3 Years 0 Months 10 Days 12 Hours

Dear Cecilia,

It's been 3 years, 0 months, 10 days, and 12 hours since I last saw your face.

I've been seeing you all over these damp city streets. Everywhere I look there you are. Sweetly smiling Cecilia, sipping from a soda. I turn a corner, and slowly circling Cecilia is there, scampering along the sidewalk. Softly sauntering Cecilia, coming out of Saks with a scarf. Sexily sinful Cecilia seducing an older man on a street corner. Everywhere I look all I can see is a sea full of sadly stony eyes, silently succulent lips, and sprucely spindling legs stemmed from a sensationally slender waist. In a word, you. You. You are all I see. Oh, everywhere I look everything is just so serenely, sincerely, sublimely, stupendously, secretly Cecilia! And yet... you are nowhere to be seen.

You fade and melt like a scene drawn in chalk on a quickly dampening sidewalk. The cement, smelling of murky ozone and tainting the air with a metallic piquancy of blood and rain. Your deep gray eyes fade into the soft brown irises of some random passer-by. Your thinly pink lips dissolve into the collagen filled frown of some unknown stranger. Your legs, your waist, your hair, your hands, they all fade and morph and slip and dim into other people. People who aren't you.

Dearest friend, oldest companion, why does you haunt me so? If you can't be with me then, all I want is a life free of Cee. But no, strikingly spectral Cecilia will never let that happen. You always have to be what's on my mind. Not a day goes by where my thoughts aren't strictly controlled by Senior Staff Sergeant Cecilia and your army of memoria technica.

God damnit Cee, get out of my life and get out of my head. Wherever you are, stop tormenting me with ghosts.

Whether you're here or there, happy or sad, live or dead. I don't care.

I cannot live in this surreality any longer.

Please please please, leave me be.

Please please please, write me.

Your Friend,

~M~

2 Years 11 Months 25 Days and 20 Hours

Dear Cecilia,

It's been 2 years, 11 months, 25 days, and 20 hours since I last saw your face.

I hate walking to work after it rains. I get up early, so no one is really on the streets yet, and everything is covered in that invisible white mist that turns everything over 15 feet away into an eerie outline of what it used to be. When I look up all the tops of the trees are slightly faded, as if I were really high up, even though I know I'm standing flat on the ground. It's like being on a different planet, or inside a box. There's always more past what looks like the end of the road. Things slowly emerging out of this fuzzy miasma that seeps into my sleep deprived eyeballs.

But I can deal with all that. I don't mind being blinded, I don't mind fading shapes or colorless objects. Really what gets to me are the worms.

Little rotting corpses all over the road, showing their guts and squirming in the gutters. They say that if you split a worm in half it will just become two separate worms; but I never really believed that.

I remember in 1st grade, you turned to me and said, "Hey. Hey, yeah you. Hey, I'm Cecilia, but no one calls me that, cept my mom and dad. Guess what Casey and I are gonna do at recess?"

You were so cool, even then. I knew who you were. I knew everything about you even then. I knew that you ate your pancakes cut like a cake into little triangles. I knew that you wore braided pig-tails on Mondays, and a skirt on Fridays. I knew that you could spell encyclopedia in kindergarten, and all the teachers said that you were "gifted." So when you talked to me, I was too stunned to even respond at all, I just nodded at you, dazed and excited.

You laughed, a high-pitched fairy giggle, "Just come out behind the maple tree today. You'll see..."

I couldn't wait. At lunch I shoveled my food into my mouth, and pulled my coat on getting my fingers caught in the cuffs. My green rain-boots made squeaking noises as I shot across the asphalt towards you and Casey.

"Hi." I said, spreading my grin from ear to ear and tugging on my pig-tails.

