Love Letters of the Heartless

By Erica Jean

I didn’t intend it to be like this. I’m not supposed to be caring or loving or sympathetic. Something went terribly wrong, for me to experience this strange wobbly sensation in my stomach. This forest-eyed woman makes me want to say things that are embarrassingly heartfelt. I sigh at the sight of her. It’s as if I must let out air, so I can breathe more of her in.

She couldn’t bring herself to smile a few days ago, and her soft brown skin seemed unusually wan. Her eyes were rimmed in redness and her hair was tied back in a right mess. Bloody hell, she’s so beautiful. Just lately though, she’s been sad. I had seen that kind of sad before. I had created it. Anyway, when I looked at her, my eyes burned, and when I looked away so as not to make her feel uncomfortable, my eyes excreted a liquid that tasted like the ocean.

My pseudo-mother taught me that it is important to think about the way that others feel. Hah! It was so funny at the time. At that, I used to nod and pretend I was listening. Then I would do something terrible that drove her mad, like ripping out her freshly laid tomato plants. I would make sure she saw me do it. How could her precious son do such a thing? Why would he want to hurt her so badly?

A good one I found always worked a treat was when I’d wake up at odd hours of the night and scream and cry, and I wouldn’t stop until she would yell at me. Sometimes she had this glistening, the same kind I’ve been getting lately in my eyes. When she’d wipe her face and then hold my cheeks, telling me she was sorry for snapping, I could feel the wet residue she’d just removed from her own. Every time she did that, every time she held my cheeks and told me she could be better, even though I was purposefully trying to suck her soul and scramble her brain, I guess something that was not supposed to exist within me started to grow like a weed.

So, it seems none of what I did to make her lose her mind worked at all. Not even when I would tell her I hated her.

Maybe it’s what they call karma happening to me. But I don’t understand how that works. I can feel the weed become taller and wider in my body. It mostly wraps my heart and stomach, and now it is creeping up my throat and tongue and to my brain. It’s finding its way out of my orifices! The other day, I choked on nasty words. I choked on them and swallowed, and I didn’t want to say them.

I wonder what my real parents would think of what I’ve become. It’s curious. I do not seem to care what they think, yet I still wonder what became of them. I tormented my fake mother for a while as they instructed, but not anymore. They are a distant memory in my mind, I only remember their hollow yellow eyes and sharp little teeth. I don’t look like them now, maybe I never did, and that is why they brought me here to a human place. I was a little boy then when they ruffled my black head of hair and told me I had to create havoc for this poor woman. That in driving her wild, I would serve the Southfolk King well, feeding his power, and when I was able to return, he would spoil me with riches, so much so that I’d never have to work a day in my life.

They said being wicked would come naturally. It was in a changeling’s blood to be tricky and merciless. I did find it easy at first, but now… I am a grown man who was raised by a fake mother, and the fake mother loved me into not being a changeling anymore. My family took her son and put me in his place, and I terrorised her for years until she taught me about having a conscience. Now I’m feeling the things she told me I should feel, and not just love for her, no, not just appreciation for her kindness despite my cruelty. There are other feelings too, for this wildly stunning woman, Lenora, whom I met just a year ago at the workplace I’ve actually learnt to enjoy.

In this case, fae magic has come in handy to make human work easy. I teach adults different languages, ancient languages. My mother couldn’t believe my knack for them; she’s still so gullible. I wonder if she ever realises I’m not her true son, not the one she birthed.

At the beginning of the year, when I was promoted and I brought her to a celebratory work function, she was speaking to my colleagues about me. She said, “Gosh look at Arlo now. He’s got this wonderful job, and you wonderful people.” She nodded specifically in Lenora’s direction. “All he went through as a boy, and now he’s this handsome, intelligent, kind man. I told him time heals all wounds. He just needed time, you know?”

She talked about all I went through as if I didn’t cause the pain myself. As if it wasn’t all she went through. No, time itself could not heal. It was love that did that.

Ah rats.

Bloody love.

This thing I’m feeling, for Lenora. The most gorgeous historian in existence, I would bet. It’s love.

I don’t deserve this, so I suppose it is my karma to suffer with this feeling. To suffer and never have it reciprocated. She shouldn’t love me.

