The letter to the heroin addict I loved that I never sent.

Life has all those special little moments. The first time we kiss, the first time we make love (or just have sex) and so many other first memories that we create and hold onto for a lifetime. I was never prepared for my first time feeling real love. As a person working on commission for many years I relied on my sales to make me happy. I was content. I wanted to remain unattached to anyone of the opposite sex I met, until there was you.

You came in quietly like they usually do, asking me questions about myself. You seemed self involved at first, like you were running a game you ran on most woman. Somehow someway our bond grew stronger. Through the intimate conversations discussing our lives and mishaps. I still think about when you see your mentally ill mom and have the same conversation about the twenty dollars she owed you since you were a kid, and it still breaks my heart. I fell in love. And no it was not my intentions. My intentions were to make you love me then feel embarrassed and used for the times you called me fat a few years before. But your voice felt safe, like a blanket holding me tight. I found safety and warmth in hearing you speak to me. I became attached to you holding me metaphorically through our phone conversations. I vocalized to you many times that I was severely struggling with my own mental illnesses at the time and most of the time you were sweet, until you weren’t. I`ll never forget the morning after you called my cell phone when we were supposed to meet in Brooklyn. You called me fat and told me to kill myself. The next morning going home in my Uber I still kept calling and texting you. I needed to go back to how it was before. I needed to talk to you. You were flipping a switch like you usually do. I`m pretty certain you suffer from extreme bipolar disorder or BPD, yes you have it as well. But I needed to flip the switch off. I needed you to go back to being the person who listens to me and gives me advice. Who I talk to and laugh with for hours on the phone. I needed to feel that again, I couldn’t let you do this. Not to me. Not to us. But the car ride home the messages kept coming in. “You`re fat” “You`re disgusting” “Go kill yourself” followed by photos of razor blades. And the laughter in your voice when you called me and told me to kill myself the night before rang in my ears. The horror I left my cousin in when I dissociated and his house with a knife and a bottle of whiskey. The pain I wanted you to feel when I said I was going to show up where your baby sister lives after my Uber ditched me on the side of the road for being belligerent when you gave me an address to meet you. Which by the way I never thought twice that it could actually be yours. How scared I felt when my phone died that night and I was stranded. Realizing this wasn’t the first time this happened. You had been calling me a fat cunt and telling me to kill myself for four months now. I get home from my Uber. I walk into my house dazed. This pain in my chest. This unworthiness. This feeling that I don`t belong. This ting of pain. This pain. This empty feeling. This hopelessness. Closing my eyes but my chest feels hollow. Tears streaking down my cheeks. Asking god how could I have been so dumb. He showed me who he was and I still wanted to believe he was something different. And I desperately wanted this pain to go away. To not feel this type of emptiness. I was waiting for you to pick up your phone, because if one our voices heard one another we couldn’t be mad anymore. It was this strong power we had between us where it was impossible for us to be mad at each other if we were talking on the phone. But for three days the texts kept coming in. I told you is this what you want? You want me to kill myself? And you said “No I don`t care about you, I don`t ever think about you. You don`t ever cross my mind. I don`t care what you do, I just want you to stop calling me”. I knew you were pushing me away. I know this was a defense mechanism to your mother breaking your heart. I still could not let you go.

Fast forward to the summer. I tried to f*** you out of my mind, it didn’t work. I was getting tired of blowing up your phone or posting your number on sites to get you to call, but I knew it was the only way to hear your voice again. I`ll never forget the last two phone conversations we ever had before we met. And I finally believed that this was real. I was right. Despite all the harsh insults and threats for me to self harm, you did want me there with you. I said to you on the phone “Whats going on? We talk on the phone and we click so well and the chemistry is amazing. But for all these months your trying to deny theres something between us. I know you want me in your life, but why are you so scared to admit it. Why are you so scared to admit you like me or want me around? Don`t you think you're going to have that moment where you're down and out and have nobody to call or talk to, but you think of me and you a hundred percent know I`ll answer the phone. Don`t you want that in your life?” And you grew quiet. There was a long pause. And you said “Yeah, fine, maybe I do want you in my life”. And it sounded like you were choking up. I never saw this vulnerable side of you. You hung up the phone just as you were about to cry. I kept trying to text you for days. I needed to know why you weren’t okay. I needed to know what was wrong. Again I had to trick you into answering me by putting your number on websites. And once I finally got you on the phone you told me you were shooting up heroin. And in that moment I went numb. I didn’t want to feel anything at this moment. The room started spinning and I could’t gather my thoughts. I was at a loss for words. I lost my ex to heroin and the thought you were doing the same thing to me was too much to handle. That night you gave me your address and then I planned to come. You realized you told me the secret you had kept for all these months, now it was time to let me in and meet me in person. However you were still scared. Scared that once I saw who you really were, that you are a heroin addict, that I wouldn’t love you anymore. That I would leave. The whole night I knew you were going to stand me up. I turned off my phone and had Jess text you because I was so nervous. Me and Jess fight. I take out my phone and have all these missed texts from you. By the time I call back I’ve already been blocked. I rush over to your house. I`m banging on the front door. And you wouldn’t answer. It started pouring rain. Just then and there, right there in that moment. The rain is pouring down on me falling fiercely from the sky. And you can’t even see that I am hysterically crying. I go into a bodega around the corner from your apartment to take shelter. I wait as a young couple walk in dressed for a night out. The girl was gorgeous. Tall, thin, blonde hair, blue eyes, pouty lips like a model and she sported these gorgeous four inch Loubatins. And she stares pitifully at me, in my sopping wet clothes and soaked hair with my make up running down my face. I never felt so insecure and so embarrassed. I go into my Uber shivering from the air conditioning hitting my drenched clothes and the emptiness starts to roll back around. You thought I`d walk away after this, but no I didn’t.

