He looked down at the envelope in his hand. So many things had lead up to that letter. Other letters, encounters, looks and feelings. Everything he wanted to say he put in that letter. However, he had never sent it. Slowly he turned it over. It wasn’t' even sealed. With a sigh he opened the envelope and took out the letter. His eyes scanned over it quickly, only taking in certain words and phrases. Then he went back over to the top and went over it again, more slowly this time.

Dear Professor Lin,

It’s mid-November now, which means it’s been six months, one week, two days, and four hours since I said goodbye at graduation. Obviously I’ve been keeping track of how long it’s been since you and I were together. It’s obsessive and wrong but I can’t help it. Every second without you…never mind I’m getting off subject. How are you doing? I ask this in almost every letter I have written since I left Taipei but I need you too know I still care about your well being.

This is starting to sound less like a letter and more like a jumbled diary entry isn‘t it?

I started work about five months ago at a school for witchcraft in the States which I had applied to only two months before graduation. It’s an exceptional institution, though, being one of the few male presences in an almost all female environment is rather tiresome and somewhat frightening at times. Most wizards only a month out of school don’t normally get teaching positions but thanks to the letter of recommendation that you gave me a few months before I graduated I was able to get the job without much of a fight. Though I imagine me graduating out of Wizard’s college at only eighteen might have something to do with it as well. You always said I was more intellectually gifted then most people my age which I suppose is the truth. I always was four years younger than my fellow classmates.

Professor… I do miss you. After graduating, like so many other times before, I was tempted to approach you and even after graduation I thought of contacting you but I could never work up the nerve. Maybe this time I’ll send this letter and possibly the other ones as well… Though we’ll have to see.

Always Yours,

Lunar

He sighed, putting the letter that he had written over six months ago back in its casing. Memories. Nothing but old useless memories. He was going to just put away the box of letters when he spotted a date on one of them. June 15, 2004. That was just before the vacation of his first year. He remembered that day. He was full of hope then. But he had never sent that letter either. The first of a chain of unsent letters. Reluctantly and almost on impulse, he picked it up and opened it. Slowly he started reading.

Dear Professor Lin,

Taking Ancient Magical Writings wasn’t my first choice but after signing up late and seeing I had to chose between your class and Temporal Studies I chose your class and I can see that I made a good choice. Your class was amazing, though, I assume it has more to do with your charismatic teaching style rather than the class itself but that is besides the point. The way you teach is just so amazing. No matter what comes out of your mouth you always manage to draw me in because you have such a wonderful way with words.

Summer break starts in a few days and I think out of everyone I’ve met I’ll miss you the most, Professor. Your one of the few who looked past my young age of fourteen and saw more than that. You treated me almost like an equal instead of a naïve brat who is considered to be way too smart for his own good, and for that I thank you.

Sincerely, your faithful student,

Lunar Wu

Lunar never gave his professor that letter before he left for vacation. He meant to but at the last moment he became nervous and decided it wasn’t appropriate for him to send him a letter but… despite this he still held onto it in case he ever did get the nerve to give it to him. The nerve never came. He told himself with every letter that he wrote that it would be the one he’d send to him and each and every time his nerves got the best of him. Placing the letter back into its previously sealed envelope, he set it back in the box and with a sigh he stood up from the couch, leaving the box full of letters open on his coffee table because he felt he needed to avoid looking at those letters for the time being. He wasn’t even sure how he had come across them. The box of letters were usually tucked away in the back of a shelf in his closet. Something had possessed him to look in that closet. His eyes were quick to flicker upwards and almost immediately he spotted the plain, tin box that held all his secrets. The tin box hadn’t been opened for two months which was the last time he had written his professor a letter.

He ventured back into the living room, barely one hour later, only glancing at the clock before he sat back down on the couch. There were least two hours left until his friend came to pick him up and take him to a local club specifically for wizards interested in the male gender. Flipping through the letters, he pulled out one from the bottom of the stack, only hesitating momentarily before he opened the envelope and pulled out the letter. 05/10/05 was the date on it… oh. It was /that/ letter. The one that had changed everything.

Professor Lin,

I’ve been writing you for over a year but you don’t know that because you’ve never received one of my letters which is admittedly my fault. All the letters I’ve written to you are still in the top drawer of my desk. They are almost all sealed up in an envelope with your name written on the front of it but… that’s as far as I’ve gotten. I am unable to bring any of these letters to you mostly because I am a coward. I am not sure how you will react to them. Will you think I was stepping over the line of our student/teacher relationship or would you merely accept them as amusing ramblings from an awkward fifteen year old boy?

Tonight I wanted to give you the letter I wrote over a month ago and I was on my way to your chambers when I saw you. Your door was cracked open and I know it was wrong of me to peak in but I went against my better judgment and did just that.

I love you. I realized it the second I saw you and Professor Han in a passionate lip lock. I think I’ve always had feelings for you. A year ago a crush started but I didn’t realize it then. I was much too naïve to believe I had anything but friendly feelings towards you but now I realize that I held more than simply platonic feelings towards you and it took seeing you kissing another man to force me to see that I was blind about my own feelings.

He couldn’t finish the rest of that letter. Even after four years it still hurt like a bitch and it made him feel like he was that heartbroken fifteen year old again who was so lost and unsure of how to proceed with life after witnessing such an event. Wanting to crumple up the letter and throw it in the trash, he barely resisted the urge as the letter was put away like the last two had been but this one was put away harshly while the others had been put away gently. Lunar’s feelings never faded and they only seemed to grow stronger after that incident even if his teacher seemed to be attached to someone else. However, because of this he was scared to even think about giving one of his letters to Professor Lin.