"Hi." you said, not even looking up. You were crouched in the grass with a stick in your hand poking at something I couldn't quite see. You said, "Casey. Here, help me do this. Help. Get another stick, I wanna move it onto the blacktop. Help." And Casey, wrinkled her nose and bent down to pick up a stick. Finally I saw what you were doing as you moved a long worm onto the pavement. It was curling in the air, trying to find balance, it's moist skin, glistening in the muted sunlight.

"Ew." I whispered.

"Just wait," you said, "it gets ickier." And a little smile pulled at the corners of your mouth, as you focused on setting it down lightly on the dusty ground.

"What are you going to do?"

"Just watch." and then you took your stick and slowly- so slowly it was agonizing- you pushed it through the center of the worm, "Huh. Feels... like jello." It writhed around on the black-top indecipherable redness pouring out of it's wound.

I didn't say a thing, I just watched in astonishment, and let my eyes grow wider with every passing second.

I said, "Cool." even though it wasn't.

"Yeah." you said, "Now you try!" and you handed me the stick.

"Okay..." I didn't want to. But if I did you'd finally be my friend. I could finally go home and tell my mother or my brother or my cat that I finally was best friends with Cecilia! Cecilia, the coolest girl. Cecilia the girl who knew everything. Cecilia the girl who was so special. Finally I could be a part of that. And all it took was smushing the guts out of a helpless worm.

So I took the stick and slid it though it's center, separating it neatly into two parts, both of which wriggled and spasmed slowly on the ground.

You were wrong, it didn't feel like jello. It felt like raw meat.

You inflict pain and happiness on all those you touch, I don't know how people function without knowing you. I don't know how people function once they do.

Respond. For the love of god, just a word, anything. Please.

Your friend,

~M~

2 years 11 months 11 days and 23 hours

Dear Cecilia,

It's been 2 years 11 months 11 days and 23 hours since I last saw your face.

I have the hiccups. I've had them for days. It's awful; like jumping in an elevator every 30 seconds, that feeling of everything shaking around while you stay in place. I can feel the hiccups in my lungs and my chest slowly spreading into my heart. I wonder if heart hiccups ever go away... I doubt it.

Winter is fading here, I wonder if it's warm where you are. God, I'm going to miss winter. Snow has always been my favorite form of precipitation. It covers the world in it's white blanket and suddenly everything is clean and pristine and innocent and... pure. Sewage covered streets become glistening white landscapes. Rundown tenement crack-houses turn into soft gentle edged buildings. Hell, rotting corpses could look like fallen angels in all that whiteness. Snow is camouflage for all that no one wants to see. Snow is nature's cosmetics for rundown shit-holes and forgotten back alleys. Snow is there to cover what is already gone. I've gotten comfortable with hiding in plain sight.

I was sludging through all this melting snow the other day when I saw Jimmy Berkowitz. You remember Jimmy Berkowitz, don't you? How could you not? You took a hammer to his heart Sophomore year. Apparently he's still picking up the pieces.

I said, "Oi! Jimmy. Is that you?" and I shouted it real loud, startling a few pidgins before he spun around to face me.

At first he gave me that look. That squinty-eyed, arched eyebrows, confused and suspicious look. He ran his calloused hand through his short hair and nervously reseated his glasses before he really recognized me, "Oh! Umm.... You're Cecilia's friend from college, right?"

"Yeah. That's right. So... How've you been?" You were always the more vibrant personality, how could I be anything next to you, Cee? I couldn't possibly expect him to remember me.

"Fine, fine." He was looking at his shoes; faded green leather, "You?"

His enthusiasm overwhelmed me... I could've told him I started to blow dicks for a living after I dropped out of college and would he like to have a go and he wouldn't have heard a word. His thoughts were elsewhere and I could tell. But I answered anyway."Good I guess. Not really doing much right now, I'm waitressing down at--"

"That's nice. So hey... have you seen Cee lately?" Nonchalance really never was his forte... His voice was raggedy; kind of like old drapes, drooping and filled with wholes and rips but still attempting to cover everything on the outside, or in Jimmy's case, everything on the inside. But his veils were no good, he was completely transparent.