And then the day everything changed. I show up to your house and pretty much break into your apartment. You're in your apartment shooting up with some kid Jimmy. My emotions are running crazy. And I`m telling you to come to long island with me. I thought I could save you. I was wrong. We`re yelling back and forth. Screaming at the top of our lungs. We go outside. And I exam you. You really looked awful. Nothing like your photos. I was not attracted to you at all. Well not yet. Your gorgeous porcelain pale skin was drenched in an extremely dark tan. Your hair was messy and off putting. You were skinny to the point of emaciated and your eyes were hollowed out (not that I'm not extremely attracted to tall skinny type, but you could tell he was sick). We argued back and forth about me just barging in like that. You ordered I take your friend home around the corner because “That’s what happens when you break into peoples apartments”. Jimmy was a dirt bag and kept trying to make sexual advances at me. He kept telling me you were a loser junkie and he was light years better than you. And I should ditch you and go inside with him. But I texted you and you actually unblocked me despite all the bickering. You told me to come back. I remember our very first interaction together. The first time we were alone and speaking. You got in the front seat and I said I had to find a spot to park. We drove around for maybe ten minutes until you practically yelled “Get out of the car, you can’t drive, do you see how many spots you’ve missed” which was true, I’m a horrible driver. Which is why you always drove my car from there on out. While you were driving we started speaking. I told you your friend Jimmy is a pig and he made me take down his phone number. I also exclaimed that Jimmy said he is better than you because you are an addict. It was then you admitted to me you were shooting up with him in your apartment. And that he is an addict too. I then said he wants me to come see him again, what do you think? Trying to get a reaction, for you to finally admit you like me. But you then say “If you want to see him then fine do it, I don’t care”. I got so upset and said “Why do you always do that?” “Why do you act like I mean nothing to you, like I don’t matter”. Which unfortunately that feeling never changed. I’ve spent the last two and a half years sitting with the same feeling (this letter was written six months post break up). You said that wasn’t true. And I just grew silent. We pulled over and after you parked and I watched you. You sat there in the drivers seat staring down at your hands and fidgeting, too ashamed and insecure to look me in my eyes. I realized for the first time its not me you hate, it’s you. You truly hate yourself and I felt pain in that thought. Pain in the thought that you didn't realize how special you were to me. Despite all the negative interactions there was something there we couldn’t run away from. A vortex of extreme chemistry and deep emotions that always pulls us back in and brings us back to each other. I asked you when you wanted to get clean. I didn’t know anything about addiction. You said you weren't ready. But I told you, you had to be. I needed to take you to Long Island with me and keep you safe, safe from yourself. I wanted to protect you, a feeling that grew immensely over the years. I presented the puke bags and electrolyte waters I brought for the car ride. You laughed and said you didn’t think those two plastic bags were enough. I teared up and said “Well if you don’t come with me what if I never see you again”. This was the firs time I was forced to realize that you could be dead at any moment, that I could lose you forever. A thought that haunts me and overwhelms me to this day. And your head jolted to the side and you stared for a brief moment in disbelief. You didn’t know how much I really loved you. And you were really too damaged to even believe I possibly could. You said calmly “You will see me again”. And we sat quietly for a few moments until we were just around the corner from your apartment. You turned to look at me and said “Don’t Call Jimmy”. And I just smiled and said something cute. Before I went home we stopped to get gas. And I looked at you and said “You are pumping my gas for me”. Although I demanded it because I knew you were going to do it anyways. Regardless of the fact that you were limited because of your addiction I later realized that you are a true gentleman, in every sense of the word. We went into the gas station store and I bought you a turkey sandwich. I later learned thats your favorite sandwich, I believe them to be gross. We came back to the car and after you pumped my gas and we stood by the trunk of the car. I said comically with a subtle giggle, “Do you think I can pick you up”. I tried and obviously failed. You laughed too. You then solemnly held out your arm in front of me. You ran your fingers over your track marks and explained they were from shooting up. I ran my finger tips over them and didn't say anything. We just looked at each other in that moment and knew we could never be closer. And especially never experience this closeness with another person. Later that night when I went home you finally admitted to me that you liked me, well you actually said when “ Did I ever say I didn’t.” But because I was happy to hear you admit it I didn’t bring up the “ I don`t ever think about you, I don`t care about you, you never cross my mind, you mean nothing to me” speech I got every few weeks