Right. It's 4.07am. Fuck it, let's do this.
1. Of course it hurt me, what you did. I'm just thankful that I'm a good enough liar to hide that from you, to pass it off as okay, because I'd rather have you as a friend than as nothing at all - and the way you were speaking the next day, saying you'd understand if I never wanted to see you again... that scares me. I don't want you sabotaging our friendship to appease your own guilt. I need a friend, not for you to run - so stay my friend. We'll be okay, I promise. Thank goodness I can lie well enough to pass it off as okay, as if I don't care, because if you saw what you did you'd run a mile out of shame. And I don't want that. Stay my best friend, please, because I need you. I want you to be more, but I need you to be my friend, right now, especially with the sort of place we're both in emotionally. I hope we can do that; make this work as a friendship, because you're one amazing human being.
2. More than anything, I'm glad I got over myself/my principles and found my empathy. I still have issues with the selfish decisions you made with him, hurting others, but I also understand them better now. And I'm not going to hate him for you anymore; we might be incredibly close friends, but I'm not your brother or father, I can't be angry at him for you. If you forgive him for hurting you, I will too, and I'll try to understand the decisions you guys made. Hell, I've made similar mistakes, and we're young, and I cannot stand the thought of losing you as a friend over something like this.
3. You colossal asshat. I don't think you even realise what you've done. I trusted you, told you things in confidence; I told you I liked her; and you went off and kissed her anyway. Last time we spoke properly, we were drunk, and you hugged me and told me we were like brothers, that you were so glad we finally grew up enough to talk and be real friends. And then you stabbed me in the back. And the worst thing? You probably didn't even do it with malice or selfishness. You probably didn't even think of me, or how it could hurt me, and you probably still haven't. Thoughtless. And I tricked myself into thinking you'd grown up.
4 and 5. I know you care, but I wish it wasn't so passively. I wish you'd do something to maintain our friendship, not just stand on the sidelines and worry about me. It gets to the point where I feel like you care, you worry, you want me to be okay, but only as long as you don't have to do anything, as long as it doesn't inconvenience you.
6. I don't know whether to be sorry or whether to be pissed off at you or whether we should both reconcile and move on. I think all three. You were everything to me, and neither of us wanted it to end the way it did. It sucked, it hurt, it was awful to be young and trapped by circumstance, unable to do fuck all to separate ourselves from the difficulties of unfortunate circumstance. But you, you moved on so quick, and I know why - you've told me, said to me, that it's just a defense mechanism, to bury your head in the sand and not feel. It cuts me deep, though, to see how little you seem to care - even though I know you lie awake at night, feeling, you do it alone, hide it away, and don't you remember, dear, I can't look into your eyes and see it for myself. I can only know what you tell me. And right now, all you'll show me are the parts that are killing us both, and killing everything we shared.
7. I'm including you here because I feel I should, even though I've run out of things to say. One day, you will learn. You will stop repeating the same selfish, stupid actions and mistakes. It just won't be by my hand or from my lips that you learn, because I'm done trying to help you. I'm done.
8. You're so fucking infuriating. I've tried to care, to be there for you when I knew nobody else was. I've walked you home at 4 in the morning just to get the opportunity for us to speak about all that I can see is bothering you. You keep promising me you'll try to change. But you never do. And I don't know, after all the shit I've been through - you never consider that, do you? - whether I can continue to care for you, when you will happily drag me down with you. Once upon a time, I'd do it happily. Now, I don't know. I simply pray you get a fucking grip, so I don't have to break my promise to always be there for you.
9. We could have been much better friends. You think nobody notices the way you detach yourself, or the secrets that lurk in your eyes, the pain or upset you can feel. You think you hide it - but we see it, we all give a shit about you, if you'd only give us a chance. You are not the only one with the clarity you do, admittedly, possess. I understand, more than you would know. But now it is too late, and we will never have a chance to be that close, and it kills me.
