Dear memory book,

It’s been a day that’s for sure. Ever since I came to the mysterious world with no recollection of my past life; I think every day it has gotten slowly better. Sure, everyone else around me seems to have a different perspective, but as they said, “You weren’t here to see the wars”. Right now I think there only uptight from… whatever wars they were talking about. It seem to me there isn’t anything to bad to come. Today Toby and I made our way towards the docks. It was really late, around two in the morning (that is if any clocks actually worked here). I know I probably shouldn’t have been there with him and rather in bed for our meeting with the community council. But I can never sleep, Toby seems to have the same problem. The docks were nice. Winter seemed to be the only season here, but when I’m with Toby, the chill nipping the hairs of the back of my neck don’t feel as taunting. We didn’t do or say much. It was just comfortable. There isn’t much I can do to describe the interactions. The only thing I can note is, warm.

-Ran 12/11/20

Dear dumb book that my therapist said I should have,

It’s been a year here. One year ago today I woke up on the shoreline. Washed up, with the faint taste of seaweed in my mouth and salt water burning my eyes. I won’t understand why I came here, I’ve excepted that fact unlike others who dig deeper and deeper until they’ve gotten too deep. If I’m gonna be honest, I don’t want to go “home”. Where ever that once was it doesn’t exist to me anymore. Maybe it never had. The newcomer, Ran, he’s been here for a month now. After I… did what I did, he’s been a great distraction. But it hurts to think I might just get close to someone to only excoriate them on an island because I had no other choice. This place forces you to be a bad guy. Ran doesn’t seem like he has a stern voice. It’s shocking but I think he might never. He needs to be careful because that might just kill him.

-Toby

Cold water feels warm when you’re freezing because at this point the air around you is much more frigid then the frozen over lake.

At least, that’s what you want to believe. Maybe if you stayed submerged in the murky ice water long enough your libs won’t feel as stiff; as if one single touch could shatter the bone into millions of tiny pieces.

The air might be so cold that it hurts to breathe, your eyes might burn but at least the water wouldn’t make all too much of a fight.

Maybe you could drown quickly rather than having to wait for hyperthermia to kick in. It’s not the best way to go out but it sounds peaceful enough.

It’s like anyone is around to just give you a gun, make it quick, easy… painless.

If they knew, they’d would only make this process so much slower. You don’t want a false coat of reassurance. You don’t want a fake wax candle of lies that didn’t even produced real heat.

That’s the last thing you could want.

They might control your life but they shouldn’t be able to control how you take it.

There’s still time though. Still time to go back. This place might not be home but you could try to make your own.

They don’t need to control you because you feel something different. The shouldn’t alienate you from the home they say you weren’t given. The home you’re supposed be in.

The home they say you have, isn’t a home. The water that shifts gently inbetween the frozen sheets, isn’t your home.

You’re not supposed to be here.

But there’s still time.

Toby couldn’t understand the thick blanket that suffocated the air from his lungs. It was hevy, weighted, as if the sand its self was too much for the fabric. But he was always making sure he was observant enough to stitched up the threads before it could spill out, raining on the two.

It was always like that when the duo-haired boy lay next to him.

The silence was way too loud yet not enough. At the moment, he could just wish for the ocean to be heard. Maybe get ahold of a shell so he could hear the illusion of waves crashing into the shore line. Ruff and storm-like, like how they’d used to play fight when he just wanted an excuse to touch him. Yet peaceful, how Toby’s body would collide with his when he pinned him to the ground to take his stolen pillow away from the taller. But later that night when he was animating his ceiling with thoughts, he’d wish the silence could be even heavier. Maybe then he’d finally have the courage to make moon lower the tide and the sand to become a bit more soft.

Maybe his lips would taste like the sunlight that shined across the rippling waters. Soft, sweet, like how his mother’s voice used to sing the cheesy lullabies while he was in the playing in the bathtub as a toddler.

However, he was still at the brink of a sand storm of silent glances and steamy temptations that swirled around the two in an unseeable dust of doubtful emotions. If only Toby could open his eyes in this dust storm without feeling like he’d hurt himself.

If only he knew they both had the same safety glasses on.