Even though she did smile at me during our first meeting when I told a dismal joke. And just last week, after a rather intimate lunch, Lenora told me she had never seen green eyes like mine, told me she could get lost in eyes like this. I should have said that to her. It was true. Damn it. I think she loves me too. You can only say that to someone you love.

I wrote her a letter of all the things I want to say, but I’m not sure I deserve to drop it on her desk. Is it cowardice to write it and not speak it? I thought it was romantic to put it into words she could read over and over so she would always remember how I feel for her. How I think about her endlessly and want nothing more than to make her smile. To take away the days when she doesn’t want to, or at least have her know there is someone she is safe to feel terrible with. I want her to know that I already get lost in her eyes, that I adore being lost in them. That every time she purses her lips, even in dismay at something I’ve crudely said, I want to sweep my thumb down her chin and kiss her.

Thoroughly.

Even the words I’ve written don’t quite do justice to what this weed strangling my insides desires to say. Damn changeling roots. She deserves more than me, and still, she loves me, I can tell. She looks at me the same way I look at her. In any spare moment we have.

I was supposed to go back and be a King's favourite. To laze about in a pretty fae castle and make my ugly little parents rich. Instead, I have a fake mother who loves me in a real way. A mother I don’t deserve to call my own. Now there is a woman with the prettiest name in the world too. As my mother said, I am handsome to some degree, thanks to being made to look like her, with emerald eyes, and dark hair, and fine bone structure. Still, I’d consider myself batting above average to win Lenora’s beauty. Mostly because she is attractive in not only the obvious ways; with pretty curly hair, round hazel eyes, freckles upon her nose, and lips always painted a shade of red roses. No, it’s not just that she is undeniably easy to stare at. On top of all that, her energy begs me to be more human than I ever imagined myself being.

It reaches for me, all that light and hope and genuine care. It calls to me. To the weed growing inside me that I now don’t want to extract. I earned that genuine care somehow, and now I don’t know how to deny myself of it. She deserves more. My mother deserved more. I want to be more.

Ugh.

I could accept the love, I think, I could trick myself into thinking I deserve it, even.

My issue is complicated, you see, it’s not that I have become better than a changeling and that I no longer desire to haunt people alive for pleasure and riches. It’s that I can’t stop being a changeling, not fully. The fact that I have somehow convinced not one but two women to love me despite my nefarious ways has earned me something I did not ask for.

Every time someone tells me they love me, which so far I can only account for the moments my mother has shared those words, a strange hexagonal portal finds me when I am alone, and some stupid creature who I can’t identify from their gloved hand alone, leaves me a human heart for consumption. They come in a bloodied ribbon, quite well tied actually, and there is a handwritten note with each one. Every little letter reads something more ridiculous and terrifying. Good job, a heart for a heart. Amazing, their heartfelt words must taste so sweet. The last one has me worried the most. Soon you will get to taste her love, too. 

Firstly, I’m a changeling, not a blasted vampire. I don’t know what to do with these hearts. I don’t eat them and never did. What in the Southfolk realm has gone so wrong that raw hearts are a reward? Who are they harvesting, which poor humans are suffering for my wretched soul being lovable? They cannot, I repeat, cannot be serious about feeding me the hearts of the ones who love me. I will kill them. I will crawl through the depths of the forest and track down their hidey hole, and I will jump in and murder them. Even if it’s my true parents, because I do not want this.

Damn it.

Bettering myself was not a journey I wanted, but now it is! I guess that’s in the bin since I have to become worse than a menace and upgrade myself to a murderer.

Lenora and my mother will hate me, hate me as they always should have. It doesn’t matter, I cannot allow this mysterious heart giver to rip open their chests. Even if I did not love them, they are but innocent women cursed with my existence. I’m not sure what this means for this whole becoming better thing. I’m not sure what it means for whether I deserve love, but I suppose it has to be done. Now I just have to figure out who exactly I’m off to kill.

In the case I die during this murder attempt, I’ve decided I will give Lenora my letter. My mother says it is better not to leave things left unsaid. Maybe one day I should tell her I’m a changeling. But not today, I’m not ready to lose her love just yet.

After carefully planning my hike through the forest to the most well-known rock portals, I ducked into work after hours, hoping to leave the note on Lenora’s desk and scurry away. My thinking was, it would be easier to do that than to make sure she received it. That way, just in case I’m imagining her interest, I won’t be mortified if she ignores me. Despite my discreet efforts, it didn’t quite go to plan. Of course, Lenora works late – she is passionate, and other people’s company often bothers her. I was only two strides away from rounding the corridor corner before I could hear her chasing after me.

