Dear friend,

It has been three weeks now since we first learned the truth from Troy regarding your parentage. And I can't stop thinking about it. Thinking about how we aren't brother and sister. Not half-cousins. Not half-brother/half-sister. It's tearing me apart inside, Annie. It's so incredibly painful I don't think I can bear it anymore.

So I won't.

I know this will sound odd to you. That day I kissed you in the hospital, that day I touched you like I'd touched no woman before…I told you how guilty I felt for loving you when we were related. But what I didn't tell you was that I was also a little excited too. What we had between us then sent bolts of electricity through every inch of my being. It was like an orgasm every day, without the sex. It set me on fire.

Ann, I'll come out and say it. It wasn't you I loved. It was the way you made me feel. I tried to recreate that feeling after we learned the truth but it was gone. Destroyed by Troy. Now when I touch you, when I kiss the lips I used to crave so much, I only taste bitter salt. I don't think I ever really wanted you, but when I thought I couldn't have you, it gave me the freedom to wish for that which could never be. I think too that it was really you who loved me, and all this time, you had me fooled into thinking it was me who loved you because you couldn't stand the thought that maybe it was all just a little too one-sided. Shame on you, Ann. But I forgive you. That is the main purpose of my letter, so please, keep this in mind as I continue. I forgive you, Annie.

And I'm writing to you to let you know I've found someone else. You know of her. Her name is Lia Jameson. My half-sister. My mother's daughter. I dare Troy to disprove that (gee, how masochistic I've become lately). And you know what? I don't care that we are blood. I know it's the real thing. I feel for Lia the way I never felt for you, even when I thought we were related. And isn't her name funny? Lia and Luke. A lot like my grandfather and your grandmother. We had it wrong all along, but perhaps we weren't far off. The clue was always there.

I went to Lia the other day (you don't know this but I visited my sister regularly growing up. I was ashamed to talk about her back then. Can you believe that?) I told her about our life-long love, yours and mine. I told her how fate had played such a vicious joke on us, making us believe that what we had was real. Our love is no more than the dime-store variety, Ann. We were naïve children, enamored with the idea of sex, but so damned scared of following through with it that we had to make someone we could never love the object of our obsession. It's a good thing we never actually had sex because it would have made me see sooner what I see now, that the chase was better than the catch. And you would have been so hurt, if we had gone that far only to reach the same conclusion I've come to know. So in some ways, fate is kind.

I told Lia all of this and I cried and she took me in her arms and she kissed me. Oh you bet I was terrified at first, afraid of my own self and my desires. I kept berating myself, saying, "Luke, don't you go through with this. You know it will come to no good." Casteel, my mind taunted. Dirty no-good incestuous Casteel. But she kept telling me it was all right, it was OK because she loved me, really loved me, and I believed her; she was so persuasive. Her hands were even more convincing. You know what I mean, Ann. You're not dumb. And there, on the floor in the living room, in front of her fireplace, I experienced sex for the first time, and it was everything people say it should be, even if it was with my sister. But hey, who are you to judge, right? If anyone should understand, it would be you.

With this in mind, I can't imagine ever living a happy life with you, my precious innocent Annie, my sister who's not really my sister. My childhood love who's really still a child. My Annie who's no more than a friend to me. A really good friend. That's all.

You need someone who can take you to the heights you deserve; someone you can share your first time with. I'm too experienced for you now. I've moved beyond little kisses and childish games. Annie, step away from that youthful world too. Enter into the arms of the man you were born to be with. That man was never me. I only hope you can find a love as beautiful as the one I have with my sister. I was ashamed of her before but I now call her my older sister with pride. That's what love can do. And maybe, one day, you will know this happiness I feel as your own.
I wish you the best, innocent child.

I'd like to tell you to keep in touch, Ann. I'd like to end this letter on a cordial note. I wish I could say that I'd like it if you could look at me and still see some compassion there, some flickering of our old love, even just the smallest flame burning.

But I can't. It's all a lie. I promised you once that I would never lie to you. And I won't now.

Don't come after me. Please. Don't write me. Don't call me. Let's make a clean break.

I'm going to go now, Ann. Don't even bother asking me where it is I plan to go. I haven't thought it all through yet. But I will go there with Lia. We can't marry, of course, not ever, but we'll be together. We'll have many more nights like the one I just described to you. And the sex will only get better.

Always know though, those times in your arms, when you were my sister, and I was still your brother, were some of the happiest in my life. I wish only to find that feeling again, and I know I will never find it with you.

Goodbye, my old love. Hello, bright future. The sun does, sometimes, come out tomorrow.

Luke Toby Casteel

Luke,
You are a bastard. I'm glad you're not my brother.
Ann