dear karkat,

um, gosh. i don't really know how to start this letter! hehehe. i guess i'm still not really sure what to say yet, except maybe that it's kind of weird seeing how everything "started over." i… i thought that maybe dad would be back, but after checking with rose, dave, and jade and hearing that none of their guardians are back, i guess that wasn't meant to happen. that should mean that your dad—um, lusus?—didn't come back either, huh?

i'm actually really sad about that, but i guess it can't be helped! i still wish though, you know. since we got a second chance, i was kind of hoping that THEY would get a second chance too. but then again, it's pretty lucky of us to even get a second chance to begin with.

it's strange, coming back to earth and seeing everything and everyone doing okay. it's like nothing happened, you know? it's hard to believe that something like sburb happened, and it takes me so many times to think about it just to remember that it DID happen, and that i wasn't just hallucinating. even though it was such a big thing, with everyone around us acting like nothing went on, it's hard. karkat, it's hard being the only one who remembers. it's hard, and nobody understands. well, i mean, rose, dave, and jade do, but… you get what i'm saying, right? hehehe.

by the way, none of us can find you guys on our pesterchum accounts. since you haven't trolled us yet, i guess maybe you guys don't have our information anymore either! i wish i could know how everything turned out with you too, but there's no way to communicate with you now….

i hope you're doing okay, karkat. even if we can't talk to each other, i know we'll still be friends!

~john

dear john,

i kind of cant believe it, but we're home again! everything on the island is okay, but i guess i never really realized how lonely things were here until now, since bec is gone... :( he was a very good dog and my best friend (after you guys of course!), and i really REALLY miss him! when i came back, the first thing i did was try to look for him, even though i knew he wasnt on the island anymore. not having him greet me like he always does really hurt somehow... i grew up with him, so its hard to believe that hes gone now...

um, sorry! i didnt mean to sound all sad in this letter, because you know how much i hate seeing you upset! i just... i dont know, actually! i think its just super strange that im really here all alone. even grandpa isnt as intimidating now. im not sure how thats possible. :/

i wonder how rose and dave are doing? the last time i heard from them, they were kind of busy trying to look around their own homes. we're all just really busy lately, huh? what about you, john? are things kind of different on your side too? i know its been a while since we settled back down, but still! i dont think any of us are ready to go back to "regular life" after sburb! i hope youre doing okay!

ummm, i think thats all i have to say for now! write back to me soon, john! even though letters take foreeeeever getting here, id still really like to see something from you!

love,

jade

dear karkat,

i don't really expect you to get my letters, but somehow, writing them makes me feel a lot better. talking to the others help a lot too, but i just kinda wish that you could keep up-to-date with me too! … in a way, i suppose.

i didn't really talk about it in my last letter, but the four of us are doing great. it's a little bizarre, but all of our guardians had left us a lot of money to live off of, so we don't have to worry about living expenses. i guess they all knew what was going to happen and left us all a safety net.

i invited jade to come live with me, because it was so strange living by myself and since she's technically my "sister." she was getting really lonely on her island too, so i thought it'd be nice if we just lived in my house! it's fun finally having a sibling! sometimes, we stay up late and talk about sburb, you guys, dave and rose, and a whooole bunch of other things! this sounds a little silly, but we both get really homesick, even though we're right at home. do you feel like that too, sometimes? jade gets really upset at times, when we talk (and i'll admit to having cried too! but just a little bit!), but she's got me, and we'll be okay.

dave and rose moved in together as well. dave had to bring all his stuff to the lalonde household, because rose's place was soooo much bigger. he complained a lot, but i think he's thankful that rose is there for him. :) he won't ever admit to it, unless it's ironically. i bet he and rose have a lot of sarcastic/ironic arguments! it's probably a lot of fun. maybe jade and i will visit them sometime!

we still chat with each other a lot on pesterchum, but it's not the same somehow. rose says it's because we've all changed so much, and i think she's right. but no matter what, we went through everything together, and there's no one else out there who know exactly how we feel, so we're going to be sticking close always!

okay, karkat. that's all i have to say for now. i wish i could hear from you too….

~john

Mother,

Perhaps it might be a bit late to be conducting this type of a letter to you now, but you always told me that it was "better late than never." I still don't know if you meant that in a passive-aggressive way to clean my room, but I'm using it now, just to make things equal. If they ever needed to be.

Even though it's kind of bizarre to think of you as my mother, you were still there for me all these years, and I feel like, maybe, I have projected your actions as things far more despicable than you meant originally. Your late-night house-cleaning undertakings were always impractical to me, but I will let such actions of yours slide.

Someone once told me that "a mother will always do whatever is best for her children." I don't know how true that statement is, or if I would ever ask you, even if you were here, but it makes me wonder. The things you did for me throughout my entire life—did you intend for them to be the best for me? The wizard statues, the expensive frame, Jasper's tomb: did you really buy those to make me happy? These will be questions I don't believe I will be able to answer, even if I psychoanalyze them from every possible angle.

And, perhaps, some things are better left unanswered. That's something I learned the hard way.

I suppose that, at this point in my epistle, a note of gratitude should be left for all the years you have taken care of me. I'm not implying that I didn't appreciate your eccentric manner of child-rearing, but they were always a little disconcerting. Nevertheless, now that you are gone, it would be rude of me to not leave at least the slightest mention of thankfulness toward you. Therefore, Mother, thank you.

Also, I hope you don't mind that I invited Dave Strider to live in our house. I don't believe you would be able to make much of a complaint anyway, but I wanted to let you know anyway, as a sign of respect.

Rose

sup

jade keeps fucking insisting that i write one of these shitty letters or whatever but i dont even know why she does it. its not like i have anything to say to you anyway. whatever im just going to pretend that im writing and get her off my case.

dave

shit now rose on my case about it. something about making jade upset. they just dont give up. goddamn it this is annoying. why the hell do they even want me to write something sappy and sentimental as a letter. who the fuck even writes letters anymore? ill just keep writing this ironically.

yeah okay rose just let me bust out my diamond-encrusted ink pen and start laying down some sick beats onto this gilded parchment paper i have lying around the place. ill be using my own fucking blood just to make sure im being sincere enough. give me a second to cross my ts and dot my curly is. ive gotta start hymns dedicated to the life and undertaking of this glorious hunk of manbeast if you dont mind so just give me a second. frame this fucker up in uv protected bulletproof glass on an authentic gold frame after im done too.

fuck that was stupid. okay i dont know what to write so. i dont know. should i be thanking you or whatever? jade keeps telling me to do that and that its not healthy to keep everything inside but i think shes just trying to screw with my mind.

alright you were kind of a cool older bro and im not gonna deny that i looked up to you. i dont think any kid out there was as lucky as me to have a bro like you but the shit you were up to was always pretty legit. but now youre dead so its not like any of that counts anymore. who the fuck cares about what dead people did anyway.

so thanks for taking care of me and fucking my life over so i could win at sburb or whatever. you basically freaked the hell out of me every time you showed up but its all cool. nothing i couldnt handle.

i guess its time to take egberts advice. i gotta get out of your shadow and spread my wings. this coolbird has to fly.

peace dawg

dave