February 22, 2003

Stanley,

I'm not in love with you Stanley; so don't get nervous, you poor cagey darling. I only really find you tempting every now and again, when you're not being completely self-serving, or completely unavailable. But then, I confess I have these other moments, time warps through unresolved issues.

I know I once told you I'd had a crush on you in middle school, but I'm sure I never told you how my daily existence was validated by a flash of a smile in my direction, or a slight chuckle at one of my crude jokes. I have so many vivid memories of middle school, some to do with pre-adolescent social agony on a larger scale… but most of the instantly recallable sensations have to do with you, and the way the room began to whirl a little, the way my throat would seize and my veins would throb with intoxication, from just a whiff of your cloying scent.

There's a particularly visceral snapshot in my mind's photo album, of that day in ninth grade. You were over at my house, we were sitting on my bed, and we had stopped talking…I remember, because my senses were singing, I remember I was running my hands through your hair; your long hair, parted down the middle. I tease you about it still, every once in a while; it made you look like Rider Strong on Boy Meets World. (I distinctly recall thinking on the first day of sixth grade that the new guy was disappointingly unattractive. But that was before you started oozing your belligerent charisma all over the place. And before you grew up. A little.) That day, in my all Laura Ashley room, I remember you telling me you liked it when girls wove their fingers through your hair. I don't remember taking the hint. And even though you sometimes let slip that we came close to being together, I think your sixth grade torture, now outweighed by years of friendship, is too imbedded in my engineering for me to believe that you ever have found me at all appealing. But why should that be of any consequence?

Even in recent years, there are moments that snare me: the way a certain t-shirt will stretch languidly across your broad frame, the look of enigmatic intelligence and thoughtfulness your reading glasses imbue you with. Grace, before dinner at your family's house, sometimes surprises me with the astonishing softness and vital warmth of your hands. I've always loved your hands, your musician's hands. You have such long fingers. They've always struck me as awkward and elegant at the same time; they exude a rough deftness that's so compelling.

But the real reason I stick around is your writing. It's indescribably beautiful, and inexplicably addictive. It's so un-elaborative, so unlike mine, so taut with passionate tension; it's like a melody you heard only once that continues to haunt you in moments of loneliness. Much like my memories of you sometimes give me goosebumps. I think on some level I stay by you to be close at hand when your talent fully blossoms; I want to witness your release into public consciousness, and to claim a friend's rights, maybe even a dedication page.

Your talent keeps you irresistible…even as my days are frequently validated by greater things than you, greater things than me.

I'm a happier, healthier person than I've ever been, I feel increasingly comfortable with myself and in my body. Sometimes I'm even buoyed by purpose. But, within the confines of our relationship, I still sometimes feel like I'm in grade school. The only reason the subject of this letter is of any concern is because I may forever assume that I am unattractive to the majority of the world, even if I might very well be, and though I usually don't care, much. And all because somewhere in my past is a dangling participle (pun intended.)

I watch myself crumble in the wake of your writings, and I am intrigued; given hindsight and perspective, how can I still have these concerns, entirely separate even from how I feel about you as a person, that go back to before I had braces? You've seen me too; I finished reading 'Flirt' and slipped off to the bathroom. When you asked later what was wrong, I calmly and objectively explained as best I could…That your poignant detail, your smooth prose, makes a girl feel like all she'd ever want out of life would be for someone to write about her that way. And then I started crying again, much to my continued surprise. You left, despite the hour, to write a letter. Who was that letter destined for, Stanley? Will I ever know? Will you ever have anything exposing, or at least consoling, to say?

I sometimes imagine that on my twenty first birthday, I will finally say something. 'Be a good friend, a supportive, caring friend for once…help a girl out with something that's bothered her for years; a decade, to be exact…Please Stanley, could I just kiss you? We'll still be friends…Or…could you maybe write about me? Think of it as tying up a lose thread in one of your stories…' But then, I suppose that's not your style; to give yourself away.

Your loyal, and indeed quite silly friend,
Sarah