W

(The list I'm referring to is the 'List of People I Have Loved' basically.)
Hey W,
You shouldn’t be on this list, really. I thought about starting with ‘Dear’ but that would put in you a place you never belonged to- because when all is said and done, I was too young to be in the situations you put me in- much less to have fallen for you.
I was never in love with you but you were my best friend’s brother.
You hunted for Pokémon figures in the blazing sun with us as we clutched those plastic Poke balls in our fingers. You laughed when we would play Sailor Scouts, trying to mime the iconic arm motions and you sat with me when the little kitten I found was drug by a dog too big for me to chase away, with us because everyone was working to make ends me, and… when we would study.
I have a term now for what happened: child-on-child sexual abuse.
You were young, too. You were barely a teenager when you reached over in that humid room and kissed me… when you told me to hush and keep studying, when I learned to recoil at demanding grips and lips.
I was never in love with you. I couldn’t be because I didn’t have any experience with that and I didn’t realize the fluttery feelings for a certain girl in my class was a crush or that crushes could develop into more.
You were young, but I was young, too and I may never have fallen for you but… you skewed my perceptions.
You taught me about secrets. You taught me how to swallow my words until my throat was raw and bleeding, how to smile through my chest caving in, and with those lessons, I picked up the knife for the first time.
Those things you taught me and the things I found… would serve me well through the years.
Yes, I am bitter.
Yes, I am furious- but it’s because I don’t hate you.
Maybe it’s the leftover confusion of a child who didn’t know better. Maybe it’s because I have not seen your face in years, or maybe it’s I just… don’t because a child learns from people how to hurt, how to use… and I have to wonder who taught you.
If anyone did.
While I may not hate you, it does not change that I hope you meet hardship in your life because I don’t understand.
I never have, I never will… and I didn’t say a word about you until two (or maybe it was three? My memory is always spotty when it comes to those times) years later… and I was told it was too late.
Too late for a child who didn’t know anything. Too late for a girl who was naïve. Too late for the eleven-year-old with scars on her wrists and her thighs.
Too late.
I never loved you, but you played an important part in my relationships later… in some where they went down in flames, I used your lessons: mouth shut, full of glass; eyes closed, sewn shut; heart silenced, screaming.
In the ones that have gone well… I have taken those and manipulated them for my own: think before you act… mouth shut until your thoughts slow; keep your eyes on their face, their motions, their expressiveness and always, always listen to inner dialogue of your heart in tandem with your brain.
I have learned to use my words…
I still have trouble sometimes. They dig into my trachea, but I can.
…and perhaps, I should thank you, because when I couldn’t speak, I picked up my pens, tapped at my keyboard, fell into the world of the Silver Millennium and Senshi battles and the knowledge that good can win, if I let it.
Or it could lose, if I wanted.
I was the one who controlled the Fates, the pain, the joy… the words.
You gave me one of the only mediocre talents I have so thank you.
Sincerely.