Let me explain.
I never knew my dad. My mom has a boyfriend, Richard, but I don’t think I could ever call him “dad”.
None of my grandparents are alive. My mom and dad were only children, so no uncles, aunts or cousins either. It’s just us. Me, mom and Liam.
I realized, recently, the only other important man that will have a part to play in my life is you.
I may not know my dad, but that doesn’t stop me from talking to him every day. I confide in him all the time, in my heart. I feel like I’ve gotten to know him in some weird way like that because I think he listens. Maybe even answers my questions or is there for me when I’m scared.
I feel like talking to you now, through the pages of this book, will help me know I’ve found you the day we meet, because I’ll kind of already know you. It’ll be like we’ve already had hundreds and thousands of conversations, making it easy for me to know I’ve found you.
You, this book, are my vault of secrets. My crutch when I feel weak. My protector when I feel scared. My balance when life is too turbulent and my anchor when I feel capsized by reality.
You are my everything and I know I’ll have found you when I am your everything. When I am your vault, your crutch, your protector, your balance, and your anchor. When you are mine and I am yours, I will know you and I will love you with my whole heart and my whole soul.
Love,
Maybelle Mason
7 Invisible To Non-Existent
Maybelle
For over an hour that morning, I jogged continuous loops around my suburban neighborhood block. Waiting until Trey’s Jeep was no longer parked out front of my family’s home.
I didn’t know what to make of the moment we had. All I knew was that I was high on the feeling. And would rather die of heat exhaustion from the exuberant amount of cardio I was doing than run into him again before I was emotionally ready.
As soon as the coast was clear, I bolted for my room, my adrenaline launching me at a neck-breaking speed.
I eagerly showered away all the anxious sweat from my body. I put on my fluffy pink bathrobe, then parked myself on my bed. Pen in hand, I was ready to document every detail of my encounter with Trey into the journal I snatched from the top of the bed-side table.
I wasn’t a quiet girl who had nothing special to tell the world. I was quiet because I told my world everything through the words of a small leather-bound book.
Since I was in middle school, I recounted anything and everything into this little notebook. Every high and every low was detailed in the form of letters to someoneI hoped to one day meet. Like reading or running, it was an escape, an outlet. Except it was made with so much more hope for a future I could love, for a life I would not dread.
So, I sat for a while, writing out every look, touch, and smirk from Trey, with a girly grin tight on my lips.
***
We were a little behind for setup preparations. Liam had lost his other dress shoe, setting us back. Mom made a few “just like your father” comments but smiled as she dropped us off at the front of the fine arts building.
My hurried steps had my hair coiling onto my face and catching on my gloss. Overstimulated, I shuffled around the items in my arms so I could push the hair out of my eyes. Somehow, Mom had convinced me to wear my hair down. The curls were usually so crazed and ratty, but it was a special night, so I appeased her.
As we made our way inside, almost every single person we passed greeted Liam. While we strolled toward the entry doors to backstage, my twin was on cloud nine with all the recognition.
Not one soul acknowledged me. That was nothing new, but Liam and I rarely stayed together long in public. So, it was a little eye-opening to me, just how invisible I was next to my brother. I wasn’t by any means jealous of the attention he got. Liam deserved to be seen. It was impossible for him to go unnoticed.
No, it definitely wasn’t jealousy. For the first time in a while, I was just truly realizing how great of a job I did at making the world forget my very existence.
“Hey, Mason!”
Liam and I both answered the call as we looked ahead to see Noah Williams.
“Williams, how’s it going, buddy?” Liam beamed at the boy as he pulled him into what qualified as the “brohug”.
Noah was Liam’s pride and joy. He was a Junior and second-string quarter back on the team. At the beginning of the year, Liam had taken full responsibility to train the young football player, preparing him to take up his mantle once he left for college. Fortunately for Liam and the rest of Harbor High’s football team, Noah Williams was a natural born athlete.
He was a handsome boy with deep brown eyes, beautiful dark skin, and cropped black curly hair with a genuine smile. I had seen and spoken to the boy a few times when I picked Liam up from practices. I liked him. He was always super kind, very respectful and…
