She had been struggling with this stupid letter for days, never knowing where to start. Never getting beyond the first line. Convinced it would make no difference. Her therapist had suggested she write it as some kind of healing process. However, as the dog rather aggressively rearranged his bed in the corner she sat back and silently cursed herself again about how she had ended up alone in this dingy one room flat with 'their' pet, not a single word added to the page in front of her. She could be a real dick sometimes, she knew that, but why did she have to be such a dick to the one girl she had truly loved and still did. Naomi dragged her body across the room and threw it down on the bed. She closed her eyes and thought back to the letter she had found on the coffee table that fateful day. The curve of Emily's cursive was beautiful but it didn't mask the fact that the letter was angry, so, so angry. A tear rolled down her cheek as she hugged her knees tighter into her chest. The therapist had said things would get easier in time, but almost two years had passed and everyday still hurt as much as that first lonely one. She lay in the same position, her tear stained face untouched, until the sky started to darken. "Darwin, walkies" she eventually mustered the energy to shout across the room, and he marched up, lead in mouth, obedient as the day he was when Emily had drilled it into him.
She absentmindedly walked alongside the dog, head down, focussing only on the gravel below her. The noise of a car horn shook her from her daze, and as she looked around she realised she was in Cook's street once again. Though it was no longer Cook's street, not really. Not since he had disappeared. She wished he was here though. She really wanted to talk to him. He would have known what to say to give her some momentary happiness. She sat down on what was once his doorstep, and began to talk, Darwin lying patiently at her feet. "Oh Cook, I miss her, you know. I really fucking miss her. Life's really shit right now. She's gone, you're gone, why did you have to go after that nutter you stupid, stupid fool?" Darwin inched closer, resting his head on her lap and looking up into her face. After a long while sitting on the step, and a few twitches of the curtains from the new family that lived there, she sighed and got back to her feet. They never bothered to come out and check on her anymore, she had ended up there so frequently that after the first few "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to disturb you"s they just left her to it. She didn't seem to cause any harm, and she always looked so sad that they didn't want to cause her more unnecessary pain by shooing her away.
Darwin tugged her along, it was now dark and he was getting impatient for his dinner. Back on automatic pilot she dragged herself home and filled his bowl. Naomi grabbed a cup from the washboard and filled it with milk; she took an apple from the fruit bowl and sat on the lone chair at the small dinner table she had forced herself to buy just to remind her to eat. She picked up the pencil and pad that still lay untouched on the table. "Here goes" she said once again to no one in particular, licking the tip of the pencil, a bad habit she had picked up somewhere along the way, before glancing over to the now worn photo of the beautiful red head that lay on the pillow of the untouched side of the bed. The fresh air seemed to have done her some good as she found the words she had so desperately needed to share began to flow freely from the tip of the pencil.
My Dearest Emily,
My therapist keeps saying I should write you a letter to tell you what I will never get to say to you in person. He thinks it will help me, so here goes... I love you more today than I have ever loved you. I whisper it into my pillow every night as I think about your big puppy dog eyes and beautifully lopsided smile before I fall into another restless sleep. I just hope you know it is true. I'm so sorry we fought like that. I should have trusted you when you told me you weren't cheating on me with that girl. I just couldn't bear the secrecy, it reminded me too much of those months we were fighting and you were out nightly with that Mandy. Do you remember? Those months were horrible, and I worried that I was losing you again just like I had then. I should have trusted you though. The tickets you were trying to surprise me with turned up 3 days after you had gone, whilst you were laying out there alone less a hundred meters away. I never have used them though, the time just never felt right, going alone just never felt right! I'm sure you would laugh at my sentimental stupidity but I have them framed now and I look at them every night before I fall asleep. Anyway it is the last thing I have that you gave me and I don't want to let them go just yet.
Emily, I keep having the same nightmare. A short, balding policeman knocks on the door and tells me you are dead, that your body was found in the park at the end of our road, our address lying on a form tucked into one of your pockets. I dream that I am staring at your swollen, purpling hand sticking out from beneath a sheet that is stark white in comparison. That they pull back the sheet and you are only recognisable by your tattoo (you know the one you got in Goa) under all that bruising. I keep having that same nightmare, and when I wake up dripping with sweat I momentarily think that's all it was, just a nightmare, but then I remember and I cry myself into oblivion all over again. They were sentenced last April by the way, life imprisonment. It should have been the death penalty! I know I should be in there with them. You wouldn't have left the house that night if I hadn't accused you. You wouldn't have been so angry and got yourself into such a horrific situation. If I had just believed you we would have been snuggled up in bed watching some crappy romantic film and chatting about our day. I am just as guilty as those murderous bastards Ems, I sent you to your death and I will never forgive myself for that. I don't live there any more by the way, couldn't bear to come home to that empty house. The silence was stifling. You'd hate my new place, it reflects my mood perfectly! You'd call it bleak, cold, dreary. You'd moan at the lack of colour on the walls, and the crap left all over the work surfaces. You'd moan that the carpet was caked in dog hairs and muck, and that you could almost reach both ends of the room if you lay stretched out. You would like the bed though. I kept our bed.
I'm sorry I haven't been back to your grave since the funeral. I couldn't stand to go alone. It reminded me too much of what was missing. I remember the exact location though. The day was a blur, but I will never forget how I can find you. That is ingrained in my memory. I often think about visiting. I go to call Cook for some moral support and realise he is also gone, laying not far from you. Effy is no better, she is so out of it on psychotropic drugs that she doesn't even recognise me any more. She never did recover from Fred's leaving her. I promise I will muster up the courage to visit soon though my love. I will bring you your favourite flowers and read you your favourite poetry.
Emily I wish you were still here. I'd tell you how stupid I am, how I love you more and more every day. I'd even make more of an effort to get to know your family. They don't talk to me now. I think they blame me too. I don't hold it against them. Ems if you were here we'd use those open ended tickets to travel Europe, drink European drinks, eat European foods, and smoke European cigarettes. We would be sophisticated in France; naughty in Amsterdam. We'd walk the Appian Way pretending to be soldiers in the Roman army, and learn to snowboard in the Swiss Alps with some guy named Pierre or Laurent. He wouldn't be able to keep his eyes off you and I'd get jealous as usual, but we'd later joke about it. Darwin would hate us for leaving him for so long with your sister. We'd talk about how we were going to travel to Australasia next, joking that Katie should just adopt the soppy pup, before we eventually settled down and had all those children you dreamt of. Our kids would be beautiful Ems, smart like me, but oh so beautiful just like you.
I love you with my whole heart EmsBear.
Yours always and forever,
Naoms
She put the pencil down and read over the letter, tracing the recipient's name with her finger tip and laying a kiss at the bottom of the page. Her therapist had been right; it felt good to properly talk to Emily again, even if it was only in a letter that would never be read by anyone else. Naomi picked up her glass of milk and drank from it, lazily swiping the back of her hand across her mouth to remove the remnants from her lips. "Think I'll write to her more often, Darwin" she affirmed to the dog before folding the letter into an envelope and placing it into the memory box her therapist had suggested she keep.