There's no use hashing it out... or going over the same things over and over again. I think we've all said what we have to say, and we're all set in our perspectives. So, it is how it is. Instead of fighting with you, for you, and wanting you back with me... it's all useless, so let's just leave it...
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When you first moved into our little town of North Plains I was instantly jealous of your fiery red hair, that and you had curves already - when I was still just a stick figure. I was bullied at the time by a group of girls that thought it was simply hilarious to make fun of me because I was poor. Then, you were so strong. You stood up against the bullying with me. You helped me to have a front against hatred for hatred's sake. So we'd sit on the even bars, play MISSISSIPPI and we grew to be fast friends.
I fell in love with your army brat family. The concept of each of your siblings being born in a different state was so alien to me. I loved your mother's accent - how thick it was then! - and your brother's chubby cheeks. We spent our time getting to know each other, to play and to grow as only children can. We watched Dark Wing Duck and danced with high pony-tails in your back yard, singing into hairbrushes.
In middle school, as you became closer with Jason - we slipped apart. We still gossiped in bathrooms, and we talked about joining the lacrosse team in high school.
Freshman year we played lacrosse, and all those old bonds we had forged came coming back to us. Spending those long, long, long practices running - playing in the mud, chatting about boys, putting on those horrible fake nails. We made the ultimate defense duo. Your parent's made you move because of Jason, and I left after due to my father's increasing violence.
I didn't think I'd see you again. So many things were whirling around us both. Yet, I moved in with my grandparents, I faked my way into Liberty - and there on the very first day I met you all over again. Fate would put us together then, in every class (thank goodness our guidance counselor listened to you!). Any separation that existed between us was gone. You became my best friend once again, you became my sister, once again.
We played lacrosse again, we switched - regrettably to tennis. We had our boys, such silly boys, and we wrote novels of notes. Both matching in wit and intelligence, we flew through our classes. We expanded our range of friends and those we held near and dear to us. We made plans to go to PSU together, to live together and start our lives together.
We worked together, and shared so many precious moments and milestones.
I thought, so many times during this phase in our lives, how much easier life would be if we could just be with each other. If all the drama of the boys we'd loved would cease. It was so much easier to hold your hand and love you than it was anyone else. I warned you against all the broken hearts. I held you as Justin smashed your belief in love to pieces. I knew that with one another we would be content, we could be happy. But, I just couldn't force myself to see you in that light.
PSU didn't fit with your dreams, and it was too expensive for me, so you moved down to Corvallis. It was the hardest time for me. I was limited in my connectivity with the female race, spent far too much time with Clint and became codependent. Yet, for the summer you came back to me and all things were as they should be. I was anxious as you described Danny to me, your way of meeting, of starting a relationship. However, as I saw you grow and watched all your positive attributes heighten and your negative ones diminish - I knew that everything would be okay with him.
You not being there was hard for me. When things started falling apart, I called you... but I couldn't hold you, couldn't bury my tears into your ever welcoming embrace. I think it was then I really, truly felt your absence. A hole was in my heart where you should have been. I was so dejected and broken and wished that you were there to hold me. I love you more than I've loved another human being in my life. Your comfort is the most cherished out of all.
I turned to other friends, the pain eased. Soon I grew to see the sun again. Summer came, and brought you back to me. I think this summer was my favorite. You were there, a new love was there... everything seemed to be falling so perfectly into place. We saw Broadway shows, we ate tasty lunches, we grew together. We discovered proposals, we rejoiced together.
We planned my wedding, you became engaged. Everything was so perfect... minus you moving away from me again. Still, we e-mailed and chatted and facebooked... we stayed close. On my wedding day, everyone was there that mattered. You, John, my grandparents and family. That's all I needed. All I've needed for so long was you beside me.
There everyone met Corey, although you'd briefly met him before hand during extravaganzas throughout the town. There, the seeds were planted that led to all this demise.
Whereas in elementary school you stood up against the bullies with me, in this case you let the bullying continue and fell in love with the bully. You let hatred for hatred's sake run rampant. He was jealous that I took his friend from him, and so plotted to take mine from me. He was successful, though I never thought it would work. In his design, he spread lies and rumors about me to all that would listen. To my astonishment it worked. All these people that I thought would be with me through thick and thin let their hearts and minds be turned against me by someone they hardly knew. Somehow he wormed his way inside, somehow the light that once shown was diminished. Though I did nothing, though I spoke to no one, somehow everyone had painted this picture of me that I had no help in building. I was newlywed, blissful in my time with my husband, busy with work. I had no time to tell people these things he said I did, I had no time to partake in the actions he said I did. How ridiculous the accusations, I thought that even the smallest child, the dimmest wit could see through them... yet, to my disbelief and astonishment not a single person did.
