my hope for you

Dear Adam,

I hope, deeply and sincerely, that you find someone someday about whom you care more deeply and passionately than you ever thought yourself capable. I hope that somewhere, deep inside you, maybe there is a slight uneasiness that the person doesn't quite reciprocate the way you wish they did, but that you are able to put it out of your mind, because you are a sensible and secure and emotionally healthy person. And you realize, it doesn't matter anyway, because what matters is that you knew this love, unlike anything you thought possible.

I hope that eventually, though, it works out, and you and this person work together on a life that you love, a life you are thankful for every single day, a life you don't take for granted. And then one day, out of the blue, this person you've loved and trusted and shared your whole self with suddenly decides that, due to some mistake you made ages ago which they claimed to have forgiven you for, they haven't actually; and as a result, they haven't even felt the kind of love for you they've been claiming all along; that the whole life and the supposed love it was built on was a one-sided lie that the person was going along with to appease you; and that every promise you've been basing your vision of the future on is dissolved, and every insecurity you had along the way is something you maybe shouldn't have quieted. And then, I hope you remember you were the worst friend ever to the best friend you ever had.

And finally, I hope dogs everywhere know the promise you broke to the puppy who loved you, and whom you abandoned. I hope they pee on your shoes.

Sadly, none of this will probably happen. You will continue to go through life, faking your role as the golden child. "Mom, I threw that dirty magazine away" you will say, before going to secretly dig it out of the trash. And everyone will believe you. You will purchase puppy-mill dogs who will love you, because they don't know any better. And I will go on with my life, without the friendship that was supposed to be once in a lifetime. And in the next life, I will not look for you. I will read about how the dolphins, in slapping their tails against the water, were actually telling us "get away from me" because that is, in fact, what it means when dolphins slap their tails against the water. And you will have a nightmare or two over the course of your life about how you hurt me, and how you still feel a little bad about what you did, but you'll wake up and remember it is only a dream; it is only the past, and it doesn't matter now. Not to you, anyway.