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What follows is a collection of personal letters exchanged between the parties writing. Unless otherwise agreed upon between us and those reading, this is not knowledge known to other characters outside of this little circle. We are presenting them here for your mere reading entertainment and our writing enjoyment.

Mi amor,

You don't feel?

You write me a letter that sings of him and what he has done and how he and he alone can make you feel? About how he let you have him? How great for you that my "petty jealousies" did not keep him from you.

You write me a letter that says you don't feel? You don't feel for me. You might as well have said it that way. Is it the Autumn? Is it? Or is it really that I never got deep enough into whatever it is you call a heart?

Yeah, thanks for that. I really needed to read that letter because I wasn't already hurting enough.

What in all the hells am I supposed to do with that?

I suppose at least this gives me a voice, that letter, because I can write one back. So here it is.

Ever since we danced in the dark parade
Something old was born anew
In spite of all the good things
Your good God has made
Everything I touch turns into you
Everything I touch turns into you...

My Chev. My Beloved. Do you remember when we were at the rings, and you were struggling with what to call me? You named me your "amado". Was it only after Sinjin returned that it suddenly was no good anymore, that it was girlie or stupid or whatever you called it? Perhaps that happened before he returned and it was just a journey we were already on. I don't know anymore.

Ever since my eyes perceived your face
There was little doubt that I could do
Anything to save my fall from grace
Now everything I see turns into you
Everything I see turns into you...

Our union became when we realized we loved each other. It was that love that gave me the strength to say you could sleep with whomever you wanted, because in the end it was me that you came home to. Home to Matadero and me. I told you those very words. It was me that you loved and the others were people you cared about but were not in love with. Their bodies were just fun playgrounds that you were having good times with. No problemo, mi amor. That's what you needed, what you wanted, and it was right to let you be who you were. Sinjin Fai is different, though. You really do love him. I could not see past the smell of him on you that day because I know his place in your heart is greater than mine. Does that make me petty? So be it, then.

And ever since my ears received your cold clear voice
Singing silver lines so soft and true
My destiny was written, I had no choice
Now everything I hear turns into you
Everything I hear turns into you...

But then Sinjin came back. Ilhar knew he would. She knew it, and so did I though I knew not the man. That was about the time it seemed you were redesigning the boundaries and edges of our relationship. It was made clear to me that I'd gotten it wrong. You were in love with us all, or some version of that which defines love as you see it. Maybe it was that way from the beginning but I was too blind to see it. I was no longer your special one, I was just one of a crowd. It wasn't me you came home to because I was your luz, your amado. You came home to me because I just happened to have camped out there.

Each snowflake that falls
Achieves your subtle form
The howling wind calls
Your name in the storm
The frost in the ground
That turns into dew
Each sight and each sound
Turns into you...

About that time it seemed you started to think I was a lady boy or something, with no spine and no reason to respect. I was suddenly an idiot, a fool, a romantic irritant. You didn't feel that way when you gave me your name. You didn't feel that way when I took you in our bathtub, when I made you scream and die the little death.

A statue of your likeness
Floats through my dreams
Carved in ice and glacial blue
You're in my heart forever
Or so it seems
Now everything I dream turns into you...

You laughed at me. When you fell off the roof and I dived off the edge to catch you before you hit the ground three stories below, you laughed at me. You found it amusing to see the fool that I was trying to save you because I was too stupid to know you wouldn't break from such a fall. You laughed as I risked my own life to save yours. My wings still ache from the breaks in those bones, as does the very heart of me.

Everything I touch turns into you
Everything I am...turns into you

You said I never understand, that others don't need you to explain things. I tried, Salvador. I tried so hard. I am trying still. I want to hear, I want to understand, I want to know.

But I can't hear when you belittle me.


Your bloody Luz.

(Lyrics taken from Steeleye Span's "You".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIp0hnJsxX0 )

Salvador,

I read your letter.

I've sat here for the last several hours, reading it over and over again trying to make sense of things.

I keep thinking about our time together, wondering how we got from such heights as we felt then to the lows that we are at now.

How did this happen? Was it all an illusion? Did I make it all up?
Did you feel what I felt? Was it truly all my fault?
Is it my jealousy of a man who hurt you that tears us apart?
Or am I really as poor a man as you paint me to be, jealous, petty, foolish, selfish, needy?

I find I cannot answer these questions.

Even now I read again the words you spilled across the paper, those tiny knives to stab me with, whether that was your intention or no.

You are right in many of the things you say, but you are also wrong.
I am no better, though, for I am as often wrong as I am right.

We do not talk well together, you and I.
I think you will agree with me on this, at least.

