense, and he surely deserved to be hated for that, I couldn’t bring myself to actually hate him.
In fact, now that everything is supposedly over, I come to realise how much I actually love him. I suddenly discover a side of him that I never saw in all the time I’ve known him. That new aspect of him completes the picture I have of him. It’s like a missing piece of a puzzle, only I never noticed it was actually missing. But it makes him whole.
I don’t want him to hate himself. Not for me falling in love with him. It needs two people to that after all. I knew what I was getting myself into when I started messing around with him at first. And I knew what I was getting myself into when I told him for the first time that I loved him.
I don’t want him to hate himself. Not for anything he did. Because, honestly, it was as much my fault as his.
Sure, he could have left his girlfriend but then again, I could have left him as well, saving me from all this. I had just been too wrapped up in my feelings for him and in the feelings he had for me, or maybe still has. I was too in love to think logically and do what would have been the best for the both of us.
===
But I will never, never ever, hate myself for loving you. Loving you was the best thing I ever did in my whole life. And that it will always be. I will never regret loving you, same as I will never stop loving you.
===
I am getting angry again.
Have I mentioned he’s an idiot?
Because really, he could have shoved this paragraph up his arse, for all I care.
If he really loves me that much, why the fuck does he have to leave? Why doesn’t he even look for a solution for this? Why doesn’t he talk about it with me? Why did he write this bloody letter and doesn’t even have the guts to wait until I read it? Why is he leaving me like that, on a mountain of questions which will never be answered?
I am this close to grab this damn letter and hold it into the flame of the stove. Burn it before I even get to finish reading it.
In fact, I am standing at the stove, fighting to light a match, when the next sentence makes me stop.
I put the match down and against any better judgement, keep standing there, reading.
===
I am going to miss you so much.
===
At this, a first tear slowly slides down my cheek. I can’t really explain why it comes now. He told me he’s leaving, he told me he’s going to start a family with someone else, he told me he loved me.
Nothing of it made me cry. Sure, brought me close to tears, but still not close enough.
But reading that he is going to miss me, that actually makes me cry.
It’s like … now I can actually see how hard it is for him. What he is going through upon making this decision. He does realise how hard it will be for him, no matter where he will be.
===
I will miss the mess that you call hairstyle.
I will miss the blue of your eyes.
I will miss your cheeky grin.
I will miss your loving smile.
I will miss the sound of your voice.
I will miss the softness of your lips.
I will miss every curve of your body.
I will miss the sound of your breathing mixed with your heartbeat that always brought me to sleep.
I will miss the fun we had.
I will miss talking to you about nothing.
===
I let the letter sink down, careful to not let my tears drop onto it and wipe away the words.
No, this definetely is not easy for him.
I feel actually bad for calling him a coward and idiot earlier.
And I am going to miss him too.
===
I will miss everything that made you the love of my life.
===
God, why does he have to make it so hard? He can’t just call me the love of his life, for the first time ever, in a letter that is a goodbye to me and to our relationship.
This is just not fair. It simply is not!
I lean against the counter, slowly sliding down until I am sitting on the cold kitchen floor. The match and the desire to burn the letter already forgotten. I can’t burn it, not the last thing I have left from him.
I have reached the bottom of the page again so I take a deep breath to calm myself and stop the tears before switching to the next, the third page.
===
This is the hardest thing that I ever had to do.
I had to deal with family members passing away. I had to deal with years on boarding school away from home. I had to deal with learning to drive. I had to deal with building up an own life without always running to my parents’ for help.
All of this has been a walk in the park, a piece of cake, compared to writing this letter.
===
Finally, he admits it.
And I know this is hard for him.
He likes to appear as the strong one, the one who never gets affected by anything, the one who doesn’t let anything get him down, only coming out more confident.
For the first time ever he is showing that he isn’t that strong, that he is vulnerable.
===
I think this is the hardest challenge that life has set for the both of us. It challenges us to give up on our love, to give up on us. It challenges us to let go and move on.
===
And that is just him for you as well.
He refuses to believe that any of this happens without a reason. In his mind, all of this is meant to show us something, that we have to learn our lessons from it.
