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This writing was accepted for publication in the 84 page perfect-bound issue... Down in the Dirt magazine (v099) (the October 2011 Issue) You can also order this 5.5" x 8.5" issue as an ISSN# paperback book:						This writing also appears in this 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback “Symbols Manifest” Order this 6" x 9" ISBN# book:

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Your Fault

Laine Hissett-Bonard

Dear Julian,

    I just want you to know this is your fault.
    A small amount of blame can be laid at my feet, but only because I should have known better. I should have known a twenty-two-year-old boy like you, with your bleached blond hair, your big brown eyes, your body like a diabetic’s sticky candy dream, would never end up with an old guy like me. For God’s sake, I’m almost thirty, practically at death’s door already.
    Still, I let myself believe we had a chance. If you were unhappy, you could have let me know instead of stringing me along for over a year, calling me honey and baby and sweetheart to my face and laughing about me in your nineteen-year-old lover’s arms in my bed while I sat in a cubicle for ten hour stretches, working overtime whenever I could, desperately aiming for that promotion and the pay hike that would accompany it. All I wanted was to make enough money to give you everything you wanted. I guess I never really knew what it was you did want, or that no amount of money could buy it. Then again, maybe he could be bought. It’s a pity I’ll never have the opportunity to find out. Nothing would satisfy me more than letting you walk in on me with your precious Kyle and watching your face crumple and witnessing your heart break the same way you witnessed mine when I walked in on the two of you.
    I’m also to blame for putting up with your bullshit for thirteen months. That’s another reason I should have known better. If you were someone my own age, I never would have allowed myself to be trampled on like a mildewed bathmat. I was blinded by your beauty, obsessed with your body, intoxicated by the taste of you, and struck dumb by your endless stream of bubbly, inane chatter. It didn’t matter how often you got drunk and insulted me, or, worse yet, got even drunker and hit me. Your rage was as intense as it was inexplicable; if I only knew it was triggered by your passionate urge to be with someone who wasn’t me – by your feelings of helplessness at being “trapped” in a relationship with an old man – I would have set you free.
    That’s one thing that really burns my ass, Jules – you were by no means trapped. If you had only told me you didn’t want to be with me anymore, I never would have forced you to stay. I know why you didn’t want to leave, though; I was your meal ticket. As long as I worked and let you live for free in my apartment, you never had to do a thing, aside from your infrequent auditions. I don’t know why you haven’t landed an Oscar-worthy role yet; no one knows better than me what a convincing actor you are.
    I only wish I hadn’t given so much of myself to you. My self-worth no longer exists; I only saw myself as an extension of you, validated by your love and your place in my life, and now that I no longer have either, I may as well cease to exist. That’s why you’re reading this letter. I’m going to leave it on the kitchen table on top of the box of your things that you asked me to have ready for you. I’m assuming you’ll be here today; you’d never leave your precious laptop in my hands for longer than a day. If you’re reading this and it’s not Tuesday, well... cover your nose before you come into the bedroom. It’s not going to be pretty, but again, I can’t stress this enough: this is your fault.
    Just to make things easier for the medical examiner, in case it’s not immediately obvious, yes, I took my own life. (It feels weird to write that, considering that as I write this, I’m still perfectly alive, but by the time you read this, these words will be true.) The two things I didn’t put into your box of stuff were your bottles of Xanax and Ambien. It’s lucky for me that you refilled both over the weekend, and even luckier that you didn’t have time to collect your belongings before I chased you out into the hallway in your underwear along with your pretty little boyfriend.
    I didn’t dare ask at the time, and it’s probably good that I’ll never know... but I can’t help wondering if he’s as good to you as I was. I wonder if he’ll meet you at the door with a silent, non-judgmental hug when you get home from another failed audition with your lips curved in a frown and your eyes cast downward. Will he get up extra early before work to cook you breakfast? Will he put up with your violent mood swings and incessant drinking? Will he pick up, without complaining, the clothes you leave on the floor and the dishes you leave in the sink (not three feet from the dishwasher) and all the other shit you leave strewn around as if it’s his job to clean up behind you? I wonder if he’ll think your ass is worth it, at least for as long as I did.
    That’s the worst part. For all that time, at least at the time, your ass was worth it. My logical mind was clouded by it. I was able to put everything negative aside and be sustained by the mere thought of climbing into bed with you at the end of a long day. I probably wouldn’t have felt that way if I knew how much time you spent in that same bed with Kyle. In retrospect, I should have known something was up. I never saw you lift a finger around the house, but the sheets were always clean when I got home.
