To: gildedsiddharta@gmail.com
From: pikapie0907@gmail.com
No problem is petty. I'm not here to judge about them, anyway. I'm here to talk and to be talked to. Don't doubt yourself here.
It seems to me as though my father is drunk more than he is sober. Is sober even the right word? He does little more these days than send me to the store to purchase alcohol and grow violent when I misstep, even in a tiny way. He claims he loves me, and that he doesn't want to be this way, but only when he thinks I'm sleeping. He's angry. Hateful. Ruins everything I love because he doesn't think I should love anything, and nothing should love me in return. I don't know how to deal with this. My whole life, I've covered for him with late night movies and bumping into bookshelves, but I'm taller than the bookshelves now, and I've run out of interesting movies. Friends are more observant. One, she noticed a bruise scrawled across my cheek recently, and I had to divulge the lesser of two evils.
She cried, even at that. I wonder how she would hurt if she knew of my father, rather than just those ones at school. I wonder how she would hurt if she realized that I might leave her.
I've always had a special kind of craving for love. I want it, so desperately. I want someone to care, to cry over me, and yet when they do... It can't be real. It can't be love if they don't know what they're dealing with. They like the version of me that they see, the pokemon-loving nerd man with a few problems but a largely okay life. They don't see me. Me, I gave up a long time ago. I'm secretive, self-absorbed and too weak to leave a house despite having a ticket out. I'm an alcoholic at age 17, now 18, and I'm terrified I'll take after my father. I know it's likely. The statistics tell me so. And it's absolutely petrifying.
I also know of the conflict of love. I have... someone in my life, now. And I think I may love him, in a way. We haven't even been together long. Hell, we hated each other for the longest time, but after a letter of confession and apology, we were suddenly just... together. I don't even know if it's this man I love or the idea of him. If I just love the feeling of it. I feel as though I don't deserve him, because he's good. He calls himself terrible, but I know his pains, and he is good. He calls me good, but he doesn't know what I've done. What I've battled. Who I've battled. He doesn't know how dangerous and filthy I am.
My last relationship was with a lovely young man who I won't name for confidentiality reasons, but he was beautiful, and we were beautiful together. I loved him. Even now, I think it was he whom I loved, not just his idea. I think. I think I loved him. But I, obviously, couldn't tell him why he couldn't come to my house. He followed me home. I broke down. I never cry, ever, never, but I broke down in his arms because my father wasn't home and he didn't understand why he should leave. For the first time in my life, I told smeone everything and he didn't leave. He didn't leave me.
Except he did. My father came home, saw us kissing on the couch. It... I've never told a soul this before. I've never... come to terms with it. I still don't think I will have even after admitting it here. But he threatened death to both of us and his family if we ever saw each other again, hit me, kicked me around, and he... Hurt me... In a way no father should ever even THINK of hurting his son... I stopped thinking of him as my father that day. And both times... after.... only cemented it.
I've never spoke of that before. I don't know if I should again, but it's already written, and I don't have the heart to delete it this time. I already rewrote it five times. Why would I tell you I rewrote it five times? I'm a wreck. I'm going to move on now.
I know what it's like to want to leave. I'm tempted by it every day. I wonder if my handful of friends even care enough to hurt if I left, and if they might be relieved by it. I wonder if the man I think I love the idea of only likes the idea of me too, and if so, why? Why would anyone - anyone - like the idea of this? I battle with myself daily to stay alive. I have scars hidden everywhere to cope.
My first attempt was with pills some time after my ex left, because he never found out what my father did to me that night, by the way, and he "wanted to protect me" by keeping his distance, he thought, but if he wanted to help me, he should have HELPED me get out... I can't blame him for it... It's not his fault. But it was after Jax. It failed, obviously. I have no power keeping me alive, but I haven't tried again. Next time I try, it's going to work. i don't think I'll live past age 18.
This turned out ridiculously long. Everything just flowed. I don't get it. I do get how you think about leaving — this island, not this world. Its tempting... to wipe the slate clean, start over somewhere new. I think, if I left, I wouldn't want a big empire. I'd want something simple. Content. I've only ever wanted a simple life.