The James that had promised to marry me if we hit 30 and were unwed threw such accusations at me. The Tiffany that I had uplifted for so many years believed the lies without doubt. The Brittany... the you... that had once been ready to fight for me, was so far won over by this bully that she just stood by and shrugged. Called it not her fight, said it didn't involve her. Where before we were allies, and an attack against one was an attach against both... this time, it was irrelevant.
So now, here I am. His hatred of me for no reason what so ever continues. His lies about me with no founding what so ever continue. Your shrugging and calling it not your fight continues. I fought for you as long as I could. I pleaded and begged for you to see the reality of the situation. I pleaded with everyone. I begged Tiffany to use logic, to analyze the facts and see if they made sense. She claimed they seemed a little far fetched, but she too decided that it was easier to believe the negative than find solidity in the truth of the positive. You decided it was easier to find belief in the negative than in the logical train of the positive. For all the lies you believed, through all the facade you couldn't see through... I became more dejected.
The friend I thought I had wasn't there anymore. You were no longer someone I could love and trust. For every word I said to you was passed to him and used to develop these believable lies that then got spread to everyone. You helped fuel the fire of hatred for hatred's sake, of evil for evil's sake. As I sent you my warning, it was already too late. As I told you the truth, you were already too mesmerized by his web he'd been building to really listen, to really care. You had fallen in, it was too late.
You were the one person I believed would see through everything, the one person I thought would fight with me to the end. You had always been there, never been one to believe any poor lie about me that made it to your ear. I'm not sure what about this time was so different. I'm not sure how he was able to get in and so drastically alter your personality that you became unrecognizable to me. I'm not sure how he was able to take you from the two people that loved you more than anything in the world. I wish I was strong enough to still protect you. I wish that now I could try and forget that you let the bully win, that you contributed to him winning.
Every sunny day I long to call you and relish the morning with you. I long to drink and be merry with you. Every time I see an adorable cow, I wish I could take a picture and send it to you. Every time I go shopping I wish you were there. I miss our conversations about nothing that would somehow lead to basketball or Star Wars or psychology. I go into a dressing room and wonder how the hell I'm supposed to decide what to wear without you. My bridesmaid dress for your wedding that never will come to pass hangs on the back of a chair and reminds me every day of what I've lost. You were always one to use logic and see things objectively, yet somehow you lost that. The logical part of your brain was snatched away and something different is in its place.
I miss being able to have full conversations in a crowded room without making a sound. I love knowing who you used to be, and knowing that we'll never know anyone so easily and intimately as we know one another. I hope that you can think of me with fondness even through the lies and the hatred that surrounds you.
You know that I have a soul, that I am honest to a fault, that I unfaltering in my loyalty. You know the road that I've been down, you know the struggles I've overcome - because you helped me overcome them. It is because of you that I was brought to God, that I can let him into my heart and have faith when all else has been taken from me.
The devil will tempt me, but because of the strength you've given me, and God's given me I will resist, I will overcome. I will not lose my faith though I am tested every day. Though every single day I think of you, and therefore think of the wickedness and fickle hearts throughout humanity - I still have faith that goodness exists. Because of this, I believe that people can be brought to redemption if they admit their sins and repent. God loved all, the beggar, the prostitute, every sinner - just as much as he loved the righteous. So, I do too have the capacity to forgive all transgressions. There are two people in this life who I will have to work to forgive, who will have to do more than simply say the words but will have to show repentance in massive quantities and will have to work hard to earn anything other than my meager acceptance of their words. Those two people are my father, and Corey. The only two truly evil people I have ever known. The only two people who, when you look into their eyes you see not goodness, but a fragile soul hoping to hurt. Whether genetic, or products of their environments these two people are the only actually bad people I know, the only two people so lacking in anything good it's a wonder they don't collapse in singularities of blackness. There are others that have wronged me, the children in my youth, teachers who didn't believe, my mother who abandoned me, all those that believed a single word that was said. But these people I know were just products of the wrong environment. These people would be forgiven with the simplest of apologies, and some with time. Most of them have been already forgiven though they have not asked for it.
The bullies of my past contacted me and apologized for their actions. Though it took them a decade, they looked back on their past and realized that they perpetuated hatred for hatred's sake. They realized that the hatred they had, had nothing to do with me, but their own spite. So, of course, they are forgiven. I hope it does not take a decade for the evil done to me this past year to be realized by all involved. A decade is plenty of time to forgive and forget, but it is too long to repair what friendships that were before the games ensued.
