August 4, 1950

Dear you,

My time has come to join you, finally. My vessel was sold for scrap just a few days ago, and I have yet to know when I will be going there. Something feels like it'll be within a month or two at most.

It's strange to think that I've outlived you by so many years when I am seven years your senior. Most of us ships are scrapped by age thirty. I somehow survived for forty-two of them, but that may have been because I was needed. My tools and expertise were. But I'm ready now. I'm obviously a little stirred up, because my body wants to survive, but I'm so tired, I want this to be over. That war was worse than the first. I saw so many things I wish I had never seen and that I'm grateful you've never been exposed to. The first one being salvaging that submarine, knowing she was long gone, but we had to scrap her.

Things have turned out wildly differently from what we imagined, haven't they? That show of yours never saw the light of day, your vessel will remain for centuries in this place that you, that we adored, and where we fell in love, and I'm not going to be moored next to you for the foreseeable future, just turned into regular scrap... but that's alright, because I got to be happy for a while with you by my side. I got to put flowers behind your ears, have you do the same for me, hold your hand, to have your cheek be touched by your fingertips, and to feel your lips on mine. To look into your eyes, your gorgeous eyes that looked like they were made of the lagoon's water, and to hear you say mine were made of the skies high above. To see your bright smile and to know your beautiful heart. We got to walk around the base together and find our happy little place in the islands. To see Pearl City and get lost there for a while. Those times feel so far away...

In a way, it was a good thing that you were in such a dire state that it was clear no one could do a thing to save you. Not that I could have tried anyway with the burns on my arms and the sheer shock of having seen your vessel explode right beside mine. It was crushing enough to see Keosanqua and Ontario try and revive Utah, only to realize she was doomed from the start and wouldn't have lived much longer if they had succeeded in bringing her back. Or Oklahoma, who we're all surprised to have seen survive for so many years, especially since we almost lost her twice on the operating table and many other times when we thought it would soon be over, but who lived those years as a barely conscious shell of her former self. Had it been you, I think I wouldn't have been able to handle it. I would have broken down. I would have been tempted to do something terrible just so you would not suffer.

I'm glad I never even got to put you to sleep and operate on you for real, my dear. I think it would have made me so stressed, even if, like with every patient of mine, I would have told you to just close your eyes, breathe calmly, and think of something you love, that I'd be seeing you soon once it's over. Each time someone's life was in my hands, I was scared, and operating on someone you love is so scary. It's hard enough already on someone you know, no matter if you like them or not. Enterprise, South Dakota, North Carolina, California, West Virginia, Blue, Houston, I could never like those girls, and yet, I did not judge: I cared for them just the same. Hadn't it been for our shared grief over you, I would've never come around to like Nevada either. It's not an easy job by any means, and in a way, I'm relieved that I'll no longer be needed.

We could've sailed the world, you and I. We wouldn't have gone too far, maybe a little around Hawaii, the world doesn't have to be so big. We would've eaten way more pineapple and ice cream than we should've, you would have found a way to combine Hawaiian traditional dances and your stunning aerials, we would've settled around Honolulu and filled our garden with hibiscus bushes as to remember our best moments, and we would've heard the ocean every day. Lulu herself would be happy. I can't believe I'll have to write her a letter to say goodbye, too...

But life happens. Sometimes it decides to be cruel and rip off what we have from our hands in the most brutal way. Sinking ships as they're about to set sail for real. It's no secret I was never able to love someone else as much as I loved you. It was cut short. It remained unfinished. I could never get to something else without having finished what I had started.

Oh, Arizona, our God is one strange individual, but that's part of living, I guess, the chaos of it all. Still, our mooring quays will remain next to each other, even if we will not physically do so. It was by some fluke that our vessels were side by side in the days leading up to the one I lost you. History will remember that. They will not see that we kissed, or that we even could love each other, but does it matter anyway? We'll both become other ships soon enough. This life will just be a memory, maybe not even a conscious one. Who knows who we will be next... but the love, my angel, it will remain.

Aloha wau iāʻoe - I hope I wrote that right, my Hawaiian never really got that good. Please come and bring me flowers when I'll be resting for the last time: you know which ones I'm talking about.

Your Vestal, always.