Work Text:
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: IDEK
Sun, Apr 8, 2019, 7:32 p.m.
Hey mom. I miss you a lot, you know that? I don't really know why I'm doing this, since you can't respond. But you know. I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday, wherever you are. I love you. And I miss you. And I hope you're proud of me.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: Update
Mon, Apr 8, 2019, 9:48 p.m.
Hey mom. Looks like I'm being an idiot and talking to the ether again, but whatever. It makes me feel (marginally) better, and Rica—that’s my therapist—says if it works it works. I graduated early! And I applied to M.I.T.. I don’t expect to get in (and honestly, even if I do I have no idea how I’m gonna pay for it), but I want to go into data analytics and cyber security, and they’re the best of the best, you know? I don’t know for sure what I want to do with it, but I’d like to help people. I thought about maybe joining the police force, but I’d never pass any kind of field readiness test (which I’m sure they have, right?) so that’s a non-starter.
I just miss you so much. Every day. It’s like there’s a hole in my heart where you used to be, and pieces of me just keep falling out and the hole keeps getting bigger and bigger and is it ever going to stop? It’s not the same without you here. I wish you could see me. Hey, maybe you do?
I love you so much. And God do I miss you. I hope you knew that. Or know that, wherever you are. I love you. Happy birthday.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: a dissappointtment
Tue, Apr 9, 2020, 3:47 a.m.
I take it back i hope you cant see me. Im so drunk mom. I got into mit but i was too scared to stayy in one place. they guy that did that to you died inthe fire but you said THEY were coming mom. who are they? what did they want with us why you?
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: I’m Sorry
Wed, Apr 10, 2020, 4:45 p.m.
Hangover’s fucking suck. Sorry for the language. I felt bad because I didn’t wish you a happy birthday. So here it is. Happy birthday. I don’t even know why I’m still doing this.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: Back on track!
Wed, Apr 8, 2021, 9:18 a.m.
I’m still sorry about last year. I didn’t even give you a great update, did I? So I didn’t go to M.I.T., I couldn’t stomach the thought of staying in one place for that long. Part of it is the fear—whoever killed you, whatever was responsible, I don’t think it’s over. I hope it is, but I can never know for sure, can I? The other part, and the happier part, is how transitory growing up with you was. I know you wanted to keep us stationary for longer and never really managed it, but I liked starting over fresh, and part of me still does.
Or maybe I’m just telling myself that because it feels better than constantly being afraid.
I started undergraduate at SNHU, doing remote course work. If all goes to plan, I should graduate ahead of schedule, probably early next year. My declared major is psychology with a minor in cyber-security and investigations, so not quite what I had planned, but I like it a lot so far. I’ve also been looking into what to do after I graduate, and it turns out FBI analysts don’t need the same field certifications! So that’s gonna be my goal. I can’t stand by and let other people go through what we did, not if I can help it. You always said we were two peas in a pod, so I guess I got my strong sense of justice from you, too, huh? Along with our god awful sense of humor and love of spy novels.
I've been dating this really nice guy named Chase. You'd like him, I think. He makes me very happy. I actually think I might marry this man. I wish you could be there to see it.
Is it stupid, that I message you every April 8th? I never send anything for the anniversary of your death, so I don't know why I do for your birth. It seems more apropos. I miss you so much. I just wish you were here. I wish we had more time. I wish I wish I wish. But that's all it is isn't it? Wishes.
I hope you're happy where you are. I hope you feel no pain. And I hope you aren't lonely. Happy birthday mom. I love you.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: And still going, somehow.
Thu, Apr 8, 2022, 6:22 p.m.
Happy to report I didn’t over-promise and under-deliver! I’m set to finish undergrad two years early (NEXT MONTH! Isn’t that wild?), and I’m going to apply to Michigan State’s online Cybercrime and Digital Investigation master’s program. I’m still moving around a lot like we used to do, but at least I’m not lying to myself about it anymore. It’s the fear, it was always the fear. I don’t know if it’s just a quirk of my own anxiety, witnessing your death, or the combination of the two, but if I don’t pick up and leave at least every six months my skin gets itchy and I feel like I can’t breathe. Maybe one day I’ll get over it. But that won’t be today.
Chase and I broke up. I’d tell you all about it, but frankly I’m embarrassed I didn’t see the signs sooner. Suffice it to say, it’s better this way, and now I’ve got a whole other host of trauma to deal with. More than anything, I wish you were still around because you probably would have seen the signs, and saved me a lot of heartache. But learning from mistakes is how we grow up, isn’t it? I’m already 20, but I still don’t feel “grown up.” Does that feeling ever go away? You were doing so much, and so young, too, and then you had me and just kept going. It was like you never doubted yourself for a minute. Is that something I’ll grow into, too, or were you just better at hiding the cracks than I am?