“Arlo!” She breathed. “Wait there. Tell me this sneaky envelope isn’t your resignation.” She caught up to me quickly, her big eyes staring up at me.

I stuttered. “No… no, I love this job.”

“Then?”

“You should read it alone, at home, maybe that would be best. You can give me notes in the morning,” I attempted a smile. “If it’s completely wrong, then, well, you can burn it and pretend it was never real.”

“You’re a touch strange Arlo,” her bright lips gave a half smile. “It’s one of the things I like best about you. Bizarrely kind.”

Bizarrely kind indeed. Perhaps only for her.

We wished each other goodnight and parted ways. I did not sleep so well that night. After the following workday, I was off to become a killer, and before that, perhaps even more nerve-racking, I was to learn what Lenora thought of my sappy but completely true words.

The next morning, there was a letter on my desk. I sighed, it could only be from her.  I had always seen her writing and scribbling from afar, it felt like opening a private door to see her handwriting this close to my face. It read;

Dearest Arlo, I do not wish to forget your letter. I don’t think it is wrong at all, I think it is all kinds of right. Let’s have dinner and get lost in each other’s eyes. Xo.

A nightmare.

You’d think it was everything I wanted to hear.

Except.

The handwriting was distinctly the same.

Lenora, somehow, some way.

My heart giver.

Well, it would be rather dangerous now to not accept a dinner invitation, wouldn’t it? At least I didn’t have to go wandering in the woods. Did that mean I had to kill Lenora now? Surely not. I can reason with her. I know her. She likes me…

“So, have you enjoyed the hearts?” She asked me outright as we walked to the restaurant I strategically picked. Indian, if you’re wondering.

“I…” was trying to find a way not to offend her.

“Oh dear, it’s not a custom for your kind, is it? I’m so sorry, I am not from Southfolk.”

I swallowed. “Where are you from?”

“I come from the Hunted Lands, heard of them? They are further than the forest where Southfolk is found. Sometimes I don’t remember how I ended up here.”

“How did you know? That I was…”

“Fae of some sort? Well, I am a witch, and we can smell you quite easily. Especially well, brownies and changelings and fairies of that kind. You know, Southfolk fae. We hunted you once. Centuries ago, don’t worry.”

“Changeling. Reformed changeling, I like to think.”

“Reformed heart-eating witch,” she said, holding up her hand as if we were in some kind of evil fae recovery group. “I should have known the hearts were too much.”

“Why did you send them?”

“To reinforce that you are loved.” She shrugged. “I think you have a hard time accepting that. It took you long enough to ask me here.”

“How did you know I had heard an ‘I love you’?” I’m not sure I really wanted to know, but now the question was asked.

“You mentioned when you go to see your mother. I just figured she would tell you.”

“Right…” nothing too weird then. “And the notes?”

“I was trying to be funny.”

“You’re not going to harvest my mother's heart, are you?” I had to be sure.

“Not if you don’t want me to,” she winked.

“I don’t. Definitely don’t.”

“Then it’s done. For you, I will cease heart-mongering for good.” She exhaled a breath of relief. “It was quite taxing. I had given it up for so long.”

Oh dear, those red-eyed days. So many times she had seemed sad after I had visited my mother.

“You should never have to do that again,” I couldn’t help but say. “My heart is yours if you ever get the craving.”

She laughed, a mesmerising song of a laugh.

I think this is karma after all. I looked it up. I did dream of her ceaselessly. I did wish I could ease any pain she may have had, forever, and in this moment, she truly seemed the happiest I had seen her. It was an unusual ecstasy to meet someone so similarly twisted as oneself — someone from a similar place, trying to be a similar kind of better.

I thought I could make up for all I had done to my good pretend mother by loving a human woman. I thought in loving Lenora I would pull the roots of a changeling tree built within me.

I’m not sure what this means now, for me to love an ex-heart-eating witch. A being who once was as nasty, perhaps nastier than I was. What I do know is that all along she knew what I was, and pursued me anyway. And that makes me love her much, much more.

I suppose this is what I grew to want. To accept love and embrace its magical fix. Still. I didn’t intend it to be like this.