Warning: This work has been rated 18+ for mature content.
Dear Tiffany,
I am sorry. You had such goals, dreams, and ambitions, and I drowned all of them in alcohol, drugs, and unreturned love. I allowed bad things to be done to us, so that I could feel an ounce of acceptance and superficial love. I left God behind for a boy pretending to be a man, but instead he was just the devil in disguise.
I don't know how to salvage the life you wanted for us. I don't know how to finish the goals you started on so young. I can't seem to navigate this life any better than you; sometimes, I believe you could do a much better job. My mind feels less mature, but my body feels aged, and my soul is in such despair that it cannot find rest.
I know you didn't expect to find this kind of letter twenty years later, and to be honest, I never imagined I would be the one to let you down, that was everyone else's job. I get so angry and feel such shame that I couldn't pull myself together, that I allowed life to go right past us, and that I never finish anything you start with such aspirations.
I think the only thing left to do at this point is to let go from all the things from the past, and move on. Maybe I could start dreaming new goals and accomplish those, but that would mean leaving you in the past and no longer feeling ashamed, that would mean forgiving myself. I'm not sure I know where to start with that; what does forgiveness look like?
Let me rephrase that because I know what outwardly forgiveness looks like. I have forgiven the young boy who sexually molested us, our mother who never loved us, and the monster who raped us and lured us away from ourself with drugs and promises of love. But, forgiving myself for all of my past regrets and unaccomplished expectations and goals? How does that work?
Maybe writing this letter is a start. An apology for my actions should be a good beginning, right? This has been the hardest apology I have ever put thought and authenticity into, but I need you to believe when I say, I never envisioned this life for us, and I never meant to let you down.
Here's to a fresh outlook,
Tiffany
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139,524 Literary Works • 672,598 Reviews
Hello! Morrigan here to review your piece!
First of all, this seems very personal, so it will be difficult for me to review. Since you posted this as a literary work, I am assuming you want suggestions for refinements so it can be read by an audience. That's what I will do!
Wow, you don't wade in to the deep end at all, do you? I appreciate the progression in this piece from bad to Bad to BAD to rebirth, however it can be difficult for a reader to accept a narrator who, right off the bat, is wallowing in their own poor decisions. I recommend writing the beginning a little more gently so readers aren't slapped in the face and turned off by the bluntness of your prose.
Let's talk about passive voice. Please take a look at the first post in this thread, which contains a definition and great way to fix passive voice: Passive Voice
Now one thing that post doesn't mention is that you don't always have to have "by" and then the subject at the end. The subject can be nothing mentioned in the sentence. One good test one of my professors always liked to use is that if you can add "by zombies" to the end of any sentence and have it make sense, it's in passive voice.
I found an example of passive voice in your piece. One way you could fix it is to say,
Make sure you're on the lookout for passive voice!
You start the first four paragraphs with I. This can create a feeling of repetition that might not be intentional, so try restructuring a few of those opening sentences to create a nicer variety for the reader.
This is a cliche. Cliches are bad because while they might have held power or imagery the first time they were uttered, they now mean a singular thing. The reader skips over this in their mind, and any imagery included in the cliche is lost.
I am a little unsure why you put this into the short story category. I feel like it would fit better under "other," since it's a letter to yourself.
I hope that this review proves useful to you! Hopefully this letter brought you healing! Let me know if you have any questions, and happy YWSing!
Goshness, this is personal, but I'll shoot my shot at reviewing this. You are extremely brave for even writing this and posting it here, so please know if anything comes off offensively I didn't mean for that to happen.
"lured us away from ourself with drugs and promises of love."
"Ourself" isn't exactly a word.
The last paragraph is really what sinks everything in. You start to realize everything and that brings it to life. This whole thing reminds me of late nights where you think too much about everything you've done wrong, and that makes it hit differently.
Wow, good job, and I'm sorry for everything that has happened in your past.
Axi
Thank you so much for the review!!