Doubting
A Letter, Horatio to Hamlet
My Prince-
Did you think you could hide from everyone, prince? Did you think no one could see through your hastily erected masks? That no one would notice how much you were disturbed? It is an insult to me, friend, how much you tried to hide. But who am I to meddle in the affairs of princes and kings? None, so I shall speak to my friend, whom I know all to well.
"What makes you from Wittenberg?" You asked, as we met. It was easy enough to respond lightly, "a truant disposition, good my lord." With a slight jest, you left it at that. For a moment I wanted to speak to you of my worry, but the guards were there, and there was a more pressing matter for which at that moment I had come to speak. But in truth, there was no more pressing matter than yourself. Dimly through your sadness, I saw something else. At the moment I knew not what. It was only after you met with your father's ghost it came to the surface. I don't think you even recognized it before. Anger. And what ghosts can overcome the living without bearing sorrow and that? But you needed to go. When you returned, I knew I could never again try to speak what I had come to. You were at that moment on your first step to the worlds beyond. Knowledge of this world's mysteries, which I have spent years vainly trying to learn, filled you. I believe it gave you some power unknown to me.
After that, all I could do was stay by your side, trying to delve out truth and give what comfort I might. I wish to believe I did. Yet how could I? In those days following, I was as aware of our differences as I was the first time we met. Then, you helped me. How can I ever tell you how much your assistance guided me? You gave me the strength I needed to carry on. That, and a friendship I swear I shall carry till the day I die. I cannot forget a single moment of our time spent together, for it is the only memory I have that is untarnished. Was untarnished. Now I can't remember our happiness without tears. How beautiful everything was. How simple, at least to me. You must have had so many princely duties that any time spent in listless pleasure was a rare event. How much of that time was wasted with me? I hope I was able to repay some of that great debt with the small favors you asked of me. I wonder if I could have done more. Never doubting you, or showing more cheer. Or, perhaps, not showing what I did, for so much of that little was forced. But it was hard enough, feigning some essence of normalness. You must have seen through my paltry acting, as I saw flashes beneath your magnificent performance. Or maybe some true madness clouded your vision. Maybe I was, by then, beneath your notice, merely another member of the audience. Oh, how I hope not. I gave so much to be there. But so does an audience, to see an act. Somehow, you must have noticed. I would not have survived otherwise. Yet I did not say what in the beginning I meant to. I am terribly sorry, for now it is too late. When I finally understood everything, it was far too late. You were dead in my arms. I was a wooden puppet then, speaking as was expected, carrying your last words. All I could have said to you was worthless, floating words that had once carried meaning. They still do, to me, but with the would-be receiver dead, what worth are they? Reminders, only, of the past. Perhaps what could have been. I cannot remember what I meant to speak to you, though it was rehearsed without end. Any words of meaning have left me, save for the story you bid me tell. Your story.
Your masks had grown heavy, but you had molded them to yourself so well they could not be lifted. In the end, even I could not see through them. Perhaps it was because so many of the masks had become you, maddening your already distraught thoughts.
I never told you what I meant to say, and now I find I cannot write it. So I will give you my farewell, and with it my love, for tomorrow is another day. You created that day, and made it far brighter then it could have been. But there will always be a shadow hanging over the future, for your bright light has been extinguished.
The morning's sole star has risen, with it new beginnings, and it is too late too say goodnight. So good morrow, my sweet prince, and sleep in peace.
-Horatio