UNSENT LETTER TO MY ESTRANGED COUSIN                                                          2/10/25 

 

Dear ------, 

​

I’m angry with you. I’m sad when I think of you. Sometimes I stare into nothingness and wonder if we’d even get along now. 

​

When we were together, you were my idol, my favorite person. I wanted to be like you. 

You were creative and silly, sometimes violent in that childish way when we were roughhousing. You were also sensitive. 

​

I remember when we were young and they started fighting, so you herded us into the basement and turned on the TV. We could watch and ignore. Watch and forget. You got in trouble, though. You got into trouble by giving us the thing we needed in the moment. 

​

You actually got in trouble a lot. Like I said, you were silly. But also, rude and sarcastic. We all were at that age, just you more than most. 

​

You loved animals. You loved baby dolls. 

​

The last time I saw you, you loved makeup and straightening your straight hair. You had grown up.  

​

I wasn’t quite there yet. And before I could get there, and be as beautiful and cool as you were, you left me.  

​

It would be dramatic to say I’d never forgive you for that. But I would. The second you come back to me, I will. 

​

Sincerely, 

JK 

 

​

ANOTHER LETTER TO MY ESTRANGED COUSIN  

                                                    2/17/25 

Dear ------, 

​

The last time I saw you was the summer before seventh grade. The last time I talked to you was on my thirteenth birthday, in seventh grade. 

​

I had gotten my first phone, and you were one of, if not the top, person on my list to contact. My sister gave me your number. 

​

I texted you. I was so excited. I don’t remember your response, but I do remember how lackluster it was. And how you then stopped responding altogether a few days later.  

​

At first, I was sad. Then I thought nothing of it. Then it made me sad again. And then, I raged.  

Knowing what I know now, I understand why you didn’t respond.  

​

But why? 

​

Why did you have to cut me off? I didn’t do anything to you. When our families were together, you were my best friend. I would’ve done anything to trade the sister I had for you. 

​

But apparently summers at the beach and Christmases spent together mean shit amid family drama.  

​

So, I wrote you a letter. I took pictures of the pages upon pages of writing in my journal and sent them to you. No response. 

​

That’s when I figured out you had blocked my number. And Instagram. WTF. 

​

I didn’t stop, though. I wrote you another letter. Didn’t send that one. And another. It never left my desk. And then I finally did send you one. No response. 

​

After many more unsent missives, I got the courage to send you another one. I even went to the extent of sleuthing what summer camp you would be counseling at and sent the letter to your P.O. box. It was probably all for nothing. Because, once again, I literally have no idea if the letter reached your hands and if it did whether you ripped it to shreds or not.  

​

I was a very angry child. You got a front row seat to many of my performances. I’m more tame now, which I hope I’d be, given that was eight compared to nineteen. Yet, I still feel that rage. It’s flowing from my pen right now, potent and cutting the paper.  

​

Do you know how many other things I could be doing right now, should be doing right now? Surprise, I’m in college. Yes, it’s been that long, if you hadn’t noticed. Life is screaming at me right now, to get off my ass, to complete this, to start that. But no. I’m here. Writing letter No. 5,631. To you.  

​

I hope you’re happy. Because I’m not. 

​

I hope you’re sleeping well. Because I go to bed too late and then get up too early, with feverish dreams full of faces I know and completely improbable events. And then there are those dreams. With you. And me. You completely ignoring me. My inability to reach you and be seen. Or heard. 

​

Girly, I’m depressed. No, scratch that, I’m bipolar. Imagine spending your first week back home after your disastrous first semester of college crying your eyes out after feeling unloved and unlovable. Then being told you’re bipolar, and they’ve known since you were thirteen. Oh, look at that! Thirteen marks my year of abandonment. By you. 

​

The rage is truly flowing now, but my face is completely blank. I’m sitting alone in a quiet dorm, a bleak sky outside with nothing happening besides the rapid scratchings of a pen and the hum of an AC… 

​

Sincerely, 

JK 

 

​

ONE MORE LETTER TO MY ESTRANGED COUSIN 

                                                   2/25/25 

Dear ------, 

​

I’m thinking of you again. Not in an angry, vengeful way. Or a nostalgic, overjoyed way. 

​

I was just alone. And thinking. I do far too much of both those activities. 

​

Either way, I was thinking, and that thinking led to you. 

​

You. 

​

You were a disastrous bob cut thrust upon you by a controlling mother. You were a piercing shriek released when wrestling with your father and things stopped going your way. You were the jaws of an avid gum chewer, you were the hands that kidnapped the cat from the garage so we could dress him up in pink, frilly fabrics and ribbons. There is a photo of him with a Build-a-Bear crown perched atop his head. This girl in the Princess Aurora dress holding him is anonymous; but had the late 2000s digital camera’s lens zoomed out, it would’ve been your face, grinning wildly. 

​

I guess I am waxing nostalgic now. 

​

We would stay up late drawing Rainbow Magic fairies, we played with the excessive amounts of Beanie Boos I possessed. We put on costumes, stood on a stool, and performed exclusive concerts to the family using your High School Musical 2 plastic microphone. 

​

You watched Disney Channel; I was not allowed to. You wore fun and trendy tops; I felt like a sack in Crazy 8 clothing picked by my mother.  

​

You were beauty, you were grace. You’d go barefoot outside all day. 

 

I was the youngest cousin. I chased after you on the little legs that carried me. 

​

Those little legs are longer now. Stronger now. However, I guarantee they’re still not as long and strong as yours.  

​

I’m tired of chasing you with my thoughts. I stalk your Instagram using friend’s phones. There is nothing to see, though. Just a beachy profile pic of a girl I barely know, and a big, fat lock in the middle of the screen.   

​

All these letters make me feel like a crazy ex-girlfriend begging you to take me back, or a crazy claimed relation begging for money. But I’m begging for time. 

​

My little legs are tired of chasing you. 

​

But they won’t stop. 

​

I don’t think they ever will. 

​

I love you. ​

​

-Julianne