CHAPTER 3: Dear Elliot,
(Letter)
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3 Jan 2018
Dear you,
I saw you again today.
In the same book-cafe where we met for the first time and also a few last times, but it hardly qualifies as a meeting when there are more than a few feet between us and you refuse to even look at me, does it?
I froze, my gliding eyes came to a sudden halt on you, veins turned to ice, my fingers gripped the book in my hand tighter. I wondered why you were there, were you visiting?
My mind was torn again and the dull ache in my heart that I thought was in the past returned, along with bleak grief that lately I've come to associate with you.
Maybe that's why I'm writing this. This diary is my heart and these words, my pain...
You once were that fond face I was accustomed to in the otherwise morose campus, but all that changed a while back. You no longer make my day brighter just by walking into the room, it's all in the past now, and I long for those days like an infatuated fool.
The familiar setting brought back memories, much like when I find a piece of you among my things, or a note you left behind or a photograph caught in time.
Remember the first time we met? I coincidentally sat in a chair close to you while there was some book club activity going on and we were supposed to talk about our favourite fictional character.
You turned to me and asked, "Who's your favourite fictional character?" It was the first time you spoke to me directly and I was momentarily tongue-tied staring in your deep brown eyes.
It wasn't the first time I had seen you, but you never noticed me and I was over the moon that you finally did. I have always noticed you, I was a distant admirer as I kept to my corner, but I was curious about you.
"Elliot" I answered your question on a whim.
You thought about it for a minute and then admitted: "Never heard of it."
I nodded and replied, "That's because it's in the making."
You gave me a puzzled look as your brows ever so slightly furrowed "I'm afraid you didn't get the activity." You said.
To which I reasoned "You weren't specific, you asked fictional, not famous fictional."
You smiled a little at my words and mouthed almost to yourself "technicalities." We then talked about your favourite fictional character instead and I was happy to just hear you talk.
And that's all it took for me to harbour a crush on you.
I would regularly go to the book cafe hoping to run into you- accidentally on purpose, and so we met again after a few days. You spotted me from across the room and aimed that disarming smile at me, I never had a chance of escaping unscathed, did I?
You walked up to me and asked as if you had been thinking about it, "what if I had insisted on it being a 'famous fictional' one?"
I smiled at your eagerness and your blunt questioning and said "Well, you forget to be specific again. It could become famous in the future."
You pressed your lips in a line, clearly displeased at the fact that I found a loophole again. "So much effort just to impress a girl? Is that what John Keating is still doing to the boys?"
I don't know what amazed me more, the "dead poet's society" reference or you so bluntly calling out my efforts.
"Elliot would have to be really really good if I were to impress you... " I said instead, trying to not give away how much you were affecting me.
I was the same old me, outwardly calm, inwardly loud and chaotic and intrinsically a catastrophe in social situations.
But you didn't mind all that, and we met again, this time for a date and basically discussed the perils of romanticism and poetry among other things.
Is there no way to go back?
I don't know why I remember every moment spent in your company with such stark clarity, but hardly anything else left a similar mark.
I'm always brimming with things I want to share with you, things only you would appreciate, things only you would know what to do with.
Sometimes I wish I could bridge the gap that had delved out, opened up like a giant crater between us.
You were standing just across the room, a few steps away, but reaching you had become near impossible, so I silently left the book I held, on a shelf and exited the book cafe but my thoughts lingered wanting to stay with you, much like you exited my life but left a shadow that's casting darkness in your wake.
Yours,
(Reluctantly)
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(REPLY)
28 Aug 2018
Dear Elliot,
Yes, I'm gonna call you Elliot. ('Random-guy-who's-diary-I-found' is such a mouthful.) Today I thought of numerous ways of returning this diary to you. (Especially after reading that letter) I'm assuming it is precious and you would want it back.
And even though I read the first letter out of curiosity and to find out who you are, the second one I read was purely out of intrigue and opposed to my better judgment. I must say I have no idea who you are, you've done a good job of maintaining that mystery even though it wasn't done for my benefit.
I know I shouldn't read your letters, but I can't stop myself from turning to the next page in the midst of another very monotonous class....it's too late now to reprimand my poor choices and admittedly I am a very curious creature and to be honest, the temptation was too great...
I know it's not a good enough reason, but that's all I've got.
But about that letter.....What bleak grief do you talk about? And why? I don't understand...
What happened? This is a total 180° flip from your other letter and I wasn't ready. What went wrong? Will you fill me in please, I'm missing some major chunks and pieces of the whole picture...
I noticed your letters aren't regular, they are weeks and sometimes even months apart. And I'm guessing you write these when it's too much for you to handle everything you're feeling, I get that, totally understandable, but still...
Why did you leave?
Oh darn, I'm getting way too worked up over this letter... I need to calm down.
Thank God you are fictional. If this diary is your heart as you say, then I hold your heart in my palms right now and you can make it beat with your words. I can feel the throbbing. Or is it my heart?
Okay... let's back up a little bit.
What a beautiful first meeting, actually that was like the corniest meet-cute. Does this happen in the real world? I was on the verge of successfully convincing myself that something so fairytale-like only happens in, well, fairy tales.
But beyond the decorative description of yours, I could imagine how simple and sweet the conversation would have been. And boy, you were smitten. You were-a smitten-kitten!
It made me go aww! Probably after this - Help me find a guy like you, please?
But why suddenly-... ? I thought everything was going well...discussing the perils of romanticism and poetry on your first date was a promising start, I must say.
I am really curious now... What happened? What did she do? Or was it something you did but can't accept?
After reading the first letter, I thought it was a sweet romance but now it's taking a tragic turn, I don't know how that makes me feel.
To tell you the truth I'm always hoping to find someone...something similar. I don't crave for love that inspires art and poetry, for those are too rare and yet maybe not as exquisite as the artist makes them seem. I wish for something real, tangible, maybe even flawed and imperfect, but still dear to me in many indefinite ways.
Maybe this is all still too much.
What I've experienced is only along the lines of "unrequited love' and to think back on it, I feel it probably wasn't even love, just something close that resembled it.
He was not the super popular or immensely attractive type that girls usually fall for, he was simple, very obscure and polite, he treated everybody nice and he was my friend. I grew to like him eventually- but I never said anything to him about it or confessed, but in retrospect- I feel I was quite obvious, I was never good at lying or hiding what I really feel and he probably knew. But I can't be sure. It led nowhere for the longest time, I was too afraid to put my feelings out there and eventually he started dating this other girl, while I was left on the sidelines, nursing a broken heart.
I regret it sometimes, the time I wasted over him, but it's in the past.
I don't understand why I'm confessing all of this to you, it must really be easier to pour your heart out to a stranger, than sharing your thoughts with someone you know and love.
Can't wait to read the rest of the letters (kinda sorry). Anyway, I am gonna stop scribbling.
(Here comes the signing part.) I am being sincere to your lady love's rule here. I take the name of my favourite character from a movie very close to my heart. Not that I am dating a guy I possibly don't love. Not that I have been set up with a guy by his son. But maybe. Maybe I am looking for a story with that element of magic. So even if not in Seattle,
Sleepless-ly,
Annie.
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