What lessons?
I don’t know, I’ve never truly believed in this theory. When something happened, I always saw it as bad luck or good luck or whatever. It was just … something. Fate. Karma.
He is the one who truly believes that life is just one big test for us, that we have to learn our lessons from pretty much everything.
And apparently, this is another ‘challenge’ that life had set out for us. It challenges us to be without each other.
Frankly, I wouldn’t mind to fail that challenge.
===
I have taken the first step by writing this. I have accepted the first part of this challenge. I don’t know if I’ve accomplished it but I have accepted it and did what I had to do.
===
Can’t he just stop being so damn responsible all the time?
I can’t say if he accomplished his mission. Is his mission to leave me? Then yes, he did accomplish it.
But when I look at the thing as a whole, I think he did the wrong thing. Sure, he learned his lesson but maybe …
Did he learn the wrong one?
===
But now I am confronted with the second part of the challenge. And here we are back to the plaster that’s being pulled off.
We are at the part where you will always shudder at the memory this moment brings with itself.
This is the part that I’ve been trying to avoid, trying to postpone. Push it away from me for as long as I could.
This is the part that will always make me shudder when I am reminded of this, which will be each and every day in the future.
===
Apparently, we’re not at the end of it, eh?
He thinks there’s even more to do. And I have the feeling that we’re now getting to really ugly part of this.
Do I want to read on?
I don’t know.
A part of me wants to, wants to read what else there possibly is to say.
But another part of me wants to take that letter and put it far away, in the furthest corner I can find in here. Where it can stay and I can take it and read the rest whenever I will be ready to do so.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready to read the rest, though. I surely not am right now but when will I be? Will I be eventually?
If I won’t, I will never get to find out what his last words were, I will never get to find out if he told me one last time that he loved me.
===
This is the part where I am finishing.
For real.
No return, no coming back.
The final.
The end.
===
So, this is ‘it’, then.
It’s weird how words, that we use every day in every possible context, can suddenly mean so much, be so hurting.
It hurts to no end to actually read it.
This is the first time in the whole letter that he says that he’s leaving me. He said he was going to stay with his girlfriend and the baby, yes. He said he will leave the city, yes.
But until now he didn’t say that he was leaving me.
Sure, I knew that this letter was about nothing else but that actual fact but now that I read it …
Now it sinks in.
There’s just one last line to go. And I can barely read it. Tears are clouding my vision. I’ve taken off my glasses long ago as well which doesn’t help either.
I force myself to get a grip one final time, preparing myself to get to the real end.
===
The hardest part of this is leaving you.
===
I honestly don’t think it is.
The hardest part will be waking up one day, realisation setting in.
I will realise that I won’t have him by my side, ever again.
And he will realise that he won’t have me by his side ever again, either.
And realising that will be the hardest part of this.
The End
Comments are appreciated.
A/N 2: I've decided to turn this into a little trilogy which means there is another sequel coming up which will basically be the actual sequel since this is just the same story as the first one just from a different view and .. yea, i'm rambling, thank you very much.
PoynterJudd Standalone
but but but i'll see jared leto again on monday so i am not bothered at all! i've been missing the man since i haven't seen him for a whole week already, lol.
and i think my birthday is pretty much saved.
oh .. and i've wrote the sequel to "the hardest part of this is leaving you". the idea was too good .. i couldn't have not used it. so here goes. oh .. a wee surprise at the bottom of the page ;)
Title: Realisation
Author: me
Rating: PG
Chapter: 1/1 … Standalone
Genre: Drama
Pairing: PoynterJudd
Summary: Dougie reads the letter that was left for him.
Disclaimer: nope, still not true
Dedication: my Cazzabum and those who read the previous part … kirstini, stfoosa, ktandtf4life and ichnal
Author’s note: This is the effort of a sequel to "The hardest part of this is leaving you". Written from Dougie’s POV as he reads the letter that Harry had left for him.
The hardest part of this is leaving you.
===
God, I have no idea how many times I’ve already read that. And it still hurts as much as it did for the first time a few hours ago.
