Clay,
I know how hard it was to listen to your tape after you had already listened to everyone else's. I mean, you were Tape 12 out of 13 tapes. The whole time all you wanted to do was skip to your tape and listen. You tried to give up and pass the tapes on. So many different emotions and feelings happened while you tried to listen to Hannah speaking to you and other people through such an unusual way. I can't imagine how that felt or why you did the things that you did, but I just want to let you know a few things.
First things first, don't blame yourself. So many other things went into the reason why Hannah felt the way she did. It is not your fault. I don't think you could have saved her. Hannah saw too much and people definitely made her feel so worthless. You were the one thing in her life that constantly made her happy, except when you put your foot in your mouth... I mean, that's not necessarily your fault. You didn't know if it was okay to joke about things or not, because you didn't want to upset her.
You have listened to every tape and realized how awful other people were to her. From the people who wrote the list to the people who made up stories and stabbed her in the back. You've heard it all. Now you've heard yours and realize that you may have hurt her the most. As I already said, don't blame yourself. At Jessica's party, she freaked out and in her head, you became every guy who had stabbed her in the back before. You made sure everything was okay before you did it and you tried your hardest to make her feel comfortable, but she couldn't shake the thought of Justin and Marcus who just wanted her to be easy.
The second thing I want you to know is that you really tried to be her friend when no one else talked to her and I know she really appreciated that. Hannah thought she lost everyone, but you were always there to comfort her and talk to her and be her friend. She felt a certain way toward you that she didn't feel toward her other friends. You made her feel special.
The last thing that you need to know, Helmet, is that you cannot love someone back to life. As much as we all wish we could, we can't. The only thing we can do is make sure their legacy lives on in a way that makes sure people know who they really were. So many people are fake about Hannah now that she is dead. Everyone grieves in a different way. They are thinking about all the mistakes they made and how they had a hand in her death. It's okay to grieve. It's okay to be sad, but don't take it out on the people who didn't have a tape. Don't take it out on the people who did have a tape.
Clay, you really were a friend to Hannah. Make sure you don't let her down now. She knows you love her.
