Guardian Angel

Ramona,

My dear, sweet, Ramona. I learned of your death only yesterday, when I was reading through the obituaries. I’m back in London for a bit and decided that I would visit the place where we first met all those years ago. I hate to break this to you, angel, but the old hospital has been torn down. An abandoned field is in its place. Only a large post bin stands on the property. Of course, curiosity got the best of me, and I opened the old thing up, only to find thousands of letters from you.

Oh, Ramona, you never gave up, did you? You always viewed me as some type of hero, some type of great man. How wrong you were, my dear. I’ve caused you to live the remainder of your life in sorrow and false hope. I’ll never forgive myself for the pain I caused you, I swear I won’t.

I haven’t slept much during the past few weeks, I’ve been keeping myself occupied by reading your letters. They all contain the same dark question: Why?

I wish I would have told you why I disappeared in the dead of night like I did. I wish I would have told you when I had the chance. But now it’s too late. It’s too late, and all I have is this letter shaking in my hands and the memory of the pain I have caused. However, I think it would be an insult to your memory not to tell you all that happened. I hope that wherever you are, you read this letter, and know that I am genuinely sorry.

Forgive me, my guardian angel.

I had to leave. I wasn’t the man you thought I was, although I longed to be. Oh God, how I longed to be everything you hoped and dreamed. You were my angel, and I couldn’t hurt you. At the time, I thought I was doing what was best for you, what was best for everyone. But I was wrong, of course. If I could relive it all, I’d change so much, Ramona. I’d change everything. I would bend my actions, I would break my bones just to be with you. Sadly, I cannot.

You took such good care of me while I was wounded. I took a bullet to the kneecap, shattering it completely. The doctors broke the news to me that I would never walk again. My heart wrenched and tore inside of me at their words, but you gave me hope. Seeing your glorious face every day really brightened up my life. Had I known what was to happen, I would have come clean right then and there. Oh, please forgive me.

I should have told you long ago, Ramona. I was weighed down by something that I knew was bound to break both of our hearts. I had a family, Ramona. A wife and kids. I left them to fight in the Great War. I abandoned them to be by your side, essentially. Because let’s be honest, you and I both know I could have checked myself out months before I actually did. I would take my antibiotics and hide them under my tongue, spitting them out later, just so I could get an infection and have you by my side even longer.

Georgina. That’s my wife’s name. I want you to know something before I go any further. Ramona, I don’t love her. Not in the way that I love you. Not as deeply, not as truly. We were married young, because she was carrying my child at the age of seventeen. What a scandal it would be if we hadn’t gotten married. I didn’t mind it at first, because I hardly knew the girl. After a few years of a torturous marriage, I enlisted to escape the witch. You’d laugh at her, Ramona. You’d tell her to get a grip and stop nagging so. Quite frankly, I had no idea that soul mates even existed. If I would have known that a few weeks into my deployment that I would meet mine, I would have never married Georgina. Although, I guess I have to hand it to her, her persistent griping led me to enlist, and led me to you.

Believe me, she was not the reason I left. I could have left her cold if it would have meant having you for eternity. It was the letter I received while I was in your care that made me realize I had to go. My son, the child Georgina had carried during our engagement, had fallen ill. You’d just love little Eddie, Ramona. He’s bright and funny and clever. He has quite the attitude, though, just like you.

If you see him in Heaven, tell him Daddy loves his Eddie, and he misses him very much.

I’m a wreck, Ramona. I’m old and decrepit and I honestly just want to die. I want to die so that I can be with you.

I visit your grave often, my dear, and there’s a beautiful elm tree that drapes over where you rest. When I am finished jotting down these words that will never be enough, I will join you at that elm tree. I will join you at that elm tree with a short drop and a sudden stop, so that I can be reunited with you once more.

Your soul is too beautiful not to have made it into the Kingdom of Heaven. Let’s just hope that God forgives me.

And let’s hope that you forgive me.

See you soon,

Matthew Guster