The letters never stopped. He couldn’t stop writing them even if he wanted too. They were a way for him to express himself not only his teacher but to himself as well. What a pathetic being he was. Here he was a year after graduation living in an entire new country with a great career ahead of him and he was still pining over his teacher. He should get over him and writing these pointless letters that he would never send to him were a waste of his time, energy, and emotions.

A knock on the door startled him out of his thoughts and he was grateful for the interruption. Quick to put the letters back in the tin box, he quickly stood up and shuffled towards the door, hoping that a night out with his new friend would help put the day out of his mind.

Professor,

I’m not using any pleasantries in this letter. I’m completely wasted on some drink I inhaled at the bar tonight and I doubt I’m able to think of any pleasant greetings anyway. This would be letter number… well I’m not sure. I only know that this is one of many letters which will most likely be put in that tin box of mine since I never have the urge to send these to you.

Do you know how badly I wanted to kiss you at graduation? For a split second I didn’t care whether or not anyone else saw us. All I wanted was a chance to see what it was like to kiss you and possibly let my feeling be out in the open. It’s only been a year since I’ve seen or spoken to you but it seems so much longer. Do you miss me? I hope you do. You always said I was one of your best students, but maybe you’ve said that to others in the past just to boost their self esteem. However, I hope this isn’t the case. I like to think that I’m somehow special to you. Maybe not in the same way you’re special to me but at least special in some way.

I still love you and I think I always will. I want so badly to just send this letter to you no matter what the consequences might be… though there would be less of them since I am no longer your student. Seeing as how drunk I am at the moment I might work up the courage to finally send you this and seek some sort of closure to a chapter in my life that has gone on for over five years. I hope you can give it a good ending but I won’t get my hopes up. I’ve learned that hoping too much for something that seems hopeless only brings you pain.

Remember that if I do send this I will always love you Professor- no matter what the outcome may be.

Lunar

He had written this almost immediately after coming home from the bar tonight. All he could think about all night was how he was betraying Professor Lin and in order to prevent himself from feeling this way he sat at the bar and drank for most of the night. His friend was not very pleased with the way he acted and promptly dropped him off without even saying a word to him. Oh well. He would forgive him with time. Getting to his feet, he grabbed an envelope, folded the letter, and then put it in the envelope before stumbling into his bedroom- only to stumble back out a few minutes later and then pass out on his living room floor.

xxxxx

He groaned as he finally started to wake up the next morning, the dull ache in the back of his head reminding him vaguely of what had happened last night. Eyes fluttering open, he winced at the light protruding from the blinds and attempted to sit up, doing it slowly because he didn’t want to risk giving himself an even worse headache then the one he already had. Rubbing his temples, he was about to get to his feet when he had a sudden jolt of memory and just like that he remembered what he had done after he’d come home last night. A new letter had been written to his professor and then after sealing it he stumbled drunkenly into his room. While he had been in his room he had contacted the wizarding post office and given them his letter before passing out. He couldn’t believe what he had done.

Lunar had always wished for his professor to see those letters but now that the letter was /actually/ on its way to him he didn’t quite know how to react. Rejection was what he would surely face. There was no doubt in his mind that his professor simply thought of him as a former student and nothing more. He couldn’t take rejection from his professor. It would hurt too much and- why had there been a loud noise coming from his bedroom just a second ago? Breaking out of his thoughts, he forced himself to his feet and walked into his bedroom to discover a small little demonic looking creature looking very annoyed while holding a letter- wait letter?! The creature standing on his night stand was called a mailer demon and in the wizard world this was literal. Every time a piece of mail wasn’t able to get delivered it was sent back to the home via portal and brought back by a grumpy little demon.

“You never put an address on the letter you mailed last night, you buffoon. If you want to try mailing it again-”

“No, thank you! I’m fine!” he shouted, quickly grabbing the letter as he promptly ignored the sneer the demon gave him before hopping back into the portal he had come through. It was a miracle… but it also made him realize how foolish he had been last night… and for the past five years of his life.

Dear Professor Lin,

This will be the last letter I will ever write to you. For years I’ve pinned over you and lived a pathetic, sad existence while letting my fantasies of us getting together one day ruin my judgment. I imagine this is what made me think about you all these years and hope we would one day be together- no, professor this isn’t the truth or at least the complete truth. I do love you and I always will but I need to stop fooling myself. You will never feel the same way about me and that night I discovered you kissing another man was probably the day I should’ve realized it. I assume you were attached to him. Just recalling the look in your eyes that I tried for so long to ignore is enough of an answer to me. My love for you did cloud my judgment for all these years… but not anymore.

I need to let you go and move on. You will always be my favorite teacher but that’s all you’ll ever be and with time I can accept that.

Thank you for teaching me so much, Professor.

With love,

Lunar

That was it. It was the end to a five year long emotional affair and Lunar didn’t feel any relief. He only felt heartbroken. Sighing, he sealed his last letter in the envelope, grabbing the stack of unsent letters he had sitting on the coffee table before heading into the kitchen, the male making sure to grab a match on his way into the kitchen. Burning five years of memories was something he didn’t want to do but if he ever wanted a chance to get over his former teacher… it was something he had no choice but to do.