Stephanie: It tears you apart.

This is the follow up of Juggling Coke Bottles and The Park.


It Tears You Apart

"My dear, my David.
I don't think I'll have the guts to give you this letter, but it doesn't really matter. As long as I write it.
There's so much I want to tell you, but there are only so many ways to tell you these things and after a while it gets all chewed out, so let's just skip the formalities, shall we?
If everything went according to plan, you're in the park where we had our first kiss right now. If you are, I want you to sit down on the bench where the couple just sat. In case you're not in the park, I want you to please stop reading and go to our park before you read on."

David looked around him and saw that the street lamp had turned on. In merely 2 minutes, dusk had stretched its long arms over the city and David imagined people being far away, arriving to a warm home, a family, to find them all waiting. But not for him this time.
Quickly, David walked towards the bench where the couple had been sitting only minutes before. His fingers were stiff from the cold and it took him a while before he got the piece of paper unfolded again. When he did, he flattened it out on his knee and continued reading fastidiously.

"I like your curls. I like your jumpy mattress. I hate your childish T-shirts with holes in them and the way you never clean anything up, but the curls and the mattress make up for those. I love it when you buy a drink for me, even after I initially declined it. I like it when I walk away and you chase after me, because you are the only person that knows better than I do, that I want to be in your arms- not walk away from them. I like the level we were on, not needing to be together 'officially' to prove to others that what we had was real, because whatever was real for us, was real in general. I hate how despite that level, there were bumps in the road that caused tension, which in the end caused this semi-breakup. I like how you are able to pretend not to care, but again- I hate how that confused me overall."

David stopped reading and noticed that he had stopped breathing. He folded the letter the other way and shoved it under his upper right leg, so he had his hands free to blow in them. And they say the weather gets better from February onwards....

"What I liked about you most, was how you kept hurting me and begging me for more at the same time. You kept breaking my heart, but after doing so, you would always mend it and start over from the beginning. You had me going in circles- I would leave you. You would beg me for mercy. I would tell you we could not be together. You took off. I would beg you for mercy. Remember those days, David? I do. They tore me apart. But isn't that what love does; tear you apart?"

He was crying. He was actually crying. Not in 6 years had David let a tear spring from his eyes for emotional reasons. The last time he cried before he met Stephanie was when his best friend died in a car accident, in which he only broke his nose. And then he met her.. Until this very day, David has still not figured out how one person can have such a great impact on someone else. How can one person lift you up that high? And how can that person drop you down this hard? How come there are people who know exactly what to say or do to make you the happiest man alive, or the most miserable, for that matter? How come it is always the unexpected people you come to care about and, well.. Love?
Oh. My. God....

David stood up and almost fell over. His aggression in standing up, caused dizziness and for a moment he thought he was going to throw up. He leaned with his right arm against the stone wall next to the bench, panting and finding it hard to swallow. Clenching his left hand into a fist, with the letter inside, David slowly stood up. His left arm was now shaking because of the tension in it and he looked at the remains of the letter in his fist. He could not read any further. Every word reminded him of Stephanie's teasing, crooked, smile- every word seemed a joke, but he was afraid that this time nobody would jump around the corner and say 'KIDDING!'
The curtain of night had now been rolled down completely and to read the rest of the letter, David would have to stand under the streetlamp. Bad sign. She wanted him to read it on the bench and if he couldn't right now, he'd better not read it at all. She was the one that told him that: if you're not supposed to do something, fate will let you know soon enough. Don't argue it, don't question it- just follow it.

David let the letter fall and picked up his bag that he left in the corner at the entrance of the little park. He took off to the gig where he had to juggle- never to look back at the park; never to know what the end of the letter beheld. It started drizzling.
In the meanwhile, in the back, a girl stood there, watching the scene. She had a navy jacket casually thrown over her shoulder and as soon as David turned around the corner, she stepped into the light of the streetlamp, which lighted up the silver lines on her face. She picked up the letter of the floor and held it in her hand, carefully, as if not to crush it any further. Then, she brought the piece of paper to her lips and laid it on the floor again.
It stopped drizzling and she walked away.

"It's a sacrifice you make. And I did; I sacrificed this for you, because I loved you. Why did you think I was not able to be with you? It's what this love did to me; it tore me apart. Remember that if you are thinking of me- whenever, wherever... I'll be thinking of you too. And if you think this tore you apart, remember that it doesn't come close to half how torn apart I am over this.
So, please leave me alone. I don't think you can mend my heart this time. And even if you can, you'd break it all over again and if I'm frank.. I don't think that's all there is to love. Sorry. But this time I'll try to find love for which I'm not the only one sacrificing myself.
I love you. You don't love me. In case you do- I ask you to turn around right now. If you don't turn around but walk away after throwing this letter on the ground.. I'll get over it.

I wish you the best and more.
Love. And more.
Steph."