How do I start this note? Perhaps it is not even a note—for a note brings to mind something short, sweet, to the point. A note is something you wish to receive—a simple reminder—but this is not a reminder. This is not a tender little moment which I stick these words to a post it note and leave somewhere in an area that’s obvious, but not. Something when you find it, it brings a smile to your face.    This is not that type of note.

Perhaps then I should call it a letter, but a letter seems formal.  A letter is trying to capture the news, recalling memories, requesting information, and my ideas do not seem to circulate around any of those. Though, I do suppose it would be nice to hear what is going on in your life, I believe your sweet fingers should not be wasted on writing such a reply to me. Save their strength for a true note to a person who wishes to receive a letter or note—one which brings a smile to their face. I am not that person.

I suppose there are no ways to describe what it is that I am writing. It seems more like a speech. Something I should recite, standing at your doorstep, soaked by the rain (because of course there will have to be a storm to add to the patheticness of my state of mind and my appearance), shivering to the point I cannot even keep the piece of paper steady, but it’s fruitless to read because the ink has smudged and I’m incoherent anyway. You’ll give me that look (that adorable ‘you’re scaring me again’ one that I always giggle at). So, of course, I’ll giggle. The moment will be ruined, and I’ll end up walking back out into the rain because I know I cannot stay with you. It hurts to be with you. I know I will just end up disappointing you. I know I am a kind of failure to living; I’m a stranger even to myself.    

I know what you’re thinking. You’ll shake your head and list a bunch of adjectives that are the most positive ones you can find in your mind. I’m amazing. Incredible. Fantastic. Wonderful. And that you love me. I’ll want to believe you. I might even hesitate for a moment, quivering my lower lip as I fight back the tears that are wishing so much to be free. I might even bite my nails—trying to take up time as I look for some sort of retort, but I’ll come up short. Yet I know it is impossible to be those things because I have never been amazing, incredible, fantastic or wonderful. I’ve always been me. The plain Jane. The one that was never pretty. The one that talks too loud. The one who laughs strangely. The weird one. The odd one.

The one that does not deserve to be loved—especially by someone as amazing as you.

I admit. I got attached. I became dependent. Perhaps fairy tales do come true in some sort of form of reality, but I am still just a child. Foolishly believing that princes and white stallions crossing over flowery plains into the sunset do indeed exist somewhere in this world. Clinging on to the desperate hope that soulmates and forever still exist in a dictionary somewhere and not just in my mind, but I should know better by now. Happily Ever Afters are not apart of this reality. Forever could mean only months. Soulmates are only passer-bys that direct us in a different direction, somehow altering our soul to the point we feel incomplete. Relationships end. Marriages disintegrate into memories of the past. Words that once meant something, I no longer know what they mean anymore.

So what do you mean when you tell me you love me?

I’m broken. I’m hopeless. I’m humpty dumpty without all the king’s men to put me back together again. I’m insecure, easily frightened, a phony when it comes to strength, a liar when it comes to knowledge, a fool when it comes to love. I know nothing. I’m a dreamer whose only hope comes from that soft glimmer in the darkness that perhaps dreams magically come true—a genie will appear from my dolphin-shaped lamp and grant me a wish.

I’m a hopeless romantic.  I live where hope can never find me because I will never let it in because I know it will only let me down.  That’s why they call us hopeless romantics—because our dreams and our realities will never collide. My mind is a fairy tale where I constantly find myself hiding in. I need to escape now because the realization has finally sunk in.

You are the prince of my fairy tale, but I am not the princess of yours nor will I ever be. I’ll always be the hopeless dreamer, watching as prince and beauty take off into the sunset while I am left only to a moonless night, without a date to the ball, and content to at least be able to sleep in the cinders of the fireplace.

Life is not a fairy tale. You are reality when I am only imagination. You are perfection when I am nothing. I suppose this is my way of saying goodbye. No note, no letter, nothing in this world was designed for such words , for paper is so fragile, absorbing my tears, obscuring my words. It may be for the best if I walked in the rain, stood in your doorstep, and whispered just that: “goodbye.” Yet I know in my heart I would never have the strength. I know you complete me, but I do not complete you. Please let me hold you back no longer. Set your heart free.

For you are my knight in shining armor—you’ve saved me, but there are far more wondrous things to see. You’re needed elsewhere.

So, goodbye, my prince, my valiant knight…May you always know that you brought a tiny bit of hope to an almost completely hopeless case.

Perhaps you will find a fairy tale ending, but I will always stand alone.

                                                                                                                            Sincerely,
      A broken angel.