One thing must be made clear and I do ask that you believe me on this, for it is the truth. My mother has not poisoned me towards Sinjin. She has told me that once, years ago, they were great friends. She has told me he saved her life many times. She has said he was great friends with Godfather. All she has said about him now is that he dislikes her for reasons he has not told her of. That it hurts her but it is his right to feel what he feels, and so she avoids him out of consideration for that right.

Perhaps your claim is true, perhaps she does not know him.
Perhaps the man he was then is the only one she knew.
Perhaps he has changed. I do not know. What is between them is their business.

No, my feelings about Sinjin spring from what I perceive to be the poor way he treated you. And, I confess, to fears that he would return and steal you from me. That makes me the bad guy, not my mother. From this point forward let us leave her out of whatever is between us, for she has no business in it and she has not sought to meddle in our affairs since you showed her the mark on your hand. I will not bring her up if you do not. I think that is fair. Hopefully you will, as well.

Regarding Sin, I will say this. I do not hate him. I do disrespect him for what he has done to you. If you choose to forget what that was, or that it was wrong of him, then so be it. That is between the two of you.
But I do not choose to forget those things.

I will try to stop putting words in your mouth or your hand as you write them.
I will try to stop saying what you think or you feel.
It is clear I do not understand you.

You will need to do this as well, from the other perspective, if we are to talk. Stop saying I feel this, or think that. You are as wrong in those statements as I am in what I have stated of your thoughts and feelings.

I do love you.
I do want to understand you.

You tell me that you should never have...

But you did. We did. Do you really want to forget all that now? Would you choose to undo it if you could? Really?

I am here. I am listening.


Once a Luz

8 X 2014

mi m?s querido luz,

I want you to remember how our skin felt pressed together. Remember kissing me. Keep close the memory of how I made you cry out my name. My touch. My scent. Do not forget these things.

I don?t. I won?t. I can?t. I remember everything.

I saw you and my heart ached at the sight of you. I saw you and felt guilty for having just been kissing Sin a second before you were there. Even though in that moment before, with my lips on his, everything felt right and good and I was happy. The moment I saw you all of that left me.

Then he went to talk to you and I felt my whole world crumbling apart. I fear nothing he might say to you, but everything you might say to him.

Please remember, mi amor. You don?t know him. Don?t pretend to think you do. Hear him and listen. Please. Hear him out. He knows me better than I sometimes know myself. And the man I love in him is not the one he lets you see.

And then I saw her. Everything after that is a blur. I remember thinking my friend and sometimes lover was in danger with her near. Smiling at her smile. Offering her a favor when she asked. I could only act. I had to keep him from touching her.

The monster in me was riding high and I was ready to take her. She was ready to let me. Then mi alma slipped his words in through the cracks of my mind and I let her go.

My sometimes lover soothed me too with his heat and his whispers. I asked him to take me out of there before I did something awful, something I might regret. After that everything was blood and sex and the hunt that called to me.

I was a long time returning to Matadero, where your letter waited for me. I read it. I always read what you write to me. I always hear what you say.

Your poetry drew me to you last night. I have been struggling with what to write back to you. A dozen different crumpled up scraps of discarded paper litter the corner of the room. Words I?ve started that stall out and messages gone unfinished.

I read your words and all I could think about was how much I wanted to touch you again. How much I?ve missed you. I do not regret coming to your bed.

I had to leave, though. Autumn burns cold and boils under my skin. I don?t sleep. I can?t. I could have lay there all night beside you while you did, but I feared the words that might come out of your mouth when you awoke.

You?re always talking, mi luz. Grand, elaborate speeches spill out between your grinning teeth. And you wound with words in ways that make the sting of a blade seem more favorable. It is not the talking you are so very terrible at. It?s the listening.

I know he intends to speak with you. He has told me. Please, please, mi amado luz y risa - Please, for the love you bear for me, promise me you will listen.

And know I have not forgotten what he has done to me. Know this. But know also that I have forgiven him. I always forgive him. In many ways we have always been cruel to each other, but always do we forgive.

I will always forgive you too, because I love you.

Remember. Listen.

- tuyo

10 X 2014

Rei,

I almost let your words ruin me again. You scrawl your jealousy across the page using another man?s words. Or maybe they are a woman?s words. I don?t know. I don?t know this song you wrote down.

Carolyn would know. She was always good with music. - I miss her.

But you could not have chosen a better time to wound me again with your words. Even if they were not your own words, you chose to use them and they cut me deeply. Instead of drawing me to you, they pushed me away.

I went to the Arena to bleed, but no one there gave me what I wanted. Sinjin told me to win one for him, and I gave him double. I won two, but they did not satisfy me at all.

Your poetry asks if sleep comes easy for me. I want to make you choke on those words.

You have no idea. You don?t know, because you left me the very first day of my season. When I came home smelling of Sin and you showed your true colors to me. You lying asshole. Fuck you.

