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dear jacob,
i’ve dismantled my life completely in these two weeks.
dear jacob, i know i haven’t spoken to you in a while—it’s been difficult. it’s been the happiest almost-year since you left, and i apologize for substituting contentedness for communication. i owe you more than silences. the time i visited you, just before the dismantling began in earnest, i didn’t give you my full attention. i was selfish. i didn’t listen, didn’t really talk. just looked at a rock and wondered what’s left of you.
dear jacob, i know you would have loved her. and i know you now know everything i’ve collected of her. and i know that i would have been the one sobbing at the fire.
it’s now been a year since that first kiss, and i think i’ve lost her.
forever is a difficult word. you know that better than i can until i’m there.
i’m leaving this place, and i’ve started to box things up. the dismantling has ruined me. i can’t apologize enough, because i don’t know what to apologize for—it’s me, just me, all of me, and i don’t think i can get it right.
dear jacob, i understand the how and why now, and every day for weeks has been dissuasion. it’s been a fog. i’ve slipped back into so many habits. you know—the drinking, forgetting to eat. 176lbs now for the first time since you left. i’ve spiraled off into productivity, but what products could substitute? i shouldn’t have driven home.
god, i wish you could have seen me this year. almost-year.
because i’d never had a partner, never given myself so completely, never loved so deeply, and now i think i’ve lost it all. and the worst part is the maybe—maybe she still loves me, maybe there’s a chance, but i can’t operate like that. i have no great goals of getting back into the game—the thought of being with anyone else makes me sick. the thought of her being with anyone else makes me want to stop breathing.
i’ve started stuttering again.
if you could have seen us—
i don’t know what to do anymore. it’s all broken. there is no home, and i’ve substituted moving away for any semblance of trying to improve my situation. you know the friends—they’re gone now, married off and busy. no one’s visited since may. i’m always the one to drive to visit. and home—how do we define that? the farm has gone. under new management. and the constant—every day for almost-a-year, she was my constant, and maybe i shouldn’t have ascribed that responsibility to her, but i thought that’s what partners were. now it’s lost, and i stay awake at night wondering if i’ll ever see her again, if she’ll ever love me again. because i can’t imagine a lifetime without her.
if you could have seen me that night—you would have known.
dear jacob, i’m on the edge, and i know how it must have been for you. at least i can suspect.
but i won’t be visiting anytime soon. i’m sorry and not in the same breath.
i’m so lucky to have been given the time with her i was. few are given the opportunity to love like that. i know i’m greedy and selfish to want more, but i don’t know how else to be. i’m so lucky—do you understand that? to have loved like that—to continue to love like that, even if it’s only me.
i can only hope that something remains of this almost-year.
dear jacob, i’m fighting right now. i know you understand. because even with you gone, you’re still the one who listens.
i love her.
let me broadcast that with everything i have left—i love her. and if that love is resigned to echoes and sunrises, if it’s only a box of plastic or a folder of postcards, let it be known that my heart continues to be hers. and i’ll hide away from the world. i’m done with the game. i’ll rebuild in a ghost house and make a bonfire pit. i’ll set and overmeet goals and my heart will be hers, as flawed as it is, as broken as i am, because i’ve never wanted anything more than this. anyone more than her.
i’ve lost my best friend.
dear jacob, i’m so tired, but i’m fighting. there’s no room for surrender.
a year ago…i can’t write through the tears anymore. so much of me has been excised.
and i know words are weapons and this broadcast could ruin further, but i can’t keep it inside anymore. it would have been one year today since that first kiss, since i started to fall the best fall. i’m so scared to tell her how i feel, and i can only hope that she knows, beg that she remembers. because i gave her the best of me i could, and i don’t think i did enough. it’s a startling realization to know now that my best will never be good enough.
dear jacob, i’m coming home.
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…] [i] know you told me to go to bed, but there was editing to do and i wanted to write to you before i tried to sleep. i’m sorry i haven’t called. i know it’s ridiculous and i can call and leave a message and i know i should, but i don’t want to interrupt and i want to talk to you when you have time and i know you have time for sure. i don’t know how to do this. i think i’ve been doing a bad job, and i apologize….] [i have had] dreams of you, and i’ve looked through england pictures and all the other pictures. missing you is my constant. and it’s something i don’t want to get good at. i don’t want to be good at missing you. that’s why i’d really like to see you on saturday. i don’t mind driving, and i wouldn’t presume to spend the night, anyway. i’d just like to be within a distance of you where i can feel you there. i don’t know if that makes sense. i never imagined that you’d feel farther away in vt than you did in england, but it’s happened, and i know i have to deal with that. i miss my best friend, my lover and partner. i miss us. broken hearts can heal, but it’s like the heart is made of glass. scar tissue can form around the pieces, but every time it beats, you can feel the sharp edges. i’ve never felt so lost….] people come into and leave our lives, but we keep going. i’m trying so hard to keep going, but i’d give anything to hold your hand again. i keep busy and do things that most people never do, most people never have seventeen authors excited over the opportunity of being published, and i’m the one offering that opportunity, but everything just feels like i’m going through the paces, sitting in front of the camera putting on a strong face and saying that i’m okay, but everyone knows that [i’m] lying. the cashier jokes playfully while checking my id and it makes me sick. i’m in love with someone i’m afraid i’ll never see again. my dad says i need to find me a big indian woman to keep me warm in this cold old house this winter, and i know he’s just joking, we have the same sense of humor, but there’s no one else i want to hold on to. sisters hint at passing my number to really nice 36-year-old divorcees, two kids, like to read, and i feel like breaking. does