And Cee, I'm so sorry, but I just couldn't stand it any longer. You left me. You left me when I really needed you. Without a word, a letter, a number. Nothing. Just poof. Gone. And you fucking KNOW the effect you have on people, how could you not? You use us and leave us. There are some people in this world who glow and the rest of us are just left to soak up the sun and hope we don't get skin cancer. But you're too bright, too hot. You burn everyone you touch, and you're a fire to brilliant to care. And so when Jimmy asked me if I'd seen you lately, I'm sorry Cee, but I lied.

"Oh, God... Jim... Didn't you hear?" And then I paused for dramatic effect, "Cee died. Last year, drug overdose. Yeah... Heroine. Such a shame." And I shook my head, pretending to envision your strung-out junkie body draped, gray-skinned and vein-y, across some florescent hospital bed.

"Oh my, God! Cee? I had no idea she was into the hard stuff. I mean, sure, we experimented in college but... Heroine? Oh my, God..." He looked as though he were about to cry, his eyes were wide and jumpy.

"Yeah... well, really it was her pimp's fault. He was the one who got her hooked. She started accepting payments in heroine for him, and I guess one thing just led to another and... In the end it was probably the AIDS that pushed her into it... She was so depressed" I shook my head again, pausing to look at my watch. "Oh my goodness, look at the time. I've got to get to work." I hoisted my purse back onto my shoulder and fluttered my fingers at him as I started to walk away, "It was great seeing you Jimmy. We should get together sometime. Do lunch, you know?" And I turned my head over my shoulder to check his expression one last time.

His face was sheet white, his eyes about ready to burst, his lips pressed into a firm line of disbelief. He checked his watch too, and looked up abruptly, startled by the time. He didn't even glance at me as he hurried away and faded into the crowd.

I smiled, Cee. I thought to myself Good, one less person in this world who worships Cecilia as a goddess. One less person to pine away after her crooked heart. One less person tangled up in her passionate grasp. Now if only I could untangle myself... And I stepped off the curb with a grin on my face, before I pulled my scarf tight around my neck. It may not be snowing but it's still cold as hell. There's nothing to hide me now, Cee.

Write me.

Your Friend,

~M~

2 years 11 months 7 days and 8 hours

Dear Cecilia,

It's been 2 years 11 months 7 days and 8 hours since I last saw your face.

About a week ago, I was at the park at around 5 in the morning; you know how I love those hours at the beginning of the day, where everything is shaded slightly orange. I was sitting on a swing, with my toes buried in muddy silt, and my wet hair piled on top of my head and held up with chopsticks. I watched the sun rise up over the skyline and it reminded me of eggs Benedict. The yellow yoke of the sun sitting placidly on the egg-white clouds situated on top of the pink ham of the atmosphere and the toasted brown of the English muffin horizon; I started to hope it would rain hollandaise sauce all over the park and the road and the buildings and the streets. Just so that my sunrise breakfast could be complete. Breakfast always was your favorite meal…

We would go out in the early hours, and run down to that little pastry shop… God, what was that place called? Prosperous Pastries? Something strange like that… You always got a cinnamon roll, and I would get a croissant or something, and then we’d run, with our crinkly paper bags, all the way to the fountain in the park. The ledge was always wet, and we would circle around, looking for a patch of marble that was dry. Eventually we’d just sit in the water, letting it seep into our pajamas and laughing between bights of morning treats. We couldn’t have been older than 15.

I’m waitressing again, did you know? Of course you didn’t. Well, I am. The costumers are still as wrong as ever. But it’s nice to have something to do with my hands, to keep me busy.