for the past eight months. Then after that day were all the little moments. Those little f****** moments that leave you paralyzed in the shower, the water mixing with your tears, and you're replaying everything all over again in your head. The first hug goodbye where you almost fell over from rocking back and forth. The first time I was attracted to you when you came out of your apartment with your hair gelled to the side and had on a basketball jersey that showed of your tattoo. The first time you kissed me on the top of my head. The first time you ever kissed me on the lips and thinking of how unbelievably soft your lips were. The first fight we had a fight and how we fought like we loved each other. Both yelling the exact opposite of what we were feeling. Then saying sorry after two minutes. And texting me when I left that day “Surprisingly I’m really happy you came”. And I said how much I loved when you would leave and kiss me goodbye on the top of my head. The first time you said miss you tooo with lots of extra O`s. The first time you called me a cute name other than Tray or Tracy (Chiquita). The first time you jokingly asked me if I`d hide a body for you because we finally knew we would do anything for each other. The first time you teased me by hitting me over the head with a piece STYRO foam when you were trying to kill a moth. The first time you called me a Jewish American princess in person because I complained about walking to the store as I put on my light pink Tory Burch slides. The first time I cooked you chicken cutlets and you asked me to make more for you next time. The first time I got you a milk shake to say sorry. The first time I told you I was proud of you. The first time I saw you smile so wide when you saw my car drive up onto your block. The first time you asked me to scratch your head. The first time you shared an intimate detail with me in person about the time you were homeless and we held hands for a good ten minutes and when I tried to let go you wouldn’t let me. Which was followed by the first time you snuggled on my chest. Which lead to our first real kiss. Right in the car by the water. And our second first real kiss five minutes later. And it felt like I was being shot out of a cannon across a rainbow into a beautiful pool of water where the sun was beaming down. Which led to the first time you showed me you were a real gentleman. And then the first time you slapped my ass. And I didn’t know when you said give me a kiss and then went inside that those first times were all our last times too. That now these memories would haunt me forever. That I would cry every night for another 6 months because I missed you. That all these memories would keep replaying over and over again in my head. And I never knew when they would stop. That you would just leave me. And now all these months later I still don`t know how to be okay. And the sad truth is you do. You know how to be okay without me. You always knew you didn’t really need me. And I became so attached that I don`t know who I am anymore without you. But those first times for you were just fleeting memories that you probably haven't thought of twice since. And I still don`t know how to let you go. The pain of having my first love. The pain of the first time I opened myself up. The pain of the first time I was vulnerable. And not even an answer. For six months just ignore, ignore, block, block. I thought the emptiness I felt when you told me I was fat and to kill myself was bad. I thought that was the worst pain I could ever feel. But you don`t even care about me enough to tell me you don`t want me anymore to my face. You just let me look like a fool crying and commenting and messaging. It`s like all I did was try and do you right and all you ever wanted to do was hurt me. I let you in. I let you love me. I let myself love you. And then you just left with radio silence for six months as you watched me spiral downward and fall apart. Now after reading this, ask yourself. How can you live with yourself? How can one person be so selfish and self involved. You had the power to make this easy for me. Tell me what I needed to hear. I know you don`t love me. I know you never did. But why are you so selfish that you can`t even save me from myself by finally telling me it`s really over. Change your phone number. Disappear. If you don`t love me, can`t you care about another person enough to not torture their heart. With all the things you put me through. When all I ever tried to do was love you. I never understood how you could sleep at night. And still till this day, I don`t know how you live with yourself. I’ve left the fantasy`s of our first time behind. I left the fantasy of you coming back behind. Of us having a happy ending, it`s all behind. I know you ignoring me for six months means I never meant to you what you did to me. But don`t you ever want to do the right thing in life? Don`t you just want to be a grown up who doesn’t present as a heartless sociopath and just tell me to my face that you want me to move on, that you don`t feel the same? After all the fat, cunt, kill yourself, why can`t you take rejection I never liked you after spending so much money on food, after. being called fat again, after taking advantage of me and pushing me to my breaking point, you still to this very moment can`t do one right thing by me. When all I ever did was love you. I never had ill intentions for you. I never could. I will love you forever until the day god takes me to the other side.