===
It’s almost noon when I wake up. I keep my eyes closed but let my arm wander over to the other side of my bed to rest on him, like I always do after waking up.
Only, this time, he’s not there.
I am wide awake in an instant. He isn’t there and from what I can tell by the coldness of the sheets, he left a while ago.
I listen up to maybe hear the shower running or some sounds from the other parts of the flat. Nothing. It’s dead silent.
I sit up and that’s when I see it. An envelope with my name written on it in his neat handwriting. I finger for my glasses on the bedside table, put them on and take the letter out of the envelope.
===
Morning,
sorry that all you’ll find is this one. You know I would’ve stayed if I could. But I couldn’t.
I don’t know whether it’s clever to say this right now but you won’t like how this thing here goes on. You won’t like it one bit. You’ll probably read this through to the end because curiousity once more got the best of you. But I can assure you that, as soon as you’ve finished reading, you’ll wish you would’ve stopped right here.
===
Oh god, I really don’t like the sound of this. I can immediately tell that, whatever is there to come, it won’t be good. I contemplate to read on even further. And I do. I figure that I will sooner or later enough find out what this is about anyway, so why wait?
I fold the letter and put it back in its envelope. At least I need some coffee. I can’t read that on an empty stomach. I trudge down into the kitchen and make me a cup. I also prepare me a bowl of cereal.
When my breakfast is done and ready for me I sit down, getting the letter out again.
===
God, this is so much harder than I thought it would be. And that’s me thinking that a letter would be the best way to tell you. You know, to save me from the look on your face. But I know you like no one else does. Actually, I know you so well, I already see your questioning face expression while you’re reading this right in front of my eye. I can see it already and I haven’t even gotten to the bad part yet.
So, I should get it out finally, eh? Like pulling off a plaster, quick and as painless as possible. But you know what? When you pull off a plaster quickly it might be painless at first but you always find yourself shuddering just thinking about the way your skin stung when you pulled it off. So, the quick way might be the painless one but it leaves you with unpleasant memories of it.
But then, the slow way is just as cruel. The pain just doesn’t seem to stop, stretches on forever. And it also leaves you with unpleasant memories, the knowlegde that you feel just as uncomfortable as you did when you pulled the plaster off quickly.
I’m thinking, is there even a good way to pull off a plaster?
===
What is this guy on? What is he talking about plasters and the ways to pull them off? Doesn’t he have anything better to do than put so much thought into it? He really needs a hobby … or more time with me to save him from thinking about stuff like that.
Though I must say, he has a point there. No matter what you’ll do, there isn’t a good way to do it, pull a plaster off.
But then, what does this have to do with anything? I don’t get it, just as he knew I wouldn’t.
But even though I don’t fully understand what he’s on about, I still don’t like the whole sound of that letter. Again, I think about just not reading on but I can’t do it. I take a sip of my coffee and continue reading.
===
I know, I’m rambling. I tend to do that when I’m nervous, but you know that of course. I forgot that, not only I know you better than anyone else, you also know me better than anyone else. I think you know me even better than I know myself.
I bet you already know what I’m trying to tell you here. You have that weird feeling in the pit of your stomach that this isn’t gonna end pretty. You’ve always been good at sensing things. People might think of you as the slightly stupid and immature guy but they have no idea. They have no idea that all you need is one look and you can immediately tell what is going on in other people’s heads.
===
No, I actually don’t know what he is trying to say. Yes, I do know that it will not end good but I have absolutely no clue what he is trying to tell me.
But the fact that he is indeed rambling, I catch that. I imagine what it would have been like if he told all that to my face. It would have taken him three days I suppose, always switching the subject and talking about anything but the topic at hand. I can’t help but laugh slightly as I imagine how this conversation would have been.
I have to admit, by now I actually am curious about how this will continue. Or well, it’s a weird feeling. Call it morbid curiosity maybe. You know, like, when you walk down a street where there’s been an accident. You know that there might be loads of blood and other ugly things but you can’t help yourself, you just have to look.
That is what I feel. I know deep inside of me it will be painful but I still keep reading.
===
This is it.
===
Okay, what is what?