I still love running the big dishwasher. All those bright white plates and bowls piled into the dingy avocado green dish rack. I hoist up the dish rack into the open machine, the steam everywhere tickling my skin and giving me goose bumps from the heat. And then you have to spray them with the big hose, the water sounds like someone taking a hammer to a wall, a loud thunk followed by the scream of the scorching hot water rushing through the tiny rubber nozzles. Once every bit of food has been propelled off by the surging, spurting, jetting flood of water, I hang up the hose on a hook. Then I push the dishes further into the dishwasher and pull the lever that lowers the big metal tank over the plates, like a silver salver cover coming down on a platter full of food. You know it’s secure when you feel the little click of the latch grabbing onto itself, then you have to start it, by pushing the big red button. Then suddenly, everything is covered in steam, it seeps out from sides of the machine, and everything is hot and humid, my skin turns moist and it gleams under the florescent lights of the kitchen. But that only lasts for a second, before the rubber seals itself around the bottom of the dishwasher and all the steam disperses and sets me back in reality. And then… everything is cold and dirty again.

And people always wonder why I volunteer for dish duty.

Write me, please. Please, please, please write back. But I know you won’t.

Your friend,

~M~

2 years 11 months 4 days and 23 hours

Dear Cecilia,

It's been 2 years 11 months 4 days and 23 hours since I last saw your face, and yet I will never forget that your eyes are the color of a winter field, gray as ash and filled with longing. I will never forget that your nose slants slightly to the left leaving awkward shadows on your freckled cheeks. I will never forget that your right eyebrow is perpetually raised in apprehensive questioning. And I will never forget the way your thin pink lips form into shapeless silhouettes when you say the words, "Goodbye forever, dearest friend. I shall leave this place and never return."

God, Cee, couldn't you have given me some warning? Or was it one of those moments. The ones you used to describe to me when we would sit, smoking cigarettes and laughing underneath the Ferris Wheel in Juniper.

You would say, "I don't know what to tell you, M. Sometimes I just know I'm going to die with a dagger in my heart and a gun to my forehead and I'm still not gonna know what the hell it was all for anyway," and then you furrowed your brow, and slowly raised the cigarette to your mouth pinioning it in between your fleshy lips; I could almost hear the smoke swirling around in your lungs.

You paused, contemplating, your eyes searching the horizon for the words you could only ever find at the back of your skull. And then you sighed and all the words started to pour out at once, "It's like, when you're riding your bicycle and the wind is blowing through your hair and stinging your eyes, and everything around you is just a blur of colors, and everything just feels so right. And you smile and laugh, but the wind is so cold and dry, and then your whole mouth feels sticky and rough. And suddenly you can see that there's a rock in front your your wheel, and you know it's coming, and you could swerve to get out of the way, but you don't. You hit it. And there's that moment. In the air, where you know all that's going to happen is you're going to fall, and hit the ground, and it's going to hurt, and it's going to bleed, and you're going to be fine. But then there's that part of you that really believes you are going to die. That this is the end. That falling the 3 and a half feet from the handlebars to the asphalt will take you out of this world. And in that moment, you are totally free. And in that moment you are chained to forever. And in that moment, you don't remember to put your arms out to catch yourself, and you fall, like a vase crashing on linoleum. And then... you're fine... and you're not dead.... just sore. And all that excitement was wasted on a pebble in a road after you smiled so big it hurt your teeth."

"Are you saying you want to die, Cee?" I laughed, exhaling with a cough.

"Fuck no. I just want to learn to harness that excitement. I want every moment to be that moment. "


So is that what it was, Cee? You wanted to be free? You wanted to be chained forever? I don't know where you are. But I need you, Cee, I need you. I need your laughter. I need your short brown curls. I need your hand motions while you talk. I need your button up blouses. I need your thrift store shoes. I need your voice whispering in my ear. I need your anger, I need your joy, I need your sorrow, and I need your love.

My dearest friend, my oldest confidant. Come back to me.

I will write to you. My silent amigo. My wordless compatriot.

If I cannot share in your company, I can at least revel in your abandonment.

Return to sender, I don't give a shit, I'll send them anyway.

Wherever you are, I hate you for leaving me.

Wherever you are, I'll love you forever.

Your Friend,

~M~