Song of my life

Chapter 2: The Second

When I was in elementary school, I was that one girl who could always get away with stuff.  No matter how many kids I beat up, the teachers never noticed and the boys who were on the receiving end of the blows never told because their macho pride wouldn't let them.  That was fine by me.  As long as they knew who was the real alpha of the playground, they could believe whatever deluded things their mind was telling them.

Going back to the alpha thing, like a wolf I was fiercely loyal to my friends and family.  If someone so much as hinted at an insult about them, one of us was going to be heading home with some bruises.  And it was never me.

So that's how I met my first boyfriend, Tommy.  We were at summer camp together the summer before second grade.  See, I had met a really cool boy that I called T-Bone (because of Clifford the Big Red Dog).  He was a quiet boy who loved to read and had a ton of creativity, just the right type for me to take under my wing.  We were constantly being the ones to think up out-of-the-box games, like a version of dragons  versus trolls that was like man hunt, or a game where each of us had the power to turn into horses at will.

One day the entire summer camp was taking a trip to the movies when I heard a loud voice outside the bus I had just boarded.  It was Tommy, yelling at T-Bone.  He was calling him a poopy-head amongst other lame second grade insults.  But it was when I heard Tommy saying that T-Bone couldn't defend himself that I snapped.  I got right off that bus and started yelling back at Tommy.

"Leave him alone you big bully!" I shouted, and did the only thing that came naturally: I got violent.  And sucker-punched him.  In the gut.  He fell over obviously, and that's the story of why I didn't talk to one of my would-be best friends until fifth grade.

If it's serious, I can hold a grudge.  And by hold a grudge I mean really hold a grudge.  Like ice cold never talking kind of grudge.  So that just about sums up how I felt about Tommy until fifth grade.  You can imagine my annoyance when I found out that he was in my fifth grade class! Yup, I was pretty pissed off.  I showed up, geared to grit my teeth and hate him.  But we started talking while waiting for our teacher to show up, and it turned out that we actually had a lot in common.

The best part was he didn't even remember why he hated each other.  To this day he claims it never happened.  Oh well.  Boys will be boys.

I also met a new best friend, Mia.  She was so fun and full of energy, plus she was new to the school.  My bestest best friend, Katie, and I (does that make sense? Oh well- deal with it) adopted her into our friend group.  You know, I actually have Mia to thank for me and Tommy.  She told me that if I saw something I wanted I should go for it.  And so I did.  Kinda.  Well, actually Mia did that for me.

Actually, the way she did it was to get my younger sister to run up to Tommy and I when we were alone and tell Tommy that I liked him, before she ran away screaming.

I wanted to kill her, until he said the magic words: "Abracadabra alacazam!!"

Just kidding, it was "I guess it's true for both of us, then."

That was pretty much one of the only "Awwwwww!" moments of Rommy, as we were named by Mia and Katie.  The other was Valentine's day in sixth grade, when I walked into homeroom to find a red rose on my desk with a note from him wishing me a happy Valentine's day. 

The rest of it was rather awkward, as middle school and elementary school relationships tend to be.  We never went on proper dates or even talked to each other.  In actuality, neither of us could agree on how long we had actually been dating for. He said it was for two years, I said it was for ten months. Go figure.

No matter how weirdly it had gone, I still cried when it was over.  Not only had I lost a good boyfriend to this whole "dating" thing, I had also lost one of my best friends.  The one that I could challenge to video games, that introduced me to my favourite book series for two years when I was ten to twelve (before Percy Jackson took over): Warriors by Erin Hunter. The person who could easily cheer me up when I was feeling blue, who jumped along with me when I was excited.  Stupid relationships, messing everything up.