This just doesn’t make sense. I mean, at first there’s him talking about inane things like plasters and suddenly this is supposedly ‘it’?
He really doesn’t mean for me to see through all of this after I’ve just woken up, did he? He knows me, as he had already said, so he knows that my brain just doesn’t function for the first hour after I’ve woken up. He can’t expect me to see through all his babbling.
===
Okay, so that might seemed easy. Sure, when you read it, it’s just three words. But you have no idea how hard it was for me to write those three words down.
They’re so final. Putting an end to everything.
===
Hold on … end? When did we start talking about ‘putting an end to everything’, what did I miss out?
What does he want to end?
Oh god, he surely doesn’t mean his life, I hope. But that isn’t a thing he would do, not in a million years. He never had a reason to anyway. He has a good job, a loving family, great friends (though, I have to admit, this guy he knows, Danny, he can drive you to the edge of suicide sometimes because he is well insane and he just does not shut up, never!). He has everything he had ever wanted. So no, this definetely isn’t a suicide note.
He can’t mean him and me either. Just … no way. We are both happy in our relationship. Happier than happy. There is no need to end it. Sure, there still is that bitter taste to it since he technically is in a relationship already but …
Hold on.
I think I am a genius.
Does he mean to end things with his girlfriend finally? Let’s face it, he stopped loving her long ago. I think she did as well, only used him as a human sextoy or whatever. I mean, fair enough. I knew how it was to have sex with him, I wouldn’t want to live without it either.
But then, if he is ending things with her, why did he write me a letter? He should have written it to her and not to me. She is the one to be left.
Or isn’t she?
With a mixture of anxiety and excitement I keep on reading, turning the page.
===
I’m sorry for ending it. You know I don’t want to. Every piece of me is against it. Or well, almost every piece of me.
There’s this thing called ‘better judgement’. And that’s the only part of me that has to make me end it, made me take this final step.
I have to stay with her. I don’t want to but I have to.
===
Wait a second.
Stay with her? With HER?
He is going to stay with that woman? Why for heaven’s sake?
Ever since we met he kept telling me that he was getting the feeling that she was using him (which she probably did) and taking advantage of the fact that he came from a wealthy family. He kept complaining how he always felt taken for granted by her and all.
And he is staying with her?
Oh no.
If he is staying with her that indeed means that …
He is leaving me.
But he doesn’t want to. He said it himself, he doesn’t want to at all.
His parents! Yes, it must be them. They must have found out about our relationship and then they forced him to end it. Probably threatened to disown him or erase him from the family alltogether. From what he told me, his family is keen on traditions and all so that wouldn’t surprise me much. I bet his father gave him a proper talk about it and told him to get rid off me because otherwise he would take care of it. Old mafia-style or something.
But then, he wouldn’t let anyone put him into this situation. Sure, he loves his family but he always made it clear that there was them on one hand, and him and his life on the other hand. He has done things in the past that had upset them but nothing ever happened.
He actually has an exessive history of ‘mistakes’. He has piercings and tattoos (his first almost gave his poor mother a heart attack) and he had told me about the numerous times of when he got detention while he was on boarding school. His parents surely weren’t happy about any of that but they never stayed mad for too long. Even when he left them to have a life without their money and all, they didn’t stop him from it. They welcomed his independence, even.
He also told me that his family never liked his girlfriend much. She never had the best manners whereas they were quite posh.
Okay, so if his parents aren’t the problem …
What is?
===
She’s pregnant.
===
At that point I make a little mess on my kitchen table. I was just about to raise a spoon-full of cereal in milk to my mouth. But then I read that and drop the spoon right back into the bowl sending splutters of milk all over the table.
He cannot be serious!
How the fuck did she get pregnant?
Okay, I know how to get pregnant but I mean … how?
He’s not stupid, he knows what to do to not have babies.
So, this whole pregnancy-thing must have been an accident. Like, I don’t know, a ripped condom or whatever.
Or maybe she is on birth control. From the way he described her moods she surely is. And then she forgot about it, slept with him and ended up pregnant.
