….

I guess if I could have anything in the world, if someone asked ‘what would make you happy in life?’ and they had some magic wand and could just make it happen, then I’d say, my sisters.

Neither of them have a relationship with me. Why should they?

I made one last ditch effort to fix things with Carly. I don’t have the heart to explain the details of that conversation. I’ll just say that it didn’t go well.

Carly is much taller than me. She’s been taller than me since I was in middle school. She’s two and half years younger, but she has a different dad than me. different genetics. Carly and Mary are both taller, both have darker skin, darker eyes, and they both have beautiful straight hair. Neither of them have curly hair like me.

I can’t really play a small violin here, but I also don’t have the nerve to tell the whole story. I’ll just say, it isn’t their fault they don’t want to have a relationship with me. It’s okay. It makes sense. It really does. I’m not easy to be around and I’ve done and said a lot of awful things.

I love them and miss them and wish I could make it all okay. But I’m not always selfish. I stay away from them. I don’t want to put them through the stress of dealing with me.

When I really miss them, I find their online profiles. Unlike me, they both use their real names online. Carly is super easy to find because she’s an indie filmmaker. She’s won small film festivals. Don’t get too excited. It’s not sundance or anything. I guarantee, you have never ever heard of her.

Then I find Mary through Carly’s profiles.

No, I don’t bookmark any of their pages or profiles. It makes me so sad to look at their pictures that I usually try not to. I really do try not to.

Carly is very goth. Her photos and films are very goth. She loves anything creepy.

Mary is artsy, but not goth. She likes to paint. She collects porcelain clowns.

Both Carly and Mary like video games, but only Mary writes fanfiction about video game characters and sketches little drawings of them.

Mary loved the wiggles when she was little.

Carly loved Godzilla and Zena.

Carly was popular in high school. Well, like…alternative popular. People liked her. She had lots of friends over all the time. But she ran with the weird kids.

Mary was quiet but well-liked. She had friends but wasn’t as outgoing as Carly.

Neither of them had the problems in high school that I did. Not with other kids, anyway.

Mary had an eating disorder. Nobody could make her eat anything and she kept on saying she wasn’t hungry. She wore a lot of baggy sweatshirts to hide how thin she was getting.

Mary loves horror movies. Really gruesome ones. Back when we still talked, she would laugh at me for not being able to handle any gore.

I wish I could make it all okay. I wish I could make it all okay.