My Once Friend,

I wonder if you even remember me.  I wonder if you even remember that we used to be friends.

I know I do.

I remember what you did for me. I remember giving you my cheese when we ate in the cafeteria in high school.  I remember seeing you make Pac-Men out of the wax rounds it came in.  I remember laughing with you when you did.  I remember that it was you who introduced me to Er, my spirit-guardian, but not my angel, unless my evil angel.

I remember it was you who led me to Evanescence; you said, “This is the greatest band ever!  Here, listen!” or something to that effect.  I was hooked from then on.
I remember it was you who first introduced me to Breaking Benjamin, though I forgot them until I stumbled upon them again, strolling through YouTube.

I remember your crooked smile, the gap in your front teeth.  I remember you and another of my friends—whom you also left behind—dancing to “Emo Kid”.  The two of you taught me that dance.  I still remember it.  I still do it, every time it comes on and I’m not driving.

I remember the long bus rides; I used to let you listen to my iPod.  And when you got your own, and complained of the earbuds it came with being crappy, I remember giving you a spare set I had and didn’t need.

One of the sides of your set didn’t work, and the iPod you had was full of rap, because you’d gotten it from your cousin.

I remember the lunches in the cafeteria at high school; when you and our other friend broke apart, you’d sit at another table, and I used to join you sometimes.
I remember we started a story together.  It was a roleplay starring four kitsunes bound to fire, water, earth, and air and one girl—a love interest—that you made up.  I played Fire and Water, while you played Earth and Air.  We said we’d share the girl, but I don’t think we ever did.  It was set at a high school much like our own, and they (the kitsunes I mean) were all exactly the same age, down to the second; they forever argued over which of them was the oldest.

You wanted a plot, and I agreed.  I followed along for the most part, but then I got bogged down in a minor detail.  And you followed along for a while, but then suddenly you stopped speaking to me altogether.  For the longest time, I wondered why.

I thought I had said something to offend you.  I thought I had made some horrendous faus pax, and I ran through weeks of our conversations to try and figure out what it was.  I couldn’t do it, and so I started talking to mutual friends of ours…

…and when I found out that it was simply that minor detail I’d gotten bogged down on, I was pissed.  Not at myself, but at you.  We agreed that we would talk to each other through the authors’ notes of that rp; don’t you remember?  All it would have taken was a simple request to move on with the story.  Or perhaps you could have come to me and talked, the way you talked to that mutual friend of ours on here.  You told her what the problem was; why didn’t you tell me?

I could’ve fixed it.  I wouldn’t have minded.  What would have happened if that story had continued?

I still wonder; when I found out, I went to try and reclaim it from you when you were working in the library at school.  You told me that you had thrown it out.

I would say I felt like Caesar when he was stabbed by Brutus, but that would be too dramatic.  But I did feel like you had slapped me across the face with all your strength.  But all I said was “Of course you did,” and I walked away with tears in my eyes.

That was my notebook, you know.  There were things in there that I wanted to keep.

When you broke up with your other friend—who is still a friend of mine—you were quick to reclaim your things.  And she gave them back to you, even though it hurt.  She didn’t do anything to them.  Why couldn’t you have done the same?

I wonder if some future civilization will discover that notebook.  First, they’ll find a description of a group of three planets so equal in mass and volume that they rotate not about individual axes of their own, but about an axis in the center of an equilateral triangle.  The atmospheres of each of those planets are poisonous—fluorine gas and hydrogen—but things live there all the same.  All kinds of things, plants and animals and even people very much like humans.

I never meant for that description to be allegorical, but I suppose it could be seen as such.  And then, after wondering what that description could possibly mean, they’ll find the story we began and never ended.  And maybe they’ll wonder why.
I’m sure they’ll notice that two different hands were writing it.  I bet they’ll wonder what came between those two people that they never finished they’ll story.  Maybe they’ll make up a story of their own to explain why.

I doubt they’ll ‘invent’ the truth of it.  That’s humanity for you, no matter its incarnation.

After I learned what you had done, I mourned.  Not for what could no longer be, but for what we had once had.  I never loved you, and you never loved me; not in that way at least.  Not like what broke apart your other friendship.