When you dove off the roof like a fool to save me. You wounded your wings and your pride and left before you could see what it does to me. Fuck you.

The Autumn. You only saw a glimpse.

There?s a madness that creeps in at times. I slip out of my skin and my head swims with static. I don?t sleep. I can?t sleep. All of Her floods my veins and no matter how long I lay in my bed staring at the ceiling trying to will sleep to come, I can?t. I just can?t.

But I did last night. Fuck you. I did. I slept in another man?s bed and it was wonderful. I found peace. If only for a few short hours. It was the first night?s sleep I?ve had in sixteen days.

Sixteen.

So fuck you for making me feel guilty for planning it - even though you didn?t know I had.

Fuck you for making me feel guilty about sleeping at all.

You?re always making me feel guilty. You disapprove of everything I do - unless I?m doing it with you. Fuck you.

There are some things you cannot help me with, Rei. Some roles you cannot fill for me. You cannot be my one and only everything, and you?re going to have to live with that. Or live without me.

The choice is yours. It will always be yours.

- Sal

13 X 2014

mi luz,

You?re probably thinking of crumpling up this letter and throwing it away without bothering to read it.

Please don?t.

I hurt you with my last one, I know. I meant to hurt you. I can?t help myself from trying to push you away. I love you so much that I want to keep you safe - even from me.

You deserve better than me.

No matter how many pretty words you throw at me to protest, to tell me how wonderful you think I am, I will never change my mind on this. I will never stop being what I am.

I?m a monster.

But the thing I don?t think you ever understood every time I told you this is that - I am not ashamed of being a monster.

Those who love me-

my friends, lovers, and family-

They see the monster in me too, and they are not afraid of him. They love him. They love me, all of me. And I love them for loving all of me.

Sin was the first to see.

Would you still be with me if he had never come back at all?

He asked me this question, and I?m not sure I know the answer. But then - maybe I do.

I?ve noticed things. Certain things. Things I might not have put much thought into at all if not for this - his coming back.

There?s a possessiveness about you. My brother noticed it and mentioned it to me. I know. I?m not an idiot. I saw it too. I knew.

I knew you were a jealous lover before I even took you. Any time I turned my attention away from you for even a second, you took it as a slight.

Like the night I first introduced you to Thorn. We were sitting at a table in the Red Dragon, only talking, being friends. It was the first time you had seen me in nearly a year, because of my habit of hiding during the Autumn - and sometimes longer. I looked away and you left, angry.

Thorn thought I should go after you. Talk to you. But I couldn?t. You weren?t yet mine and I was still pretending not to feel what I do for you.

Because no matter how much I love you, there will always be Sin. Even if I saw him slain before my very eyes tomorrow, and I knew there was no way to ever bring him back - siempre. Had he never come back, he would have always shadowed what you and I were building together.

I had been searching for him. All that time since your return in which you hadn?t seen me, I was searching for Sin. I wouldn?t have stopped if my brother had not told me to.

He knows my name too, you know. He and my sister both. They know it. They know the core of me more than they might like, but it was a gift my mother imparted to them both with trust. To keep them safe from me.

I only give my name to people that I trust, that I care the most for. When I gave it to you and called myself yours, I was not binding myself to you heart and soul, forever and always. I felt your own oath swirl around me too, but I don?t know what it meant for you. Or what you thought it meant.

But I do now. I?m seeing it more clearly.

You called me yours. You meant to make me yours and only yours. Every opportunity you had to assert your authority over me, you took it.

On the steps of the Red Dragon when you told me to come to you.

When you told Cane I was yours that night before he could even so much as say a simple hello.

Three nights ago when you told me to duel you, before you tossed away your key.

I?m sure you thought that was a meaningful gift, too. Do you think you?re the only one with a key to my domain? It?s just an object. Whether or not you keep it in your possession, my word still stands true. You are always welcome at Matadero.

Do you know? I can?t refuse you.

By my name and by my blood, I am yours. No matter how many keys you throw at my feet, you will not be rid of me. And even should we cease to be lovers, I will never stop loving you, even if you were to release me.

I didn?t realize what I had done until it was too late. When I was talking to Skid, and he told me with the utmost faith that he did not believe you would abuse your power over me.

But you did. You do. And no matter how much you try to hurt me or beat me down - I forgive you. Because -

You are my light, and my laughter, and no one else can be these things for me but you.

siempre mi luz y mi risa - s?lo t?

- tuyo

Salvador

Rei,

You are not the villain here, and I am not trying to paint you to be.

How many times do I have to tell you I love you, in how many ways, for you to believe it?

Nothing I say matters. You address me as a stranger with stiff formality and bend my words to suit your pain.

All I do is hurt you.

I?m sorry.

I?ll leave you alone.

- Sal