"More than a stunning debut. It is the announcement of a bold new literary voice"
—Stephen Chbosky, author of The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Nothing you would notice from looking at us is gone. We still talk, we still laugh, we still have inside jokes, we still listen to music, you still get annoyed at me for not liking Green Day. A bystander wouldn’t know that everything that matters is gone. H and the others still think we’re close.

But something changed. I don’t wait for you before choosing my seat in class anymore. You sit with Y, or with C. You tell them things you don’t tell me. You don’t talk to me every evening anymore. I don’t feel like I could tell you anything anymore. I don’t feel like I’m walking on sunshine whenever I talk to you anymore. Sometimes, I don’t even notice when you’re absent from school until somebody points it out.

You and A might think that it’s because we ratted each other out when we both screwed up. But it was before then. It started when I would sit on the far side of the table because you were more likely to sit next to me and you would sit with C and Q even if you had to pull up a chair and sit at the end of the table to be next to them. Even if it meant the teacher could see your computer screen so you would actually have to work. It started when I showed you Middle School and you fell in love with it, just like I had, and then you showed it to Q. It started when I told you my deepest, darkest secret and you said “C does too.”

So I stopped trying. I stopped trying to make you love me. I stopped trying to love you back when clearly neither of us wanted it anymore. I stopped sitting on the far side of the table. I started spending time with A, H, T, M, and K – the people who actually talked to me when others were available too. I’m done with loving you.

This is a love letter. It’s a love letter for something that is gone. It’s a love letter for what we used to be. It’s a love letter for when you used to call me by my real name. It’s a love letter for when A wanted to keep us apart because she didn’t trust you, so we could never hang out when she was around, but you still managed to find a way to spend time with me. It’s a love letter for when we sang Anyone Else But You in front of the class and you didn’t ditch me to perform with C even though she’s more talented, and I was sick and couldn’t sing above a hoarse whisper. It’s a love letter for when I could listen to Middle School and What’s My Age Again and My Chemical Romance and The Middle without hating myself for not hating you.

I am only hanging on because you are. When you stop talking to me, I won’t ever start a conversation again, T.