And honestly, from what I’ve heard about her, chances are that the baby isn’t even his. Maybe she got knocked up by some guy from her weird surroundings. And then she figured that it’d be quite stupid to have some loser taking care for her child when she had him who had the money and the backround to do it.
No, I know what the reason is. She knows about me and him. And that is her way to keep him. By now she is used to have him around, pay for her stuff. And she was sensing him slipping away from her so she had to do something to tie him to her.
Stupid selfish bitch she is!
===
Yea, I can’t even grasp it fully myself yet.
===
That makes two of us then. But I think he has other reasons than me.
I bet it was a great shock to him when she told him he would be a father in a bit.
He doesn’t want an own family. Not just yet anyway. Sure, he had been talking about having one in the future. He loved the idea of adopting a baby to give it a better life with a partner he loved (which would have been me, by the way). But he also always pointed out that there would be some years passing by until he would actually do it.
And now, there he is, soon to be a dad. Now he has to worry about so much more than whether he wanted curry or pasta for dinner.
So, I guess I really am the one that’s left in this scenario. And I’m not left for another man, nor this stupid woman. I am left for a baby, someone who isn’t even born yet.
He is right, I don’t like this, I don’t like this at all.
I sigh and feel tears coming up. I blink them away before I keep on reading awaiting what is there to come, how long this goodbye will drag on, what else he will tell me.
===
She’s not overly happy about it either. But she made the choice to keep it. She’s a good person, she couldn’t kill a human being that isn’t even capable of defending itself.
And I am going to stay with her, give this child a family.
I can’t leave her with the responsibility of taking care of something, someone, that I created with her. She needs someone by her side, someone to help her. It’s my responsibility to be that someone.
It’s my responsibility to stay with her and the baby. I couldn’t cope with the fact that I brought a new life into this world but not properly taking care of it. So many kids have to live without a proper family, a mum and a dad, I would never want my child to be another one of them.
===
Mind if I laugh? What suddenly makes her a good person? Okay yes, you have to give it to her that she won’t get the baby … well … removed, but that’s all I guess.
However, he reacts just like I think he would have.
No matter if she planned it or not, but he’s doing right what I expect him to do. He stays with her, not because of her, but because of the baby.
He told me about many nights when he was laid on his bed at boarding school, missing his family so much. And I can understand it. He was a kid and he never had his family around. Until my late teenage-days, I wouldn’t have made three days without my mum either.
But there’s one thing I don’t get. He doesn’t want his baby to grow up without a mum and a dad. But I don’t see the problem in it.
I mean, I never knew my dad, he left when I was too young to keep any memories of him. All my life there’s been just my mum. Sure, my grandparents and uncles and aunts were there too but I never had a real dad. Of course, when I was young I always wondered what had happened and why my dad didn’t like me but as I grew up I learned to live with it. And I learnt that it never was my fault, but his.
And it wouldn’t be like his baby wouldn’t have a dad. He could always go visit them. Hello, his girlfriend would have insisted on him taking part (she needed the money after all). Yes, he wouldn’t be around permanently but the most important thing was that he would be around at all.
So, he knows from knowing me that it isn’t the worst thing in the world to grow up with just one parent. Why is he making such a big deal out of it? Why does he forget about his own happiness? Doesn’t he think about that, with him being unhappy, his child might be unhappy as well?
===
I know you’ll understand me. Maybe not now, maybe not later today, maybe not tomorrow, not next week, next month or next year.
But I know that one day, eventually, you will understand me.
You will understand that there was no other way than to leave. Stuff my life into my car and leave this town with the people who will soon be my very own family.
You will understand that there was no way I could have stayed here. Here, where everything brings back memories of you, of us. Here, where I know you still are, always being tempted to come back to you and hurt you all over again.
===
The fuck I will understand! I don’t understand it now and I never will!
He’s actually a coward. Does he really believe that it’s better to not just leave me, but the city as well? Does he think that the memories of me and what we had will vanish as soon as he passes the city limits?
How stupid is he really?
Angrily I fold the letter back up and toss it to the side. I get up from the table and grab a towel to wipe the milk of the table. I wipe forcefully, as if trying to get rid off some waterproof pen and not a few droplets of milk, in the process always throwing angry glances at the folded pieces of paper.