My dearest friend, my bestie. You have pained me more than you could ever possibly comprehend. I know that you are so entangled in his web you probably can't even understand my perspective at all. That's okay, it's really not your fault. You became so mixed in with him before he really laid his best work out in the open, that it was easy for you to fall into his gait. I will not blame you for this, though part of me thinks it would be easier that way. It would be so easy if I could say "You've thrown your lot in with him so I hate you just the same."
It'll never be that way. The love I have for you is transcendent of any earthly thing.
You were duped by this mirage, and yes, I thought you were smarter than all that, but it's not your fault. You fell in love, and that was not your fault.
I hope that he has changed, at least the face he shows you, enough that you are happy. I hope that he gives you everything you've ever wanted. You deserve the world, you deserve to be treated like a princess. You shouldn't have to be sad, or ever intimidated. You shouldn't have to leave your family, or your friends either. You shouldn't have been poisoned with his words. But, that cannot be changed.
I hope you thoroughly enjoy the time you have in this life. I hope that you claim the world as yours. I wish you only the best, though I am utterly perplexed as to how this is to be achieved with the one you are with. I hope you get to see Chicago as you've always wanted to. I hope you get to prance on the East Coast in the fall. I hope that someday he gives you the big wedding you've always wanted. I hope you get to wear that Maggie Sottero you fell so hopelessly for. I hope you reclaim yourself, that you build self confidence that was missing and always made me sad to never see in you.
You were supposed to be there for me. You were supposed to be the god mother to my children. I can't help but think about how absolutely amazing it would have been if Corey hadn't been such a horrible person. If he had been a wonderful person, I can't imagine how happy things would have been for us. To have our husbands be best friends, to have the four of us be the perfect quartet. I regret that he let me see who he really is, that he wasn't able to hide the evil from me. I too know how easy it is to be led by him into believing he really is sorry for himself, that he just can't help it. I pushed him away and let him back in so many times. He would have be believe his regret was genuine, and then he would tell me a lie about John, about Tiffany, about someone I loved. Unlike the rest of you, I did not believe these lies, and so I grew to know the extent of his wickedness. The vastness that I cannot even begin to comprehend.
In my lovely imagination I picture the four of us on the beach, or at Montage. Laughing and delighting in one another's company. While I loved Danny so much, he always kept you from being mine totally. And so, in my selfishness, you being with Corey would have been so much better. With us together, back in action full time, the love and happiness would have been overwhelming in its scope.
As the scene fades, I realize that Corey will never be amazing or wholesome or honest or kind. There is too much wickedness within. I hope he is combating it, that he is working on making himself a good person for you. From reading your blogs it sounds like he is. I hope he doesn't treat you so poorly as he did in his past relationships. I hope he doesn't try to control you and alienate you as he did in his past relationships. I hope that he grows to be amazing, wholesome, honest, and kind to you. In my deepest heart I hope that he becomes like the bullies of my past, regretful for the mistakes he made, guilty for tearing us apart. He tried so very hard to break Johnathan and I apart, our love will withstand anything. He tried so very hard to break us apart, and he did, though I thought our love was stronger.
My friend, farewell. I love you, as I always have loved you. I will look back on our moments with fondness. I will try to place you defending me from the bullies in our youth over you putting one before me in our present. I will keep your place in my heart available for you if issues were ever to be resolved.
I don't see a resolution happening. I just can't fathom a world where he repents, where truth is laid bare.
So I tell you regrettably goodbye. I hope you continue to write in your blog so that I can know what is going on in your life. I like being able to keep a window into your life open, so I can make sure that you feel happy and taken care of. It brings me joy to read your words and know that you feel content, that you feel like your life is falling in order. I wish that I could be a part of it. I wish that everything could be smoothed over. I miss you more than you could imagine.
There is a deep and aching pit in my soul for you. Each day it remains, though I try to forget. Each night it keeps me from sleeping, each moment it keeps me distracted from my life.
It's now habit to not call you, it's been affirmed in my routine that you are someone lost. I am made painfully aware of this. While I've let all rumors created rest, cut all those who believed them out of my life, and have tried to stop the hatred, it keeps being brought to the foreground - it keeps being asserted and rehashed.
Though I miss you, I know it is not my fault you were snatched away. Though I regret those lost, I know that I've done nothing wrong. So, I can find solace in knowing that I have nothing scarring my conscious. I just have to continue trying to be the best person I can and continue spreading love and light to all those I can. I will remain unfaltering in my resolve, my belief, my courage, honesty, and loyalty.
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Farewell.
All my love,
Forever,
Steph
