ONE LETTER TO BURN
1
Rarity carefully approached the headstone with a heavily creased letter levitating by her side. Her purple scarf whipped around angrily in the wind as her hooves trampled over fresh fallen leaves. A few steps from the slab of marble that now signified the final resting place of her younger sister, she sat on the cool grass to lay out her hoofwritten letter, pinning both far corners with her legs. She knew she should have viewed the name on the marker—she knew it was one of the sole reasons she had come—but at that moment she only wanted to read what she had hastily written and then rewritten; ruminated on all night to only cried over in the morning. More than anything she only wanted it done and out and her only faint ambition was that she’d feel better with it over. Only when she had said her piece would she finally stare at those two words neatly cut in stone. Until then she still had grievances to vent.
Next to her crumpled scroll she set down a small box of matches.
Then she began to read:
2
“Dearest Sweetie Belle,
I am sorry I have not come to visit you sooner, but I have found the notion of your passing something I can’t completely believe to be true. A part of me wakes up each day and expects to find you making breakfast downstairs or busy scheming in the latest attempt at claiming your cutie-mark. Each morning that I wake and each time I go to sleep having not seen your beaming face has only briefly allowed the truth to take hold. But no longer is it something I can deny, and even the fact that I had been denying it for so long is more terrible than I would have wanted. You are a sister that should be remembered and cherished forever. Not some imaginary sister I keep thinking will suddenly yell in her precious little voice about the latest troubles in her life. You left this world in a far darker state and now I find the need to beg for your forgiveness. That is why I am here today and that is why I’ve written to you like I have. I was unfair to you in your time of need and all I can say is that I’m sorry. I truly, truly am. All I can say is that I thought I was only doing what was best for you at the time.
“When you first came to me the morning before school, complaining about a pain in your stomach, the first thought that came to my mind was how many times I had heard that same tired excuse. I cannot tell you how sorry I was when you arrived back at home only hours afterwards, along with an urgent note from the nurse.
“A short time later, when the pain only grew worse and we went to see the doctor, I had told you that everything would be all right and work itself out fine. At that moment in my mind that seemed as though the only possible outcome. When a filly gets sick they get better. That was the way the world worked and at that time I was naïve to wholly believe in only a single, solitary conclusion.
“When an x-ray unveiled a series of lumps along your stomach I told you it was nothing to be afraid of. As heavy tears bit at my eyes and as I watched your nervous little face huddled in your over-large hospital bed, I told you the first of many little lies. More than anything I hope you understand I was only trying to make you feel better. Only now does it feel as though the truth might have been a gift far more sincere.
“Every day they kept you under observation and every day following that first surgery you asked if today was the day we could go home. Each time I told you it would be only a few more days and each time I blatantly lied, keeping a bleaker answer out of reach and of sight. Would you have felt better all along knowing what was happening to you? My only goal had been to protect you from what I thought you were too young to understand.
“A few weeks later I told you your friends could not visit anymore. By that point you had gotten so thin and so tired—each time they came they only seemed to make you sadder than you were. Each time they came they only had more questions for me. And like I had with you, I lied and then sent them on their way. In time I hope to apologize to them as well.
“After that third surgery—when another x-ray uncovered a new growth that no one had known about—you asked if you were ever to leave the hospital and come back home. Before another word could leave your mouth I told you just how silly you were sounding. ‘This is no big deal,’ I had said. ‘You’ll be right as rain in no time and I’ve been keeping your homework on top of your bed for when you get home.’ At that you laughed in that tired voice you had and said you didn’t think you’d mind it that much—as long as you’d be away from that awfully white room, and all those awfully nice doctors and nurses.
“Perhaps more than anything I am sorry when I told you your dream had been real. From a deep slumber you had startled awake, already a light sweat on your brow. I had asked what you were dreaming of and with so much sincerity you told me in such great detail. You and all your friends had finally gotten those cutie-marks you had been searching for all along. Even when the thoughts of you never leaving that terribly sterile place filled my chest with more sorrow than I could imagine, the knowledge of you leaving us all without such a gift nearly tore me asunder.
“The next morning I had given you your wish and on both flanks was the marks you’d been dreaming of—a microphone and music note, crisscrossed overtop of the other. You were so tired that morning you didn’t even notice the bits of paint left over on your sheets, or even the unevenness from one image to the next. Almost as if on cue, your friends had flew into the room, excitement on their faces while a gentle shine tugged at that empty area behind all their eyes. On both of their flanks were the cutie-marks you had dreamed about. Now it seemed as though the Crusaders had finished their quest, and no one was happier to see the three of you together again than me. Even if it was a lie that made it all come to fruition.
“I lied to you, Sweetie Belle.
“I lied to you and lied to you and lied to you more times than I can remember and each day every one of those lies eats away at a little part of me. Did I do the right thing in your eyes? I honestly tried. In those moments, every tiny fib and every white lie seemed to ease your worry. Yet now that time has moved on, and I am only left to ponder.
“When you finally asked if you were going to die in that room, I had told you that had never been an option. Afterwards, you had cried and I had done the same and perhaps on that day I did not trick you as well as you deserved. Only know that I am sorry. I am sorry for everything. For all the truths I had to spin and all the white lies I had to force on you—I was only saying what I thought you would have wanted to hear. And now I only hope this letter finds you well.
“Missing you with all the love in my heart,
Rarity.”
3
For close to a minute the unicorn sat where she was, a series of tears escaping down both cheeks and either catching in the wind or pattering to the thin letter below. When she felt a bit more in control she struck a match with her horn and gently held it to the edges of the scroll. The bright flames ate at the paper eagerly and the ashes that fell away were hurriedly sucked up into the bitter breeze.
Rarity could only hope her sister had listened to what she’d had to say.
