To My Sweet Pea,

I haven’t closed my eyes in 52—no 55 hours. I see her sweet face, cupped in between my clenched nails. Water everywhere, swallowing her little heart. I’m sorry. I’m so very sorry, sweet pea.

Please believe me when I say that I tried to purge myself of this vile attraction. I never wanted to love her the way I did. That bouncing ballerina: twirling her tutu, dancing through my fingers, slipping back into my dreams.

I wasn’t always like this, though.

I was a knight on a reconnaissance of the playground every day. We were all knights marking our territory. This—the safe zone encircled by our imaginary fences—was our country.

For years, our gang followed Charlie, an older boy from the junior high. He was idolized by all of us. Charlie had, on multiple occasions, invited a select few to join him on secret endeavors. Peeking from between two scrawny shoulders, I was never chosen. I carried a curse between my legs—one that would render me useless to Charlie. That was until I turned twelve.

That August, Charlie hopped off his bicycle and met us at the old pavilion behind the elementary school. He whistled me over. My heart galloped, as he gave me the look I had seen countless times before.

I grabbed my bicycle and trailed behind. He skidded to a halt when we reached the town turtle pond. He asked me to join him on a bench. I did. Then we talked about bicycles and turtles and little sisters. I began to wonder if this was part of the legendary adventures I had always been excluded from. I also began to wonder if I quite understood what an adventure meant.

I remember Charlie turning to me and tucking loose strands of my hair behind my ear. My body was alarmed by his fingertips brushing my cheek. I peered over to the drooping eyelids and pursing lips inching towards me. I clenched my fists. I knew I had to do this. It was Charlie. So I closed my eyes, cringing at the gross heaviness of his mouth on mine.

The rest of the boys heard of this and promptly branded me the enemy—a simple-minded girl. I convinced myself that this was for the best. I felt myself outgrowing it all. I could no longer wear the same clothes as them, nor could I stay out as late as them. Mother completely objected to all the time I asked to spend with those degenerates, as she liked to say.

The remainder of my time in junior high and high school consisted of excellent grades, average participation, and mediocre relationships.

There were two great affairs in my adult life.

The first was Norman, who was leaving one of the libraries at the university. I rammed straight into the pile of books blocking his thick-rimmed chestnut glasses and beady emerald eyes. He was actually very handsome, despite the occasional blemish.

A history major, Norman was an asset during my semester of Ancient histories. He spent many a night with me as I grudgingly drilled centuries of war and kingship into my apathetic brain. He did not want to be a history teacher. He wanted to be a global historian. Norman was a dreamer, if nothing else. Last I heard, he was teaching at the local middle school—wife and kids back home. Funny to think he wanted that to be me. What’s funnier is that I considered it.

It’s been six years since I last spoke to Quinn. I left her at the same building we had met that frosty night in December.

It was my 24^th birthday, and Norman and I had just ended things after his third proposal. I was sitting at a booth in an Irish pub down the street from my apartment, reading Rousseau’s “The Confessions.” A raspy voice interrupted my trance. I looked up from the page and noticed my rail-thin, tattooed waitress. With a creepily crooked smile, she inquired about my drink. Coffee, black. She nodded and fetched me another. Noticing my reading, she offered her opinion—one that I couldn’t have been more uninterested in hearing. It was after this night that I began to frequent the pub, until I became a regular in Quinn’s tumultuous life.

My time with her was everything but romantic. She frightened yet intrigued me. She bored yet excited me. Her enraged screams still echo in my head, banging against my sore eardrums. Quinn was beautiful but not desirable. At this point, I found no one even the slightest bit desirable.

I couldn’t love. I had to accept this.

But then you brought her to my home one afternoon. I hadn’t seen her since her first Christmas, six years ago. She was lovely and perfect and infectious.

It was her giggling that made my heart throb, her strawberry and cream hair that ignited a fire in my throat. I instantly wanted to be her everything, just as she was mine. She enchanted me like a fairy, weaving through every crevice of my mind, ensnaring me in her barbed wire beauty. The closer she was to grab, however, the deeper I locked my desires away.

I begged you not to leave her that night. You remember that, don’t you? I told you I wasn’t feeling well, but you insisted.

My ballerina, she was especially playful. Hiding in the kitchen, I heard the warm water ripple over my bathtub. I gripped my countertop, clamping my jaw shut. I would wait, just as I had time and time again. Donning nothing but a pink tutu and her smooth, tight skin, she scampered into my presence.

It all happened so quickly.

I remember releasing the cheaply tiled countertop, my tingling fingers desperately searching to feel her lacey skin. She leapt backwards, so I grabbed onto her tutu instead, ripping it clean off her tiny frame. She whimpered for a moment before screaming at me. I fell to my knees and begged her to stop. Every time I leaned in to caress her flushed cheeks, she’d stagger away. I apologized until her sobbing ceased. Pressing my hand over her bare chest, she smiled and led me into the bathroom, where she waited to be bathed.

Though there was no sunlight, she still glistened amidst the water running through her auburn locks, lingering over the curves in her fragile, child body. Her belly button sparkled like a pearl in the sea, and her fingers traced tiny dancers along the suds and bubbles floating rhythmically around her. She hummed something.

My fingers slid down her slippery torso, dipping below the water. She gasped and flinched and cried, all before I could register my actions.

I was so enraged. I needed to destroy it. The demon desire was at my mercy, as was she.

She grumbled for a few minutes, bubbles bursting at the surface. Her fingers sank. Her lips pouted. Her eyes ceased to blink.

I never meant to take her from you.

I will not die with this secret, though. 

I pray you can forgive me one day, sweet pea.

Your loving sister