Tup C12: Letters

"I don' like jour friends."

Junior glanced up from his essay  briefly before quickly continuing to write. "Why not?" he inquired.

"They stink. And jou do too."

"Mm? Then I'll go take a shower.," he stood up from his chair to leave the room, but Taz grabbed onto his sleeve.

"Stop it. Jou know what I'm talking about."

"Know what, Taz? What is it that you don't like about them?"

"They're all stupid.," she said bluntly, her arms folded across her chest. "And they're all smoking, not paying attention in class and--"

"Your hair's gotten really long…" he reached over, tracing his fingers through the silky strands of hair. She slapped his hand. "Ow!"

"Listen to me!" Junior rolled his eyes. "Jou've changed after jou started to be with 'dem. Jou're not the same." she frowned.

"What do you mean? Are you saying you don't like me just because I have different friends?" he challenged back, getting louder.

Taz's brow furrowed. It hurt, knowing that Junior thought she would give him up just because his friends were a bit….questionable. "When you smoke, jou aren't jourself. Jou're…different. I don' care who jou're with, but… jus' don' change for anybody, okay? Don' change… and stop smoking." she pouted.

"But--"

"No. Buts. Jou're weird when you smoke, too. I don' want jou smoking anymore!"

'Okay, okay! I won't." he felt a bit defeated. Who knew having a girlfriend was so much trouble?

"Good."

"No thank you? Or maybe a kiss?" He grinned, looping his arm around her tiny waist. He played with the ends of her long black hair that fell down her small back, twirling them around his finger. He couldn't help that his smile broadened when she turned red.

"Fine…" she murmured, looking around first before initially giving him a quick peck, but he wouldn't allow it. Junior kept her still in his arms, his grip tightening as his hands traveled up her spine and neck, fully embracing her as she moved her own arms around his neck, stroking through his hair… it felt nice, times like these where the world seemed to disappear. Nothing was… well, wrong. Everything was too simple and too perfect to be real.

She left Junior to his studies despite his pleas, retreating to her own room and attempting her homework in vain. Although it seemed a bit unfaithful, she couldn't help but thinking of Up during all of her waking moments. Sure, it sounded a bit… obsessive, but it was the truth. It wasn't even the fact that they could no longer see one another or touch one another; she just wanted to hear from him. How he was doing, what it was like during the war…  if he ever thought of her.

Okay, maybe not the last part.

She sighed. "If only…"

"WHAT?!"

"Jesus Taz, the more I try to think of you as cultured you shoot down the idea for me."

She had made, well, a friend. Laila was a sarcastic and fun-loving hang-loose sort of kid. That's how she described herself, anyway. "We do send letters to them, so, I mean, if you want to continue having an affair with this commander guy--"

"It's not like dat!"

"Sure it's not. But if you want to, there's always that option. Here, hold on, I've got to go talk to my brother really fast." She briefly left Taz with her own thoughts in the hall, the echoes of her yelling Krayonder almost ritualistic these days. Maybe… maybe she could write to Up. It wasn't that big of a deal anyway, right? "Oh, just don't tell Junior. He'll get all jealous and frustrated." she said with a grin. "Actually, maybe do tell."

---------

Dear Commander Up,

No. Was that even right?  Commander…. No commander. She scribbled it out.

Dear Commander Up,

How are you? How have you been doing? Who knew writing a letter was so damn hard? She frowned, writing a few words before scribbling out the lot of it. She crumpled up her paper and tossed it into the trash bin in the corner of her room before trying again. And again. And again.

Finally, it started to flow.

It wasn't pelting him with questions, but sharing a little bit about herself as she went along did help the process. She eventually did scribble out a few things in the body, but at least she finally finished. Thank God, too -- it was practically the morning.

Sprinting down the hall, she finally came to the small mail box that she had never seen before in that hallway. Guess Laila was right after all… pushing her enveloped message through, she couldn't help but smile before running to her room again, too excited to sleep. How long would it be until it arrives?

"Dear Taz,"

She fidgeted. Happiness or embarrassment or whatever the name of that giggly feeling that boiled up in her system and tingled her nerves -- that feeling of pure glee -- took over her system and left her wide awake.

In three days, she received a response. The letter was placed through the little slot underneath of her door. At first she didn't know what it was [for she had been inside of her room] but upon figuring out she lunged for it and lied on the ground as she read it, careful not to rip the envelope.

"Taz,

I'm well. It's fine over here, for the most part -- it's getting worse, naturally, but no one promised that it was easy. I'm afraid I can't tell you much about the war over letters since I'm not allowed to let any information out about it like your teachers, but we're not against fellow men -- we're against robots."


Robots?

"I'm glad to hear you're doing well, though. I won't be here for long, they say, but none of us really know for sure. How are things with you? With Junior? He probably has a lot of stress too, since the boss counts on him a lot…

Write back soon.

Love,

Up."

She blushed. Why did he write "love?" Maybe she wrote it in the last one, and he was just returning it or something. Yeah, that's it, returning love…

The letters and their envelopes piled up in a corner of her desk, and eventually the stack of papers was given its own little drawer. Still, she hadn't told Junior about it… was this cheating, like Laila joked about? No, it couldn't be -- this was different, this was…friendship.

But why did it hurt when she called it that?