But I want you to know I’m sorry.  Not for anything in the past, but for what could happen in the future.  I remember that you shared your story, about the Celestial Maidens that you and many of our friends were the reincarnations of.  I probably shouldn’t be talking about that.  Er says it’s dangerous.

But I dance with danger, and I dance with the devil.  Maybe you’ve noticed my most recent story.  But I remember the story you and the rest of our friends shared with me, and I recognized it as truth the moment you said it.

And I want you to know I’m sorry.  You and the others are Celestial Maidens, but I’m not.  I never was, and I never will be.  I am a Keeper.  Maybe, someday, you will ask your spirit-guardians what I mean by that.  But first you will have to see this, and I don’t think you ever will.

I think you wish to forget my existence.  I don’t know why; a minor bogging down of plot is such a stupid thing to break a friendship—especially a long one such as we had—over.  But I think that is what you wish.

I’m listening to “Dead Boy’s Poem”, a song by Nightwish.  You hate Nightwish.  You told me once; I combined my playlist of them with my playlist of Evanescence and I shared it with you on the bus ride home.  But oddly, the song fits both my mood and our lost friendship.

I’m not trying to make you feel bad, and I’m not trying to make you come back to me.  I don’t know why I’m writing this.  I don’t even know why I thought of you today as I was watering the front lawn of my house as the sun was sinking.  But I did, and I knew I had to write this.

And so I am.  And again, I want you to know I’m sorry.

You see, ever since you put me and Er in touch with each other, I’ve seen small visions of what might happen in the far-distant future, after I and all the rest of us have died and begun to walk the destinies that wait for us after death.  And once I saw myself standing by the side of Sauron in the tower of Barad-dûr in Mordor, and before the two of us stood you and all the rest of our friends.

I was not his bride, nor was I his consort.  I was just some ‘seer’ who had decided to help him out for a time.  And you and all the others had somehow appeared in his tower, and you, in desperation—for he was about to have you all thrown in the dungeons—claimed to know me.

Since I was there, he had a Nazgul fetch me and bring me to see you all.  That’s where the vision ended.  I’ve always wondered what it was I said.

That vision first came before our friendship ended, and I ignored it for the most part then.  I knew what I would say.  “They’re telling the truth; they are all my friends,” and then I would introduce everyone.

And when it came again, after you and I no longer spoke, I also knew what I would say.  “I know everyone but the redhead.”

And then I would turn to you and mouth I’m sorry, before continuing, “She and I used to be friends, but now we no longer are.  It’s stupid really, but you know how friendships go.  I don’t know her anymore.”

Which is true.  I don’t know who you are.  I remember who you used to be.  Have you turned to drugs in the time we’ve been apart?  Have you gotten addicted?  Have you been drinking?  Have you sold yourself to men or women?  Do you have a tattoo, or perhaps a piercing?  What kinds of things do you write now, if you write at all?  Do you still draw?  What’s going on in your life?  Is there anything that I might have been able to help you with?  Do you drive?  What school do you attend now?  Do you work, do you go to college?  Do you do both?  What color is your hair?  Do you wear glasses?  Did you get braces to fix that gap in your teeth?

I don’t know.  I don’t devwatch you anymore.  It seemed appropriate.

I hid the comment you left on my profile when I was first starting up on dA.  I was still mourning; I didn’t want to think of you.

And I haven’t until today.

And even now, I don’t know why I did.

I’m sorry.

I’m going to post this letter; if you’re reading this, you already know that.  I’m going to send this to you in a note, even though you’ll probably delete the moment you see who it’s from.

But if you see this, remember me and remember how it used to be.  I’m not asking anything more, and I wonder if even this is too much.

I hope that the scene I mentioned above doesn’t happen, for the sake of what we used to have.  I hope that you and I never meet again, at least not after we have died.  If we meet again in this life, I hope we can make amends.

I do.  Truly.

I’m sorry, but Nightwish says it best:

Born from silence, silence full of it
A perfect concert my best friend
So much to live for, so much to die for
If only my heart had a home

Sing what you can`t say
Forget what you can`t play
Hasten to drown into beautiful eyes
Walk within my poetry, this dying music
- My loveletter to nobody

Fare well, and namarie, my once friend.