Project Smile

Author's Note: Trigger warning in both of Cassidy's parts. Please be careful.
Also, there are only two more chapters and an epilogue left, so this is the beginning of the end!

I almost drop the book out of shock, but manage to catch it at the last second. How did we not manage to know? For the past two years, I always thought that it might've just been a terrible day or week or month and he just felt that he couldn't make it. I know I've had those.

But he was planning this. Maybe for a long time.

Should I read it? Should I just leave it for someone else to discover?

I consider both options for a few moments, each of them equally as painful as the other. If I read it, I might know exactly why he fell. If I don't, I'll never know why.

Finally, I reopen the book, take a deep breath, and begin to read.

9/20/12, 11:21 p.m.

Dear Pete,

I'm addressing this to you because I know that you'll most likely be the one to find it. You've always been the strongest in our family, the one who holds us all together, and you're most likely going to be the one that cleans out all of my stuff because it'll hurt Mom too much. You've always been so selfless, a rare quality in today's world.

You're probably wondering why I did what I'm gonna do tomorrow, seeing as it's in the future for me and in the past for you, and you're probably wondering why I'm rambling so much and why the ink is smeared from my tears, so I'll just start over and try my hardest not to get the paper wet anymore.

Dear Pete,

When I was younger, I always believed that I could fly.

I always wanted to. I would lie awake at night, thinking about how amazing it would be to just sprout wings from my back and be able to fly away whenever I wanted.

Then I got older, and part of me stopped wishing.

Do you remember the trampoline, Pete? You were seven and I was nine when we got it. You loved that thing so much, and so did Mallory before she moved away. I remember standing at the door, watching both of you from the window. You would head over to her yard and get her to come over, and you would jump for hours.

You used to play that game, the one where you would jump as high as possible, yell "I believe I can fly!", and jump to the other side. I especially loved watching the two of you do that. It made me realize that I wasn't alone in my wish, and it made me feel better.

Until the day Mallory flew off of the side from jumping too far and broke her arm. She was in a cast and a sling for six weeks, and neither of you ever flew again.

That day made me realize that we are like birds, Pete. For our entire lives, we're stuck in a nest with the entire world at our fingertips, but we have to stay within our comfort zones unless we want to face consequences. The world bears down heavily, and if our shoulders are frail, we'll flail to the ground and be crushed. When we're old enough to leave and make nests of our own, the world becomes a hunter, always aiming in preparation to shoot us down. Harm us it will, and it won't stop.

My soul and heart are just as heavy as my frail shoulders, and I can't hold up any longer. I'm so sorry.

I know that I shouldn't let the words that I tell myself affect me, but I do. They've fused into my flesh, all of the ones I can never say aloud, as well as what I've been told by others, like Audrey and Nathaniel. I've tried to tear the words out of my skin, sweep them from my brain, but they're stuck. They burn and they sting and they drill into me, and I've been weakening more and more each day.