I got a new job—I'm doing side-gigs copy writing for a local magazine, maybe I’m channeling you, a bit? But FBI analysts spend a lot of time on writing reports, so I figured this was a good way to keep my skills sharp.
I wish I was happy. I don't think I am.
I miss you so so much. I should be working right now, I’ve got a final exam to study for and an article I need to edit, so I don't know what possessed me to do this now, but here we are.
You’ve been gone for almost four years. I can't believe it's been so long. I hope wherever you are that you're proud of me. Maybe you can be proud enough of me for the both of us.
I love you so much. Happy birthday.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: It just never ends, does it?
Fri, Apr 8, 2023, 1:37 a.m.
Grad school is SO MUCH HARDER THAN UNDERGRAD. Hi, mom. I’m sure if you were here you’d be telling me to go to bed already, but I’ve been up for three days now and if I don’t finish this essay tonight (this morning), then I’m utterly fucked. What’s new with you? How’s the afterlife? I think the lack of sleep is getting to me. But this is a two year program, and the work is hard and fast—I knew that going in, so I have to stop making excuses.
I still don’t know why I’m writing you like this. I still don’t know if I’m even happy. I’m still so goddamn afraid.
I wish I was a religious woman, because if I were then this might make a modicum of sense. But I’m not, and you’re still dead, and I still can’t bring myself to visit your grave. I hope you don’t blame me for that. I don’t think you would, you were always kinder to me than I was to myself.
I gotta get back to work now. But I love you. Happy birthday.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: ALMOST DONE
Sat, Apr 8, 2024, 11:42 a.m.
Hi, mom! Happy birthday! I know I bitched and complained about this MS program, but I finally feel like I’ve gotten into the swing of things. I’ll get my master’s next month, and I have a work placement program with the FBI Detroit field office starting in the summer. If all goes well with that, then I should be on track to be AN FBI ANALYST by NEXT YEAR! Can you imagine? I barely can!
I keep wanting to ask—what really happened that night? You were so afraid. You knew something was wrong immediately, so something else must have been going on, right? I wish you’d have told me about it. I know I was only a kid, and you probably wanted to protect me, but where did that leave me? A teenager alone, with no answers, no reason for why what happened happened, nothing. If you had let me in, told me what was going on, maybe I’d be less afraid now.
I’m going to have to stop moving around so much once I get this job. I don’t know if I can. I don’t want you to think I resent you at all, I really, truly don’t. You were always such a good mom to me. You’re the woman I most want to be like. I ask myself every time something hard happens, or every time I get scared, what would mom do? What would mom say? And it makes me feel a little bit better.
Sometimes I feel like all I have left is the ghost of you, and how that ghost has shaped me.
I’m sorry, that got dark. I love you. Happy birthday.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: “Good enough for government work” makes no sense because government work is HARD.
Sun, Apr 8, 2025, 5:00 p.m.
I am not giving up. I’m starting with that. My work placement went well—well enough that when a position opened in the Omaha field office, they offered me a job there. So, I moved. Special Agent-in-Charge Dempsey is a huge hardass, and I’m routinely clocking 60+ hour work weeks. I’d say “I hope it slows down” but I like the work, it’s the people I can’t stand. But that’s always been the way of it, hasn’t it?
The other analysts tried early on, I could tell. But I’m just too anxious, too shy, too nervous, too stuttery, too much. I can’t hold a conversation about anything but work, and once they realised that, the invitations to after-work drinks stopped coming. Or maybe that’s because I never leave the office before 8p.
Staying in one place has been hard. Really hard. I can’t shake the feeling that I’m being watched. I’ll be sitting home alone, on reddit, and suddenly I get a flash of something outside and I’m just so sure it’s a camera taking pictures, or a person looking through my blinds. It’s a stupid fucking thought, who would be watching me? I know it’s the anxiety talking, and I do my best to breathe through it when it happens, but it just keeps fucking happening. I don’t want to be like this. How am I ever going to have a normal life? How am I supposed to find a husband, have kids, have a normal relationship with someone that I don’t meet on an internet forum, if still I jump out of my skin every time a bird lands on my window sill? There must be more to life than work, but work seems like the only thing that keeps those thoughts at bay.
I know we never really talked about the man that fathered me, but I’m starting to wish we had. Or that I had pressed you more when you refused to engage. I’m so lonely, all the time. You were fine being alone, but you had me, and I had you, and now I have no one. Other people have family and friends and all I have is an email box that never gets opened and a studio apartment that feels like a giant, gnashing maw, closing its teeth around me as I sit and wait to die.
I wish I had happier things to say to you. I wish for a lot of things these days that I don’t think I’ll ever get to have. Happy birthday. I love you.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: A rare win for Grace!