10. I am so unbelievably proud of you. You've worked so hard and achieved so much, and you've grown so much since we originally stopped speaking. I couldn't be happier that we finally started again this year, and if we end up at different universities next year, I know how far you'll go. You've the smarts and the charm and the looks - nothing's going to stand in your way now.
11. You've been one of the most consistently amazing friends to me since I was lucky enough to meet you, and I'm so grateful. I hate that I won't see you much this summer, but I know we'll stay in contact. I just hope you stop beating yourself up and expecting perfection from yourself one day. You're already an awesome friend and one of the sweetest guys I know. When I was friendless, you pulled me outta a gutter I felt I was trapped in. Thank you.
12. I don't know whether you're a bitch or just so painfully insecure that I can only pity you, not despise you. I threw a hell of a lot into being there for you, and because nobody else will, I still do. I still wipe away your tears every time you get drunk and cry. And you used to be there for me too - the only problem was, you were in a relationship with a guy you were using as a safety blanket, and you were too willing to try to blur the lines with me for my comfort. And you've not changed since then. I don't know whether I lost a great, though insecure and misguided, friend, or saved myself from your vile manipulations. To be honest, I'm glad I don't know. I want to leave that behind. I just hope to God you forge something new for yourself, so you don't end up all alone, because even I don't want that for you.
13. You've... changed so much. It worries me. You were my closest friend before you left, very close, and you come back in a few months. To be honest, maybe I wanted to be more than friends, just a little, and I think you knew that - but as I told you, how could I let myself go with you when I knew you'd be leaving me so soon? Either way, I should be excited. Instead, I'm concerned. You've acted and talked in ways I never would have expected from you, recently. I missed you so bad, and you finally managed to admit you missed me too - but are you still you? I don't know.
14. You intrigue me and always have. I want to get to know you, but don't know how. We talk and it's nice, it works, but somehow something always comes up. It never quite clicked into place, even when you told me some of your insecurities. And I was tipsy, too tipsy to be able to give good advice... maybe that was when I screwed up the chance to get to know you and be friends. I wish you the best no matter where you end up.
15. Awh, honey, your mascara stained my shoulder. We've been through some real ups-and-downs, from being best friends to you almost literally nearly effing killing me, to cutting me off, to somehow being best friends with my brother and eventually reconciling with me, now we'd both grown up so much in a few short years. We never talk, but I feel very close to you - it's odd. Maybe it's just the peaks and troughs of the story we've had. Somehow we'll keep in contact, you lovely girl - no, woman, now. Thank you.
16. I stop talking to you and you try to fucking kill yourself? I could slap you silly, jesus motherfucking christ. I know; I know I was the only one holding you above the waves, the only one you could talk to, because you only knew me by reputation through someone who loved me, and you knew I had such a big fucking brain and a big fucking heart and I seemed to know everything. You told me that yourself. I'm very good at making it look like I know everything to people like you, when I need to. And I barely knew you, but like I've done with countless others, I tried to take you under my wing. I sat there while you were drunk and had a loaded gun to your temple, and I talked you out of it. Every day. And one day, I had to leave, you know why - and three days later I hear you've popped pills. Fuck you, man, and at the same time I bloody hope you're okay now - I don't even know. I just know you're alive. And I guess..... I guess that's all that matters. You're alive even though I left, even though it was after that night with the gun that I nearly cried in front of one of my closest friends simply because she asked me how I was holding up. You were the wake-up call, to me, the last one. That I couldn't keep giving without taking, keep being used by people like you - not malicious, just desperate. You're the ones that are hard to say no to, hard to leave, hard to cut off from, because I know you just need someone. But I can't keep doing this to my own detriment, I need a balance, and I need friends like many of those I've anonymously spoken out to above, those who reciprocate. I'm sorry. Please be okay without me.
17. I wish you could keep a conversation going. I remember good ol' days, and I actually confided quite a bit in you a couple of times - and you did in me, too. But I don't think you remember. Maybe we'll end up proper friends someday, but I doubt it for some reason.
Awh fuck it, there's more stuff I want to say to anonymous people that they'll never read, but oh well, I'm tired, and this is public exposure of the worst kind.