“You’re an idiot!” I keep saying to the pages, seeing him behind them, “You’re a stupid, silly coward!”
I fall back onto my chair, taking another sip of my coffee, my gaze never breaking from the letter. I stare at it intensly, hoping to change what he is saying with the power of my thoughts.
I highly doubt that whatever else he has to say will hurt me more than those words I already read but I still find myself reaching for the letter again, opening it and looking for where I stopped reading.
===
I wish that you could hate me. I really wish you could, but I know you can’t, you won’t be able to. Even though I put you through all the pain you will not be able to hate me. Simply because you are the person you are, the person who I got to love so much that it physically hurt sometimes.
I hate myself actually. I hate myself for letting you fall in love with me. I hate myself for putting you through all of this. I hate myself for going to make you cry many times in the following days.
===
This is the first thing I’ve been reading that is absolutely true to the point.
I don’t hate him. Even though what he did was stupid and of no sense, and he surely deserved to be hated for that, I couldn’t bring myself to actually hate him.
In fact, now that everything is supposedly over, I come to realise how much I actually love him. I suddenly discover a side of him that I never saw in all the time I’ve known him. That new aspect of him completes the picture I have of him. It’s like a missing piece of a puzzle, only I never noticed it was actually missing. But it makes him whole.
I don’t want him to hate himself. Not for me falling in love with him. It needs two people to that after all. I knew what I was getting myself into when I started messing around with him at first. And I knew what I was getting myself into when I told him for the first time that I loved him.
I don’t want him to hate himself. Not for anything he did. Because, honestly, it was as much my fault as his.
Sure, he could have left his girlfriend but then again, I could have left him as well, saving me from all this. I had just been too wrapped up in my feelings for him and in the feelings he had for me, or maybe still has. I was too in love to think logically and do what would have been the best for the both of us.
===
But I will never, never ever, hate myself for loving you. Loving you was the best thing I ever did in my whole life. And that it will always be. I will never regret loving you, same as I will never stop loving you.
===
I am getting angry again.
Have I mentioned he’s an idiot?
Because really, he could have shoved this paragraph up his arse, for all I care.
If he really loves me that much, why the fuck does he have to leave? Why doesn’t he even look for a solution for this? Why doesn’t he talk about it with me? Why did he write this bloody letter and doesn’t even have the guts to wait until I read it? Why is he leaving me like that, on a mountain of questions which will never be answered?
I am this close to grab this damn letter and hold it into the flame of the stove. Burn it before I even get to finish reading it.
In fact, I am standing at the stove, fighting to light a match, when the next sentence makes me stop.
I put the match down and against any better judgement, keep standing there, reading.
===
I am going to miss you so much.
===
At this, a first tear slowly slides down my cheek. I can’t really explain why it comes now. He told me he’s leaving, he told me he’s going to start a family with someone else, he told me he loved me.
Nothing of it made me cry. Sure, brought me close to tears, but still not close enough.
But reading that he is going to miss me, that actually makes me cry.
It’s like … now I can actually see how hard it is for him. What he is going through upon making this decision. He does realise how hard it will be for him, no matter where he will be.
===
I will miss the mess that you call hairstyle.
I will miss the blue of your eyes.
I will miss your cheeky grin.
I will miss your loving smile.
I will miss the sound of your voice.
I will miss the softness of your lips.
I will miss every curve of your body.
I will miss the sound of your breathing mixed with your heartbeat that always brought me to sleep.
I will miss the fun we had.
I will miss talking to you about nothing.
===
I let the letter sink down, careful to not let my tears drop onto it and wipe away the words.
No, this definetely is not easy for him.
I feel actually bad for calling him a coward and idiot earlier.
And I am going to miss him too.
===
I will miss everything that made you the love of my life.
===
God, why does he have to make it so hard? He can’t just call me the love of his life, for the first time ever, in a letter that is a goodbye to me and to our relationship.
This is just not fair. It simply is not!