Mon, Apr 8, 2026, 9:57 p.m.
For once, I can say with confidence that you’d be proud of me. There was this serial killer cold case that I got handed—probably busy work, Agent Dempsy likes to give me a lot of busy work—but I made a connection no one saw. I caught the guy. Well, not personally, of course, but I wrote the report that got other field agents to catch the guy. It wasn’t a cold case at all, he just changed his M.O. I connected seven new bodies, and the field agents figured out he was going to take another girl, probably within the week.
I saved someone’s life. I couldn’t save you, but maybe this will be a good enough start. My personal life is still in shambles, and my head is still filled with static and screaming, but god dammit I did something right with this, and I want to ride the high.
So. No complaining this time. No misplaced lamentations screamed into the ether. Just an I love you, a happy birthday, and a see you next year.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: (no subject)
Sat, Oct 10, 2026, 2:58 a.m.
I don’t even know what to say to you right now. What the fuck, Alyssa.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Grace Ashcroft <[email protected]>
Subject: It does get better.
Tue, Apr 8, 2027, 11:47 p.m.
I’m not apologizing for the last email. You should have told me. But my friend Sherry pointed out something really important—just because I disagree with what you did, or the circumstances around it, doesn’t mean you aren’t my mother. You took me in, you raised me, and for twenty five years you were my mom. You’re still my mom. I’m proud to call you that, and I always will be.
I have a daughter, now. Kind of like you—her name is Emily, and she came into my life totally unexpectedly, but I looked at her and I just knew. I knew she was mine, and I was hers, and I could continue your legacy by caring for this child. She hears a lot of stories about Grandma Lyssa.
I met a man. Or, have been seeing a man that I met back then, when I found Emily. His name is Leon, and you would love him. He’s maybe a bit older than you’d probably like, but he takes care of me. Of us, Emily and I. But what’s most important is that we’re a team. He respects me, and listens to me, and never, not once has made me feel less than. We build each other up, support each other, and while it’s really god damned hard sometimes, it's so, so worth it.
The last time I told you I met the man I was going to marry, I wound up with a restraining order and a broken heart. But I was also 20 years old, and not much more than a human shaped thing stitched together with good intentions and deep self-doubt. This time is better, this time is right. You don’t go through something like we did together and come out on the other side the same person. I’m not afraid anymore, and I have Leon to thank for a lot of that. Not all of it, I’ve put in the hard work myself, too, but enough that it’s important to mention.
You don’t have to worry about me anymore. I’m going to be okay. I still love you, and I still miss you, and I’ll always wish you a happy birthday, but I don’t think I’ll send any more of these emails. I guess I feel like I don’t have to talk to the ether now that I have a family that will listen.
I love you, mom. Happy birthday.
To: Alyssa Ashcroft <[email protected]>
From: Leon S. Kennedy <[email protected]>
Subject: Dear Ms. Ashcroft
Mon, Nov 1, 2027, 4:32 p.m.
Dear Ms. Ashcroft,
I’m writing to you today for several reasons. First, to introduce myself—Grace and I have been seeing each other for a while now, and she’s been kind (and open) enough to allow me the honor of reading her emails to you. I hope you don’t find this to be a violation, as that was not her intention. I feel that I understand her more, having read them, and I thank you both for that.
Second, I wanted to give you an update, of sorts. You raised a remarkable woman, and in turn she is raising an incredible little girl. Emily might not be a blood relation, but she’s the spitting image of Grace and, from what I’ve heard, absolutely embodies your own spirit, too. They are both doing so well; Grace got a new job with the DSO, and Emily is enrolled in school full time now. Her best friend came over for a sleepover last night, and I’m still picking glitter out of my hair.
Third, I wanted to offer you an assurance. Grace and Emily will be safe, loved, and protected, for as long as I have breath in my body with which to do so. They are my entire world, and I will personally ensure that they come to no harm, even after I’m gone. I’ve got far reaching connections, and those connections love your girls almost as much as I do.
Finally, I am writing you to respectfully ask for your daughter’s hand in marriage. I don’t need an answer, of course, but I thought it the polite thing to do. You are a constant presence in our home, from the photos on the wall, to the stories Grace tells, to the recipes she cooks (I’m sorry, I will never like your broccoli cheese casserole. It’s disgusting. Please don’t tell Grace I said so, because I still choke it down with a smile). So, while I don’t need an answer, and am okay with never getting one, your memory is a living one, and deserves to be honored.
Thank you for giving Grace to the world. She’s made my life immeasurably better, like she does for all those whose lives she touches. I know you’re proud of her, how can you not be? Rest easy, Alyssa. I’ll do my damndest to make Grace the happiest woman in the world, that I can promise you.
Very Truly Yours,
Leon S. Kennedy