Hi! It’s me! Lily!!!
It’s funny, you know? It seems like ever since I met Yuki my life has become much more music focused than it used to be. Well, maybe ever since that time in Orlando when I learned I could play the piano, but that’s kind of when it took off. I guess that’s what happens when you’re friends with a former idol, a couple of current idols (Minami is still having a blast, I see her every now and then when I’m working with Miki, but she’s really busy), and a friend who’s pretty much a musical prodigy. And me, who’s an accomplished musician in my own way, but I have no idea how I got that way. I mean, yes, I’m sure I practiced a lot, but I don’t really remember any of that. Mrs. Doily told me a few things, but it’s still mostly a blank.
Apparently, as spoiled and hard to get along with as I was, I was a studious worker and practiced diligently. Even then I didn’t like to coast, I was just insufferable about it.
But music is important. It’s a language that can pierce all words and run right through your heart in a way that many other things, well, can’t. My piano teacher explained it like this: music is about how it makes you feel. And that’s pretty much it. A composer’s greatest skill is making you feel what they want you to.
Crystal seems to understand that instinctively, and it’s amazing to see.
But I know I talk about it a lot, like I talk about some other things a lot.
I’m starting to wind things down here, emotionally, I mean. I’m leaving soon. In a month, pretty much exactly. I’m going to hop a plane with Yuki and Emiko, and when I get off that plane, I’m going to start a new life, with new friends, new school, new apartment, even a new language. Yuki and I are going to room in an apartment, and she’s going to learn how to do anime voice acting, and I’m going to, well, learn to do whatever it is I’m going to do. We’ll go to the konbini and spend weekends in Akihabara and maybe Yuki will even find a boyfriend and get married someday. And everything I know here, well… kinda won’t be mine anymore. Even when I come back.
Sabby has promised to keep my room the way I left it, but I don’t really believe her. It’s not that I don’t trust her, it’s that it’s a lot to ask. I didn’t even ask.
Liz and Jack are preparing to go off to college too. We’re… we’re all leaving. Leaving each other. Leaving Round Rock. Just… leaving.
I’m glad I’m not taking Jack with me.
It’s not that I don’t want to spend time with him, or even live with him. Of course I do! But if I were to take him with me to Japan, well, he’d have nothing. He can’t speak the language, he’d be pretty much entirely dependent on me, and that’s really no way at all to keep a relationship going, is it? I mean, he’d put on a brave face, and maybe he’d even enjoy himself, but I’d always have that nagging feeling that I’m holding him back… or maybe even that he’s holding me back. I dunno. It’s complicated. People are complicated.
I hope we still feel the same about each other when we graduate. Because if we do and he proposes then, I’ll say “yes, yes, a thousand times yes” like in those stupid fanfictions.
But four years is a long time.
It’s a really long time.
And I think I did hurt him.
But again, what am I to do? Really, what am I to do? I couldn’t not. It’s not like he discussed it with me in advance, he just sprang it on me. He didn’t even talk to his parents. I could have spared his feelings, but at what cost? I know he knows in his mind that it’s the right thing, waiting, I mean, but in his heart?
And I just can’t blame him, I really can’t. I feel awful about it.
But I don’t regret it. It was the right call.
So anyway… I guess things will fall where they may.
Do you think I’d make a good teacher?
Love you all!!! ❤️
From the creator:
The closer I come to ending this, the more at peace I am with it. In fact, I’m kind of looking forward to it. I can’t shake the feeling that this was just a very bad idea all around, but I really don’t know why.
Maybe it’s because almost everyone I’ve ever shown this to hasn’t understood it. I don’t understand why it is that when someone like me writes a story like this and tries to bring a character to life, some people (well, most people, tbh) think it’s some kind of perverted thing. It’s not! I mean, seriously. I’m not trans, and this isn’t some kind of disguised trans cry for help. I’m a guy and I’m at peace with being a guy (though it’s not my favorite thing in this culture). Let me be clear that even if I thought I were trans I’d do nothing about it. Trying to bring my body in line with some kind of nebulous dysphoria would just damage both body and mind more than they’d already be. No, this was bringing a character to life (and in different media and forms), and that’s all it ever was.
(If you’re trans, do whatever. I don’t care. But that’s how I’d feel about if I were, and if that bothers you, go away.)
But some people, let’s be frank, are effing idiots. They see “middle aged guy writes a serial fiction story about a high school aged girl” and suddenly “middle aged guy” is some kind of pervert. Well, that says far, far more about them than me, I think. But it still gets to me. To think that a character that I have put so much time, energy, and frankly love into can be so misunderstood just because the author has male parts… well… it’s depressing. Very depressing. I have, quite literally, lost friends over this, and the very fact that people would do that is amazingly idiotic.
Did I get Lily entirely right? Of course I didn’t. It’s been thirty years or so since I was high school aged, I’m a male, and all I’ve got it my very limited source material that comes from knowing a few girls in my life. It’s all right from my imagination, and that’s probably somewhat wrong. But it’s more right than you’d have any right to expect, don’t you think? I tried to make Lily as realistic a character as I could. But it’s that very search for realism that made people get the wrong idea. And I hate that.
Let’s be honest, I’m a misanthrope. I don’t really like people most of the time. And that kind of thing… is why.
I am seriously debating shutting this site down after I stop writing here. I probably won’t. But it’s very tempting to just forget it ever happened.