    I’ve ceased to care what anyone thinks of me. I’ll be a laughingstock, but it won’t matter, because I won’t be here to endure it. My coworkers will gossip about the pathetic loser in the back cubicle who killed himself because his barely legal boyfriend cheated on him. They’ll never know – because you’re the only one who does, and you’ll never admit it – just how bad things were, or how much of my self-respect was tied up in my relationship with you, or how utterly worthless I feel now that you’re not a part of me. They’ll never know how mercilessly cruel you were when you drank, or how deeply the things you said cut me. Every word was like a knife carving away a little piece of my soul until all that remained of me was a shell – filled only by you, by the words of love and devotion you spoke when you were sober, by your lies and false promises of forever.
    You know, I actually feel bad for Kyle. I’m sure you say the same things to him – if not the awful, ugly, terrible things you said to me while drunk, then at least the same promises and declarations of love. A month ago, if anyone had asked, I would have sworn I knew you better than anyone on the planet did. I bet if anyone asked him right now, he’d say the same. Do you plan to tear him apart from the inside and leave him shattered and empty, too? There’s no way of knowing. The only person who knows your intentions is you, and no matter what you said or how earnestly you said it, I’d never believe a word out of your mouth again.
    I’m glad I’ll never have to speak to you again, actually. I tell myself I’m too damaged by your lies to trust you again, but I think if you took me into your arms and stared into my eyes the way you used to and just once tucked my hair behind my ear, I’d fall in love with you again on the spot. It’s stupid and self-destructive, yes, but that doesn’t make it any less true. I’d rather be self-destructive on my own, though, so I’m not going to wait around for you and find out.
    Yet... there’s a part of me that does want to see you again. That’s how strong your hold on me is, even now, after you’ve already chewed me up and spit me out, even after you said the nastiest things to me you could come up with. If I was the melodramatic type, I’d wait until you got here and make you watch as I offed myself in the most gruesome, bloody, disturbing way possible. Instead, I’m taking the coward’s way out, swallowing some pills – probably washing them down with some of the booze you left that I paid for– and crawling into bed, where I can still smell your hair bleach on the pillowcase, to die alone, the way I was apparently destined to do anyway.
    Now I’m getting angry, angrier than I was for that first split second when I came home from work early yesterday to surprise you and ended up getting the surprise of my life instead. You evil, sociopathic, narcissistic little shit! You thought nothing of the way I felt; you didn’t care in the least that I devoted my entire life to you, spent every minute of my time thinking of ways to make you smile, spent every spare penny I had on you, opened my home and my heart to you, and made a complete fool out of myself falling for your every lie. You don’t care what you’ve done to me or how much pain you’ve caused me. You’re probably smiling while you read this; I wouldn’t be surprised to see you chuckling over my suicide note and maybe even blowing a great big bubble with that nauseating watermelon bubblegum you like.
    I need time to think.
    It’s an hour later now, and my entire perspective has changed. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to feel this way. I never thought I could hate you, Jules, but for better or worse, everything I feel or think or am now is because of you. It doesn’t seem fair that I should have to bear this burden alone when you’re the reason for it. Don’t get your hopes up; I’m still going to do it, but I’m not going to do it alone. Maybe you’ll never read this after all. Then again, maybe I’ll have time to read it to you before the light in your beautiful brown eyes dims. I’ve carried you, drunk, to bed enough times to know I can handle your weight. You’ll be here within an hour or two. I’m glad you still have your key. You won’t expect me to be waiting behind the door with the big kitchen knife. I can’t wait to see the look on your face. The bed has soaked up enough of your bodily fluids by now that it won’t matter when your blood drenches the mattress.
    The bright spot in this is that you’ll fucking hate to die lying next to me in bed. If there was one way you wouldn’t want your charmed, vapid little life to end, it would be just like that. I owe you at least that much – making your last few moments on earth as miserable as possible.
    Never forget: this is your fault.

    Fuck you very much,
    Shaun DeVille

**

    Dear Kyle,
    Trust me; I did you a favor.

    Best of luck,
    Shaun Deville

**

    Dear whomever reads this and/or finds the bodies,
    I’m only sorry you had to be the one to find us. Otherwise, not at all.

    Sincerely,
    Shaun DeVille

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