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Luna, I know you said there’d be no secrets between us, but sometimes I wish you’d lied. I wish you’d told me something different, that there was some other fate waiting for me. For you. For us both. I go through the motions and I smile and have fun, but I’m lying. I feel like they can all tell that there’s something wrong. How am I supposed to explain it to them? The wheeling stars and their dreadful fates and how we’re all just pawns?
I didn’t want to leave the city, Luna. I wanted to grasp my father’s hand and tell him that I loved him. I wanted to fall to my knees on that carpet and cry until there was nothing left. But I smiled and waved and hustled into the car with my friends and barely gave him a second glance.
They just think I’m nervous to finally meet you in person. They’re teasing and bickering and having fun. They don’t know what’s waiting for us down the road. The darkness that will come before the dawn.
Oh Luna, why did you tell me? I wish I could smile and laugh along with their carefree jokes. But here I am, writing a letter that won’t make any difference. No matter how fast I run, I’ll never be able to catch you.
I just want to catch you before you fall, Luna. Is there really no way I can make it in time? Is there really nothing I can do? Are our fates so impossible to defy?
I don’t know why I’m even writing this. I know you won’t… can’t… read it. I just have so much to say and no one I can say it to. I wish I could have spoken to you in person. I wish we could have had one small moment to ourselves before the tides of fate swept you away. I wish I could have seen you in that dress, gleaming and beautiful and waiting for me. I wish I’d made it in time. I wish I’d been a little faster. That I’d outran fate and was there to save you. I wish so many things, Luna, that I don’t know how to keep it all inside. I want to close my eyes and travel back in time. I want to be the king you deserved instead of the one you got.
Luna, what am I supposed to do without you?
I want to scream and throw the furniture around until it breaks and shatters like my heart. I want to blaze the city into ruin so that I never have to see it again. So that no one else can have the joy that the fates stole from us. Why did it have to be us, Luna? Why did we have to suffer like this? Why did they have to take you away? Am I being petulant? Aren't I allowed to be? I close my eyes and I see you sinking beneath the waves. The blood-darkened water.
Luna, I’m so afraid to die. You never told me if it hurts. And everything hurts so much right now. I don't know if I can do it. I don't know if I can do anything.
Sometimes I thought I’d make it. That you’d gotten the visions wrong, somehow. That it was just some trick, some ploy. When we’d drive along the endless road, the future felt like it was within our grasp. Like I could pick it up and pull it apart in my hands. That I could throw away all the bits I didn't like and leave them like dust behind us.
What useless hands they turned out to be. They can’t even hold you close. They couldn't even keep you safe.
I know it makes me weak, Luna, but sometimes I wish we could trade places. Sometimes I wish it was me that died first. How am I supposed to leave them all behind? How am I supposed to be strong enough for this future that’s rushing towards me faster than I can bear?
I don’t know if I’m the king you think I can be.
Sometimes I dream about you, Luna. Sometimes I make it in time. Sometimes we fight the fates that severed our lives before we'd even gotten to live them properly and we win. Sometimes we lose. Sometimes when I dream about you, it’s you with the sword instead. And it’s me, drowning in the black water, sinking to the bottom as my heart bleeds out.
Sometimes I can’t even breathe because I miss you so much, Luna. I look at the moon and I see your face, but you’re not there. You were never there, never within reach. These useless hands just grasp empty air.
I have to leave them soon, Luna. I can feel it, my blood pulsing with the need to keep going, push harder. The itchy feeling on the back of my neck. Fate tugging me along like its well-trained puppet.
I don’t want to be a puppet, Luna. I don’t want to leave them behind for so long. Not after we finally found each other again.
Is it so selfish to want to stay, just a little longer? To smile and pretend like it will all be okay? To stay cramped in this room while they sleep and I stay awake, watching over them and scribbling this letter in the darkness. You don’t need to read it, after all. It’s okay if my handwriting is a mess.
Luna, I don’t want to go.
Did you know - you must’ve known. You went to your death knowing it would happen. I don’t know how you were so brave, Luna. Part of me still wants to hide under the bed. They can drag me, kicking and screaming. I just want to stay a little longer. I just want to pretend.
I just wanted a happily ever after, Luna. Like the kings and queens in the books I used to read when I was a child. Before you told me everything that you told me.
I want to just keep writing to you all night. But fate weighs heavy, you know. Like crowns.
I hope they’ll be okay without me.
It’s so strange to pass ten years like this. Everyone’s so worn out. So old. But they smile and clap me on the back like it’s been ten minutes.
They’ve waited so long for me, Luna. And we only get to have one night before I have to leave them again.
You told me once that they’d be okay. That their futures shone so brightly no darkness could ever overtake them.
I hope you’re right, Luna. I just wish I could see it for myself. I’m still a selfish person, I guess. Still full of all these useless wishes.
Even if I wanted to run away from this fate, there’s nowhere to go. Is that the resolve you were so certain of? You never doubted me, even when I doubted myself. Did you ever see me crouched over like this, writing you letters in the dark? Did you see them before I even wrote them? Did you see the tears that fell onto the paper? Is that why your letters had smudges of ink? Or was it just your handwriting, Luna?
I don’t have much time left before we have to go. The final step of a long journey I never wanted to take.
Luna, I hope I get to see you again. Did you wait for me too, all these long years, in that place where fate can’t touch you? There’s something I wanted to always tell you, but I never got the chance.
Will you pretend to be surprised when I tell you that I love you? Even though you've known all along, even before I did?
Will you be wearing the dress, Luna? Will you take my hand and tell me how brave and strong I was, even though I wasn't?
You never told me what happens after. I wish you had. Even if it was a lie. Can't I just pretend that we'll get a happily ever after, after all? Don't we deserve one?
Anyway, it's time to go. I'll see you soon, Luna.
I hope.