Dear Twenty-Year Old Me,
I know it’s been awhile since you felt loved. I was with you in your bedroom on your birthday that night on Dorset Street. You were listening to “I Hope You Dance Radio” on Pandora while ripping off curls of blue and pink wrapping paper from the boxes. I saw you crying, heaving with sobs over the small piles of tufted paper and ribbon. I could see that you were hurting. I loved you then.
I know you wanted somebody to see, and you also hoped so fervently that nobody would see. I was there with you when you downed a bottle of red wine on a Thursday night, taking big gulps straight from the bottle, blasting “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” by Frankie Vallie on your iHome. I loved how you twirled around the room, screaming into the wine bottle as a microphone. I loved you then.
I know you feel so alone. I can see your core, glimmering like well-loved embers, but I can see that you have no access to it at all. I heard your footsteps as you padded down his hall late at night, feeling a hard knot in the pit of your stomach, approaching the inevitable atrophy of your self-esteem with grim dedication. I loved you then.
I know you do not feel like yourself. I was with you as you crouched in the corner of his kitchen, exploding with rage and terror, screaming out expletives about love and devotion. You succumbed to the hurt, cowering animal inside you. You spit and snarled. You clawed at the air. You couldn’t expand your body enough to express the weight of your anger. I loved you then.
I hear you. You are so afraid that you don’t exist. I hear you. You are so tired. I hear you. You feel eighty years old and you are only twenty. I know you are tired. I am always here with you. I will never leave you. I will love you forever.
With all of my love,
Twenty-Seven Year Old Me
Siena Rose 