I lean against the counter, slowly sliding down until I am sitting on the cold kitchen floor. The match and the desire to burn the letter already forgotten. I can’t burn it, not the last thing I have left from him.
I have reached the bottom of the page again so I take a deep breath to calm myself and stop the tears before switching to the next, the third page.
===
This is the hardest thing that I ever had to do.
I had to deal with family members passing away. I had to deal with years on boarding school away from home. I had to deal with learning to drive. I had to deal with building up an own life without always running to my parents’ for help.
All of this has been a walk in the park, a piece of cake, compared to writing this letter.
===
Finally, he admits it.
And I know this is hard for him.
He likes to appear as the strong one, the one who never gets affected by anything, the one who doesn’t let anything get him down, only coming out more confident.
For the first time ever he is showing that he isn’t that strong, that he is vulnerable.
===
I think this is the hardest challenge that life has set for the both of us. It challenges us to give up on our love, to give up on us. It challenges us to let go and move on.
===
And that is just him for you as well.
He refuses to believe that any of this happens without a reason. In his mind, all of this is meant to show us something, that we have to learn our lessons from it.
What lessons?
I don’t know, I’ve never truly believed in this theory. When something happened, I always saw it as bad luck or good luck or whatever. It was just … something. Fate. Karma.
He is the one who truly believes that life is just one big test for us, that we have to learn our lessons from pretty much everything.
And apparently, this is another ‘challenge’ that life had set out for us. It challenges us to be without each other.
Frankly, I wouldn’t mind to fail that challenge.
===
I have taken the first step by writing this. I have accepted the first part of this challenge. I don’t know if I’ve accomplished it but I have accepted it and did what I had to do.
===
Can’t he just stop being so damn responsible all the time?
I can’t say if he accomplished his mission. Is his mission to leave me? Then yes, he did accomplish it.
But when I look at the thing as a whole, I think he did the wrong thing. Sure, he learned his lesson but maybe …
Did he learn the wrong one?
===
But now I am confronted with the second part of the challenge. And here we are back to the plaster that’s being pulled off.
We are at the part where you will always shudder at the memory this moment brings with itself.
This is the part that I’ve been trying to avoid, trying to postpone. Push it away from me for as long as I could.
This is the part that will always make me shudder when I am reminded of this, which will be each and every day in the future.
===
Apparently, we’re not at the end of it, eh?
He thinks there’s even more to do. And I have the feeling that we’re now getting to really ugly part of this.
Do I want to read on?
I don’t know.
A part of me wants to, wants to read what else there possibly is to say.
But another part of me wants to take that letter and put it far away, in the furthest corner I can find in here. Where it can stay and I can take it and read the rest whenever I will be ready to do so.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready to read the rest, though. I surely not am right now but when will I be? Will I be eventually?
If I won’t, I will never get to find out what his last words were, I will never get to find out if he told me one last time that he loved me.
===
This is the part where I am finishing.
For real.
No return, no coming back.
The final.
The end.
===
So, this is ‘it’, then.
It’s weird how words, that we use every day in every possible context, can suddenly mean so much, be so hurting.
It hurts to no end to actually read it.
This is the first time in the whole letter that he says that he’s leaving me. He said he was going to stay with his girlfriend and the baby, yes. He said he will leave the city, yes.
But until now he didn’t say that he was leaving me.
Sure, I knew that this letter was about nothing else but that actual fact but now that I read it …
Now it sinks in.
There’s just one last line to go. And I can barely read it. Tears are clouding my vision. I’ve taken off my glasses long ago as well which doesn’t help either.
I force myself to get a grip one final time, preparing myself to get to the real end.
===
The hardest part of this is leaving you.
===
I honestly don’t think it is.
The hardest part will be waking up one day, realisation setting in.
I will realise that I won’t have him by my side, ever again.
And he will realise that he won’t have me by his side ever again, either.
And realising that will be the hardest part of this.
The End
Comments are appreciated.
A/N 2: I've decided to turn this into a little trilogy which means there is another sequel coming up which will basically be the actual sequel since this is just the same story as the first one just from a different view and .. yea, i'm rambling, thank you very much.
PoynterJudd Standalone