When the Boy I Wanted Also Wanted Me
My first super crush hit me like a freight train when I was 11 years old. David was a quiet boy in my class, very athletic, very cute and one of the cool popular kids. By contrast, I was an awkward girl with bad hair, thick glasses and bucked teeth. I wasn’t athletic, cool or popular. It’s a wonder I even got past grade 6 because every day was spent pining and admiring David from across a classroom, cafeteria and playground. Sigh. He was so dreamy.
We never said a word to one another but he must’ve known that I was into him. I’m sure the love that hummed from my body like electricity was obvious to everyone. It went on like this for months until one day I realized that if I didn’t tell David how I felt, I would just die of a heart explosion because mine was so full it hurt physically.
Being a brave bold soul, I sent my best friend Terri to profess my love to David for me. I had a 15 minute window of opportunity between the last school bell and my bus leaving so Terri was to run and find my true love, tell him how I felt, find out how he felt, and report back to me. The wait was 15 minutes of pure agony. When Terri finally returned to me she was red-faced, sweaty and panting from her sprints across school. I closed my eyes and braced for rejection.
“What did he say?â€
Terri said nothing. She took my hand, placed something in it, and closed my fingers around it. I opened my hand.
There in my palm was a gold chain with a gold initial pendant. D.
David had sent his chain back for me to wear and his message was loud and clear: He loved me, too. The energy that coursed through me could have lit up the planet.
It was a moment of the purest joy I’ve ever known.
I ran to catch my bus, fastened his chain around my neck and smiled all the way home.
***
David was my boyfriend for about a week, which, in grade 6, is equivalent to (at least) six months. We had a good run.
Hello, friends. Tell me about a time when you experienced joy.
It was such a touching story that I wept, ok not openly, but I wept. Ok, not really wept, but I was planning to. I would have wept if I wasn’t concentrating on the onion that I was cutting.
It was such a great story that you have shared and I shall remember this moment always and will do my best oneday to make fun of you somehow. hehe.
Now, seriously, the world wants to, no, NEEDS to know, Demands to know who and where is this David now? We, I speak for us all, need to know why has he forsaken your love after only a short week. You are my friend so I must tell you this in secret……if you like, I know people that knows “people” who can have a “talk” with our David.
P.s. I think i fell and hit my head right before the previous comment so maybe you might want to hit edit.
You make me ROR, Chef. David is alive and well, married with children. I don’t know why we were only together a week, I think we just both wanted different things. haha.
Oh, what memories of grade-school crushes. I was that studious girl too scared to even give a hint of liking a boy. I blame my mother and catholicism for making my 12-yr-old heart flutter with guilt. i thought many boys were adorable…and in the 7th grade toggled between jacob and mark, both quiet scruffy boys. one day i was deliberately pushed against the locker by a friend of mark’s who tried to intimidate me with “mark likes you”, a mere 2 inches from my face. i closed my eyes in terror and don’t even remember what i said…totally played hard to get and pretended i didn’t care. it was pure joy and guilt for enjoying it so much.