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Dammit, Isaiah.
But there’s nothing to do about it now. It’s out there, in the world.‘Man, I love you.’
I love her. I just told her, and I told the whole planet too.
“Well, wasn’t that the slip of the century?” I wink at the audience, hoping they’ll laugh and then forget it. They don’t. They go mad, raining questions and whistles at me.
Who am I kidding? It’s as plain as day. Every time I look at her, I melt.
I just told the whole world I love her, but more importantly, I told myself. I finally told myself the truth. Like a prophet from the Old Testament, whose lips were touched by a coal, the truth has touched my lips.
It has changed me. It has burned me. I know now, and the knowledge is a coal that keeps burning inside my mouth, until it lights a fire.
For years I used to think that the coal was pain. Words were burning my lips, aching to get out, and I thought that that urge was brought on by the intense pain of losing my dad, my grandpa and Eden, then losing my academic future, and then having to face my mom’s struggle with illness. But no. The ember was never pain.
It was love. It was love all along.
It was love for my dad, love for Eden, love for every single person or thing in my life that hurt. That was the coal, and it’s now been stirred into a blaze.
I hope its fire freaking burns me. I hope it consumes everything that’s hard and bitter inside me, that it burns out all the darkness until there’s nothing left but light.
‘I love you.’
My mouth has been burned by saying these words out loud.
And everything that comes out of it from now on had better be worth the pain.
The Elliot sisters chat room
Eden: Don’t freak out guys, but I came back. I listened to you, and I’m back. I’m here in the concert and it’s… it’s not going well.
Faith: How do you mean?
Eden: Well, for one thing, if Isaiah was any paler, he’d be in Twilight.
Manuela: Oh, my gosh. What’s happening?
Faith: Wait, the lives are coming in on Instagram. I’m fill you in, Manu.
Eden: I think he just said he loves me. To seventy-five thousand people.
Manuela: …
Faith: …
Eden: Hello? Help?
Manuela: How do you feel about it?
Eden: Freaked out.
Faith: SAME! OMG!
Eden: And like I’m going to get hurt again.
Manuela: Oh, sweetheart.
Faith: Trust me, that boy knows what’s coming to him if he so much as looks at you wrong.
