Oh, Colleen. Colleen, Colleen, Colleen.
The above is like a metamorphosis. It was by luck that it was arranged in the right order.
If I could write a letter to you... well, you're already laughing. You know all my thoughts, so why should I bother fumbling to explain myself?
But I will write a bit. Or a lot. I will write because I'm pretty sure nobody reads this and I can probably spill my heart out to someone imaginary, so real to me, here in a corner that is also imaginary and real. Tongue-in-cheek, I could say you are the highest part of my religion, whatever that is.
I made you a cannibal, at first. A little girl of eight years old, just as angry as I was, except you had sharp teeth and that teddy bear. I made you tear and eat and bite and chew through flesh and blood and madness and you kept crying just like I did when nobody was looking, or when everybody pretended not to see. I gave you eyes of fury and rubies because that was what frightened me; red eyes. They will always frighten me, attract me. I gave you demon's wings on your head to fly because I couldn't. I gave you the teddy bear to talk to because that's also what I needed--someone who needed me, who I could talk to, who hurt me as much as I needed it. But he was yours. He will always be yours.
You and him were the antagonists of my dreams. You took innocents, the young, the old. You reaped all that came your way without judgement like some pure, nonprejudicial goddess, demon, thing. You ate the flesh, and he ate the soul. And he still carries it; you escaped from the prison I had thrown you in, but he enjoys his captivity.
Less about him. More about you.
In a way, I had fashioned you--irascible, broken, screaming, irresponsible and so damn beautiful--right after me, except I had nothing for myself but loathing. I was not you. I could not be you. I resented you but then resented myself; you are my creation. It is my job to care for you, I thought then, and I still think it now... even though I haven't followed it all the way.
You were my outlet. You were the victim of my circumstance. You still are, but for some reason, you don't hate me. Why is that?
But you've changed, too. I didn't mean for you to change, but you did. One day when I was ten and you were nine, I gave you an angel--the other you. The "other" you. The one chained to the roof of that dark palace where you used to live, the one who sang quietly and bled. This was part of me, too--the part that regretted the people I had bitten, the part that wanted to console the other part of me that was still so angry. It had eyes of liquid... something that wasn't quite blue, wasn't quite gray. She--you--was truly broken, so far gone that she could only smile as she was hurt. I don't remember why I did, but I gave her to you, and you were ecstatic. You hurt her. You bit her. You tore her to pieces again and again, the angel part of you, and she would just smile and hold you as you killed her. What did it mean?
We know what it means. I don't need to go further.
Thank you for forgiving me. Have you forgiven me? ...Then thank you, again.
And slowly, it wasn't as if you faded away. This demon part of you. The part that I truly call Colleen, somehow it became quiet. I was eleven then, and you and him had gone to sleep for nearly two years. I was thirteen before you spoke to me in a newer, quieter voice. I thought you had left forever. I was a wreck. At eight I cried and cried; at nine I screamed and screamed, and at thirteen I was empty, trying to fill in my life with light and time. And you came back at the right time, him in tow, and you two will always be a pair.
Sometimes I resent myself, still, and I doubt if you really stay. I know you are my creation, but I'd like to fancy that you at least tolerate me with some sort of affection. I hear you laughing in my heart--not my head, but from my bosom, right where you belong. I always feel you on the right side, even though I know you are my right brain.
But you have done so much for me. You let me torture and kill through your skin. You let me hope--even though they were through plots spun by a melodramatic child, you let me be you when I imagined. You never once complained. You enjoyed, perversely, what I made you do--because that would help you endure it--and then you allowed yourself to change, and spoke to me again.
And now you are here, and you are older. I am older. I will never be younger again, but I will always love you. You were my lifeline. I was the victim of my own circumstance, and you were the imaginary hand that guided me out.
I will never let you go. Will you stay with me?
Thank you for letting me write this to you. Another part of me is consoled.
Perhaps I should write Lale a letter, too? But now you are laughing again, perpetually laughing. I know. He will find it more ridiculous than you. At least you were a person at first, and not the teddy bear.
Even though you don't exist out here, thanks for consoling me all these years. Happy birthday, little dove.
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