The Spencer Letters

Letter 21.

Dear Spencer,

Have you ever felt happy and miserable at the same time? Is there even a name for such a feeling? I've been looking for one since yesterday, but I'm coming up blank! You're better with words than me, maybe you know? Well, when I find it, I will let you know how it is that I feel.

Last night didn't end on a good note. When Harry left around midnight without saying anything after I told him about Cruz and me, my whole world fell off its axis and it took me over two hours to finish the letter telling you about it.

By then, it was around three in the morning and I was exhausted from crying so much and so hard. My entire body ached, and I wished so much that I could pick up the phone and call you and ask you to come spend the rest of the night with me! I'm sure that with you lying next to me I would've been able to sleep at least a little.

You always calm me, Spence. At times when I break down or blow up, you are my ground wire. Without you, I either feel like a ticking bomb that's about to go off or I feel weak, frail and defenseless, it seems like there's no in-between. I need you to come back and balance me. If not you, then who?

My body gave up some time around 4:30 and I managed to get about four hours of sleep. The next morning, I felt like I had been run over by a train. Which I had... I had been run over by a train named Harry.

This time, I wasn't going to let him leave things up in the air like we've done a million times before. After the kisses, the confessions and the revelations, we had made massive progress and I was not just about to let it all go to waste.

So, I texted him asking to come see me after he got off work, or at night for our daily drink, or later after The Ace closed. I didn't care if I had to stay up all night again, as long as we talked. I had the day off, so I was available whenever and he couldn't use me being busy with work as an excuse.

I went by the hospital to see you after that and, as usual, was joined by Junior around lunch time. He noticed I wasn't having the best of days but didn't push when he realized I was not going to open up. I was thankful for that. It's not that I don't trust him (he trusted me with his secret), but this is too big of a mess to have other people involved. It's enough that Uncle Shane already kinda knows.

Junior told me that he and Dylan are trying to come up with ideas on how to celebrate your birthday in two months. Yes, they're thinking waaay ahead, but both know you well enough to be a thousand percent sure that you'd hold it against us forever if we let your big day go unnoticed (of course, Spencer Styles, I'm rolling my eyes at how extra you are about birthdays!).

There's not much they can do other than to decorate your room and get us all in there at the same time to sing you happy birthday, but planning keeps them entertained and distracted from the fact that there isn't really much to celebrate, after all. Not if you're not here to celebrate with us.

Anyway, here is how the rest of the day went...

Harry texted me back during his lunch break. Yes, he texted, not called. That meant he really didn't want to talk to me. At all.

We went back and forth as to where to meet. We couldn't meet at the loft because I didn't want Shane to see him coming upstairs with me (nothing wrong with that, he's been up here many times before, but now it's not the same), and besides, I was sure we wouldn't be able to keep our voices down. He suggested his apartment, but I refused. How could we talk about our feelings for each other under the same roof he shares with another woman?

The basketball court down the street would be too crowded that early in the evening. My parents were home, your mom was home and anywhere public was a no-go. So, we decided to meet at the river, by the bridge. No one goes there but fishermen and young couples... we are neither, but that was always the place we went to when we wanted to stay out past our curfew and didn't want to be found by our parents.