Valweld'mion Gi'ila's Letters to Faelyn Ar'aphine, Letter 9: Response to Letter 3

Dear Faelyn,
 
To start this: I am ashamed of myself for how quick I was to think you no longer wanted me, either. Also a little amused that we were having the same sort of thoughts and fears. That we both thought we’d overestimated our value to the other.
 
At times, I allow my anxiety to get the best of me. I often want reassurance to calm my nerves. As you need time to think, I may need to ask you to tell me when you need the quiet. Being shut out is so very scary. I know myself and I know I will take your silence as disappointment or anger. Neither of these are your fault.
 
I’m not asking to be let in, but please tell me when you need time. I do not mind waiting if I am told to wait. It’s only the unknown which brings me no small amount of fear.
 
I promise not to broach more difficult topics over Sending. So you may have the time and long conversations you need. If a conversation turns difficult, would you ask me to wait as I would ask of you?
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
You said I deserve someone who did not have to consider kindness. Someone who would not make me wait for niceties. Someone who is good to the last drop.
 
Even if I deserved this imaginary person, would they deserve me?
 
I am not kind to my core. The last drop of me is bitter and unforgiving and selfish and angry and cruel and cowardly. Every day, there is something new for me to regret and learn. Today, I am learning patience. And it will need to be practiced to be lived. Would you really inflict me upon someone who will utterly forgive my shortfalls? Someone who is too kind and loving to take an apology for the hurt I cause them? Someone who would never ask me to be better?
 
To be patient?
 
Sometimes I ask myself if you deserve me. You are working hard to be the person you want to be. You do not deserve to be hindered by me. And there lies all my worst faults in how I want for you. Even those times I think you would be better without me I cannot bring myself to truly admit it, much less to take action.
 
Home has meant one thing for so long. It was mist across jagged rocks battered by the ocean and flowers shaking snow from the late winter in an early spring and thunder making the shutters shudder. It will still mean that, too, but... You’ve so easily changed its definition. Lately when I carelessly say “home”, I imagine the tables I helped lay for dinner or your hand over mine or your arms around my waist as I read and you sleep.
 
I am not a creature who can live on a pedestal, mo corrachag-cagail. My body bleeds and my mouth is sometimes quicker than my good sense and my hands will look for yours. If you place me there, I will leap right into your arms.
 
The place you can keep me is by your side.
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
My heart has no numbers, love.
 
It is only made of people who I—perhaps rashly—gave part of myself to. They’ve almost always returned it, better than what I gave. I am more than content to be your number 2.
 
I know you do not completely trust me. Our six month anniversary is coming up very soon. Why would I expect all of you by now? As frank as I can be, you don’t know all of me either. Our lives are long and we both have so much of it left. There are stories I cannot tell. I do not begrudge your silence.
 
I’m glad for what you have trusted me with. And I want to make new stories with you; stories we’re happy to tell each other.
 
(Have you guessed what part of myself I gave you, mo chridhe?)
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
Finally, I see what you meant now. Whatever forgiveness I can give for what you said, I do. I know this is your first relationship, but I am not as experienced as you may believe. Sometimes, I don’t have the answer. I’m trying to do things “right” for you, whatever that means.
 
Of all of my romantic relationships, only 3 have lasted over a month. You are the third, Faelyn.
 
While I have done a lot of healing since my marriage, my ex-husband was my first in everything. Some things about what he did still makes me hesitate, makes me wonder.
 
I wanted what my parents had. For all my father’s faults, love was so clear in everything to do with my pa. His voice was softer, he smiled, he’d lean down when they were talking like a moth to a flame. My pa’s eyes would sparkle, his hands would still, and he’d smile bright enough to rival a flame. Even when they had a disagreement, their love never faltered. Whatever they saw when they looked at each other reminded them they could be better people.
 
As beautiful, funny and charming as I am... I’ve always been a little insecure. I wanted to be the people they were and found myself lacking. Lately, I’ve been made keenly aware of how much of a disappointment I was to both of them. Whatever I feel now is nothing compared to when I was younger and trying so hard at college.
 
I thought I was “in love”. While my ex-husband was younger than me in years, he was older than me, too. He was 50 when we met at my college. He was... charismatic, handsome, and I thought he was in love with me, too.
 
Stupid.
 
He took advantage of my insecurities. And by the time I realized, we had a child named after a father-in-law that hated me, a child my family didn’t even get to know existed. I felt so stuck and helpless.
 
Sometimes I ask myself if he knew what he was doing. The answer that scares me the most is the one where he didn’t even do it out of malice or greed. Maybe he even thought what he was doing wasn’t wrong.
 
Maybe he thought he was stuck, too.
 
I know now that falling in love doesn’t exist. What my parents had was probably the result of a lot of work and time I wasn’t alive to see. Like everything, I wanted it right away. I didn’t hesitate like I should have, like I can now.
 
I am bad at being first of anything. First impressions, first kisses, being the first of my parents’ children... I could go on. It scares me when I find myself to be the first for fear I may be the last for ruining it. I don’t want you to regret me. I’m so very scared of hurting you the way he hurt me.
 
So as much as you’re trying to be better for me, I’m trying to be better for you. I want to be someone who deserves the happiness you give me. What time we have, I want it to be good for you. That perhaps love isn’t “pathetic codependence” or feeling “stuck” and instead... more like what my parents had.
 
And... a part of me hopes one day you’ll fall in love.
 
And you’ll really mean it when you say you did.
 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
If I were to pepper this letter entirely in romantic sentiments, I might tell you that I was waiting my whole life for you to decide you were ready for the moment we met. And then I may say I didn’t mind the wait because I knew I’d find you one day. It gave me time to be ready to meet you, too. Perhaps I’d lean in and confess I thought I’d met you many times before.
 
Every time, unfailingly, I was wrong.
 
But, I’d whisper—low and just for you—like a secret or a promise, this time I’m right.
 
“Well, who am I?” That’d be the right kind of question to ask.
 
Would it be the right kind of question for me to answer?
 
Mm.
 
yours,
Mion