KELLY, Declan P.

[Deleted]

D E C L A N P E T E R TWENTY-SIX / VET / HUNTINGTON BEACH ....................................................................... DECLAN IN THE EYES OF HIS MOTHER / CAITLIN KELLY I made mistakes raising my children. Mistakes that even through hours of therapy, pills and years gone by.. have seemed impossible to forgive myself for. Matthew and I were married at just eighteen. Hopelessly in love and at that age - the world seemed so small that us was the only thing that felt sure. We had five children. Declan first, when I was nineteen. Then Hanna, Lou, Jenna and lastly Meredith at thirty. Everyone thought we must be crazy, but we really were so impossibly happy. Impossibly because it wasn't possible something like this could last. We were living in South Carolina when it happened. Matthew was late coming home from work and around 8AM police officers knocked at my door. Hit and run on his motorcycle. His body destroyed so badly they couldn't put it back together. I can still remember it so vividly. Declan was barely twelve and the only one who truly understood what it meant. In those moments I thought he was stronger than me. So brave, such a good son and brother. Taking care of me, his sisters... taking on responsibilities a child shouldn't. It's only in recent years I've realized how unfair that was. I tried to hold it together in South Carolina, but a few months later I had to move in with my mother in Alabama. Things just broke there. I spent days in bed, foggy with depression and grief. My mother and son took care of me and I just stopped trying. I let my only son raise his sisters and eventually that just became expectation. I regret that. I asked Declan to commute to college once he'd graduated and he did that for a couple years. Then one day he just left for Portland. Packed the car full and gave me a hug. I think that was the second most difficult day of my life. ....................................................................... DEAR MALIA Hello from salty Berlin. A place where snide lives and where people yell at you for holding doors open for them. I'm not quite sure how a city so full of non-Germans became so sharply German all the same. Though there are positives - beer is both cheap and good, food is cheap (and mostly good) and there's great nightlife. School is also going well, it's more difficult that home I think. I hope you're well. You're missed over here, I think that if you were here your energy would be infectious and the Germans less keen on being miserable. Maybe we can get you over for Christmas. Tell Grandma I said hi. Love always, - Dec ....................................................................... WHEN DECCY MET LENI The easiest thing about dating abroad is the anonymity of it all. No one fucking knows you. No one knows your trauma. No one knows your pill popping mother. No one knows your dad was decapitated by a Pontiac Sunfire. No one knows of the years you spent pining over a girl you thought was fate. The next easiest thing is dating women in Europe... particularly German woman. Whose meanness somehow makes them sexier, or maybe the sharpness feels matronly. I'm not sure. But after Malia came Leni. Quicker than I thought, probably too quick to let my head wrap around. Just a rebound to take my mind off things, became someone to talk to on the flight to California. Close your eyes and think of the perfect woman. She's tall and thin, somehow with tits. Tan skin, blonde hair, with these honey brown eyes. Now that's Leni. I'm not going to tell you that when I fall asleep, my idea of the perfect woman still haunts the walls of my mind. But I suppose I just did... that statement might make you, "then why did you ask her to marry you?" Because as much as Malina still makes guest appearances in my dreams, Leni and I are happy. We're good to each other. We take care of each other. And while the neighbours might have a few noise complaints against us, most of them are from places of passion. Plus Len loves the American dream and why not help the girl live it?

ciara , connor duermit , resident