Dear Johnny,

It’s been six years now since you broke your mother’s heart, six years since you broke my mother’s heart, since you broke my best friend’s heart, and since you broke my heart.

It’s been five years since your daughter was born, she’ll never know you at all, and for that I count my blessings. Her eyes are just like yours – molten brown with flecks of yellow; sometimes if I stare at them deep enough, it’s like I’m looking into your soul. Her life’s so precious, but once in every while I’m hit with the feeling that you stole that life; took it from another and breathed it into your daughter.

I wished you had never smoked, I wished you’d never drank but most of all I wished you’d never learnt to drive.

Your mother’s got four times as many grey hairs as she used to, she never bothers with dyes anymore; she has no interest in it. I like to watch her read, that’s when she’s at her most serene; the frown lines on her face completely disappear, and when she enters that foreign world I can almost believe that she still has a passion for all this.

I wished you had never smoked, I wished you’d never drank but most of all I wished you’d never learnt to drive.

My best friend is no longer my best friend; I gave her to you and one day you never gave her back. We shared one heart between three, it wasn’t bad, I’d have it during the weekdays, all throughout school, college and university, and you had it for the weekends with the promise that you’d bring it back before midnight on Sunday, because we had classes. But then you took it away, you took it when my back was turned, and that was it, it was gone. I’ve given up looking for it now, maybe one day it’ll come back to me; I’m waiting, I will wait but I won’t wait for you.

I wished you had never smoked, I wished you’d never drank but most of all I wished you’d never learnt to drive.

My mother clings to her hope, she clutches it in her arms when she goes to bed at two every morning, she sings it a different lullaby each night to make sure it’s still there when daylight comes. I watch her and her hope through the doorjamb, I get so consumed with jealousy that I have to force myself not to rush in and steal it away. It looks so beautiful, so shiny and dazzling; can’t I have a little for my own?

I wished you’d never been my number one, I wish you’d never taught me how to ride a bike, because now I hate that bike as much as I hate you. I hate the pink handles, I hate the white basket that sits on the front and I hate the stabilisers that you held on to so tightly. Sometimes when I stare at that bike long enough, I can see that dusty old road, and me zipping down that street with you chasing behind.

Johnny, do you sleep? Do you dream? Because I used to dream, I used to drift off and imagine myself in ten years, living in my condo with the BMW car but now I can’t do that anymore, because all I see is your blood in my dreams – I see their blood.

This is my first and last letter to you, Johnny; don’t think I’ll write again because I won’t. In a short while I’ll have dropped this into the post and it’ll be gone, poof, out of sight, out of mind. You’ll be gone, just like they’re gone.

Sometimes it’s hard to breathe, like right now; the air will get trapped in my windpipe and I’m gasping, but in sixty seconds time I’ll take a deep breath and it will be alright, six minutes from now you’ll be gone, and sixty years from now you’ll be out.

I wished you had never smoked, I wished you’d never drank but most of all I wished you’d never learnt to drive.

I don’t need anything from you anymore; I don’t need you to wipe away my hurt, I don’t need you to weave me any fairytales, and I don’t need you to say goodnight, but if there’s one thing I’d like, it’s to see you burn in hell.

Your constant cousin

P. S. I miss you.

A/N:

I just wrote this a couple of weeks ago and thought I'd share it with you all. I used to write a lot of poetry, I could churn them out like no-one's business, but it kind of dwindled down about a year go. I'd love to get some feedback, and if anyone's interested about the context drop me a message and I'll let you know.

For anybody who's following my story Erase and Rewind, the name Johnny in this poem has no connection to the one in my story, I just used the name again because I liked the way it flowed.

Leila