I know I fell and I know that I dropped you too. Man is weak: I am Man. I was just so tired... I'd carried you for so long, cared for you and helped you out of the pit you yourself said you were in, and seemed so reluctant to leave. I was tired because I sacrificed everything to help you, and when I finally collapsed from exhaustion, you fell with me and you were hurt. I wish I could have taken the pain, that I would hurt doubly and you be unscathed, and as always that I could bear your burden for you. Perhaps that is why I grew tired in the first place.

Perhaps the most amazing thing is that you didn't need me to pick you back up. While I struggled to lift myself from the depths to which I'd descended, you also fought and brought yourself out of the darkness. Scarred, perhaps, and no doubt unhappy, but independent. Perhaps you'd always been able to carry yourself, and perhaps I had helped you to grow enough that you no longer needed me to help you. For that alone I still rejoice to see; that even without me, you live.

Then I was cast aside. I realized my failure and I came begging at your feet for forgiveness. I knew that things could never go back to how they had been before, but I never expected you to leave me behind and act as though you'd never known me. I had hoped that you would have kept no record of my wrongs as I had kept no record of yours. I had hoped that you would love me enough to at least speak to me despite my mistakes. I had hoped that, at the least, you could stand to pretend that we were still friends and allow me the comforting disillusion that there was still a bond between us, however weak and unused.

But no. You instead chose to tear yourself from my life completely. And not just the visits, or the long phone calls, or the lovingly written letters, or the privileged status as a friend. No, you shattered every single thing that ever had spanned between us. When you walked out, you took my heart and my future with you. You took everything. Such a wound no longer is capable of healing, but rather sits gaping and bleeding until there is nothing left to bleed out. Rather, until there is nothing left.

I hate how you've cast aside everything that happened as though it is irreparable. I have never stopped loving you and my love for you has not diminished by any measure. I hate that I was such a damned fool and that I made you suffer so much, and at the same time I hate that you almost don't even seem to care how much I was suffering too. I hate how you fight me off any time I even just try to say hello. I hate how I think about you every day and every night. I hate seeing something or smelling something or tasting something that reminds me of you and realizing where I've seen or smelled or tasted it before. Sometimes, I even hate that I didn't die young enough to have never met you in the first place.

I know I will foolishly try to bring you back to me again, but I doubt we will ever be friends. In fact, I doubt we will ever speak. Someday we will pass each other in the store, lock eyes for a moment, and continue on without a word. And someday I will read about your death in a newspaper, shed a tear for you, and turn to the opinions page. We will never like each other again.

But let there be no doubt in your mind that you will always be my dearly beloved.

I'd feared that she would show up ever since I found out I'd have to stop at this school. Her little sister was with her too, and that could only compound the problem. When she saw my face, I saw the tears come to her eyes. I regarded her with as little expression as possible, though I probably ended up looking more snobby and distant than neutral.
"What is wrong with you?" her sister asked, incredulous at my behavior. "Why can't you even say something to her?"
I ignored the younger one and spoke to the girl who really needed to hear it. The crying one. "Because you're the only one who could ever make me feel like a blank page... like a waste of attention spent."

I've recently rediscovered the power, importance, and insight of dreams. I haven't been sleeping as well since I got home as I did at school (I prefer a firm mattress and the prison-made one at school is quite a bit more to my liking than the broken-in daybed mattress I have here) and the fact is manifested in the number of dreams I remember these past few weeks. As always, I only really remember select images and short segments from each of them. However, I can almost always remember the themes and overtones of each dream, regardless of how little else I remember about it. At this moment I can only remember three dreams which I've had since I left school; one is about a problem I have been struggling with for years, another about something I perceive as a problem (whether it really is or not has yet to be determined). The third was about me facing problems, though I was quite capable to deal with them all easily.

The field opened up in front of us as we stepped out of the cave in the cliffside. Creatures I'd never seen before nested there, as numerous and scattered as the sower's seed fallen across the dips and rises of the plains ahead. They closely resembled the four-legged spiders we'd seen in the caves, though these were each easily as large as I, even sitting dormant on their nests. In the hazy distance I could see a tower, seeming a mere needle on the horizon. If it weren't for the beasts we could be there by evening. As it was, I knew in my heart that even such large beasts would not allow their nests to be passed so closely by intruders such as us.
I turned to Theo and Keenan, the most level-headed and quick-minded of the children I was leading. They each had a quarterstaff in hand and I could see they were daunted by the sight of the creatures. "Watch out for the rest," I told them, "and call to me if you come to trouble." They nodded, seemingly unsure of themselves, but also knowing that they had to set the example for the rest.
With the rear guard set, I drew my sword and walked towards the nearest beast in our path. As I approached, a few plans of attack came to mind, before I realized I knew nothing about how the thing would react. Its large black eyes somewhat unnerved me; if the creature was awake she certainly could see me, but I could not tell. I came closer, and she stood up from her nest, reaching at least eight feet. I charged in, striking at the nearest appendage I saw as a threat...

The dream I had Saturday night, however, was not an easy dream. It quite literally scared me, and I lay awake for who knows how long afterwards, breathing hard and trying to collect myself again. It was quite clearly not your average dream. I am of a strong persuasion, in fact, that it was a message directly from God. I am also pretty sure I know what he was trying to tell me, and I must say, it was quite an effective delivery.

The lightning in the distance caught my attention away from the conversation I'd been having with Rebecca and another friend. Lightning had always been my favorite natural phenomenon by far. There were a number of small clouds satellite to the main storm head, and the lightning leapt between them regularly. After only a minute or so, I'd pinned down the oddly consistent pattern concerning which cloud would launch a bolt at which other. In fact, I began to call the strikes before they even occurred, with surprising accuracy.
Before too long, however, the pattern broke up: rather than the western cloud discharging into the central one, the central cloud discharged into nearly every one surrounding it. At that point, I was struck with a deep and unexplainable fear, and commented to Rebecca, "I think I'm about to die."
Little did I know at that time how close I was to the truth. Barely had the words left my mouth before I saw a blue glow in the middle of our small circle. A moment later, a lightning bolt touched down where the glow had been, bringing me to my feet in surprise. The shock factor of the event was deeper than the body. At that point, I realized that lightning was no longer just a pretty light in the distant sky. In fact, when I then saw the glow settling on my own body, I realized that it was a powerful and deadly force of nature which could easily kill me with only a second of notice.
I dove to the side, just an instant before the bolt struck. Barely had I recovered before I saw the glow again resting on me. I rolled away before being hit, and leapt up. I looked down, surprised to see that I was, this time, not illuminated by eerie blue light. My high spirits were crushed when I looked up and instead saw the glow surrounding Rebecca, who was still unexplainably sitting in her chair. She was much too far away for me to save her from the inevitable strike, but by God, I would save her or die trying. I leapt forward towards her...
Everything froze. A message appeared in the air in front of me as I hung in the air where I'd jumped. "I don't like your..." is all I could read before it disappeared again. I didn't need to read anymore though: I knew what was wrong, and I knew then that I had to fix it, for my sake and for Rebecca's.