Dear, Kitty 

“I wasn’t used to being so naked like that. And that’s why I left him. It was too much for me to handle. It was too much kindness and goodness and affection and love. I didn’t know what to do with it all.”

I lied to you. Several weeks ago I told you I’d only ever received one romantic gesture that is a hand-written letter by a man trying to woo me. My lying wasn’t intentional. I forgot. And of course I forgot. I can be ungrateful like that.

The truth is, years after the sweet Asian boy, I received a letter from the first man I’d ever been official with. Though he had terrible penmanship I thought the gesture cute. In the letter there was a drawing of a sun with thorn-like rays sticking out, misshapen clouds, a home with the roof caving in, and grass that looked more like oceanic waves with tall stick-figure-like sunflowers sitting on top of it. The kind of scene we drew in elementary school. In one of the clouds, which covered a third of the 8×11 page paper, he had written: 

Dear, Athena

I’m so happy I met you. 

Your the best girlfriend I ever had. 

You make me very happy. I can’t wait for you to meet my family.

M.B 2022

Typically a misspelling of “you’re” would’ve been enough for me to discard all interest. I am insensitive and petty like that, Kitty. But you already know that. He was different, though. And not in the I’m-a-misfit-but-that-makes-me-unique kind of way. He was a neurodivergent like me. Only I’m overzealous about certain things in the English language. Anyway, it admittedly made me soft.

Are you ready for the platitude, Kitty? He made me a better me. A blatantly loving me. A heart-on-my-sleeve me. I wasn’t used to being so naked like that. And that’s why I left him. It was too much for me to handle. It was too much kindness and goodness and affection and love. I didn’t know what to do with it all.